PEP and Summer Reading

Parents and teachers have expressed concerns about the Performance Task component of PEP (Primary Exit Profile), which will replace the Grade 4 Literacy and Numeracy Tests in Jamaican primary and prep schools next year. The mock test was recently administered in grades 4 and 5. The headline in The Gleaner on Tuesday, June 19, 2018  was “Students sail through first day of PEP mock exam.” However, the report didn’t paint such a rosy picture. The main concern was that slow readers would be challenged, and not have sufficient time. Perhaps that test should be given over two sessions, as 70 minutes is a long time for these students to maintain concentration.

In another Gleaner article:  “New placement exam’s success rests on parents – teachers”. Noel Pennant, Principal of Windward Road Primary and Junior High School, opined that it is going to require a massive amount of help from parents. Denise Buchanan, a grade five teacher at the same school, told The Gleaner "All in all, I think PEP is relevant and I like it based on the analysis and what students are required to do. But I am not certain at this time, that they will be able to manage it because it’s overloaded with information."  I too have expressed this opinion several times in my recent blog posts.

In another Gleaner article: “Ministry understands parents’ PEP anxieties” Chief Education Officer, Dr. Grace McLean, assures us that she will continue to disseminate information about PEP, including a full publication with different kinds of questions showing how they are aligned to the curriculum. However, there doesn’t seem to be any allowance for modification of what they have planned based on feedback from teachers and parents, or suggestions that the curriculum should be cut. 

In the meantime, the best way to prepare children for PEP is to ensure that they read plenty of story books of their own choosing. It has been shown that children who read for pleasure during the summer do better in school the following year than those who don’t. I described the research on this in my blog post “SummerReading – Some Surprising Findings”.

The question then arises: “How can parents get hold of plenty of story books and what titles should they select?” I make suggestions in my blog posts on “Books by Jamaican Authors for Children”; “Summer Reading for 8-12 year-olds”; "My picks for Class Libraries"; "1000 Black Girl Books"; and "Children's Books from or about Africa". 

Parents may only be able to afford one book given the amount of money they have to fork out for books on a booklist, but they could get together, each buying one title which they could swap with other parents. Or the children themselves could form a book club and share their books. They should aim to read at least 6 titles over the summer holidays. Books in Carlong’s Sand Pebble Series sell for about J$500 and are available at Sangster’s Book Store. If family members are visiting from abroad, they could be asked to bring books for children also.

Another consideration when choosing books is that if children are forced to read a book they don’t like, or is too difficult for them, they will get turned off and not want to read at all.  For reluctant readers,
  .... a book should be compelling, so interesting that the reader is "lost in the book".

I have this challenge with a 9-year-old boy I mind after school two days a week. When I took him to the library, I picked out about a dozen books I thought might interest him. (The children’s books are arranged in alphabetical order of authors, easy readers to classics all mixed up. There’s little chance reluctant readers will find books to interest them before they get bored looking.) He chose books with lots of pictures, at a lower level than he’s capable of reading, which he could finish in about five minutes. I also took him to Sangsters to choose a book I would buy for him, but he was only interested in the skateboards! I ended up buying him one of the “Diary of a Wimpy Kid books”.

I have tried to encourage him to read “Captain Underpants”; books from the Sand Pebble Series; the Beeny Bud books by Linda Gambrill; and Pinky and Rex Series by James Howe. Two titles in The Magic Tree House Series by Mary Pope Osbourne: “The Hour of the Olympics” and “Night of the Ninjas” were the only ones he found captivating. They were the right length and at a reading level he was comfortable with. There are plenty more books in that series and they are not too culture-bound. If we are to change the reading culture of our children, those of us who are committed to reading will have to persevere with our vision until reading becomes fashionable. You will hear more from me on this topic! 

Calabash 2018 and Poetry in Schools

How we were Lit Up with poetry at Calabash 2018!

 There were poems by women at the height of their greatness from Guyana/UK, USA and Liberia; by Lady Laureates from the UK, USA, Canada and Jamaica; by Fierce Flowers from Sudan, Somalia/UK and Jamaica; by Jamaica’s Ishion Hutchinson; from Kamau Braithwaite’s “The Arrivants”; and plenty more poets reading at the Open Mike. There were poems to appeal to everyone, including me. Thank you to Kwame Dawes, Justine Henzell and the rest of the Calabash team for staging another wonderful festival. 

Lady Laureates: Tracy K. Smith (USA), Carol Ann Duffy (UK)
Georgette LeBlanc (Canada) and Lorna Goodison  (JA).
Photo Courtesy of Susumba

There were prose readings, too, and reasonings and music, but I’m purposefully focusing on poetry. My appreciation of poetry did not begin until 2004 at Calabash. At school, it was slow torture for me to stand in front of the class, unable to recite the poem I knew by heart five minutes before; and exasperation for my mother when English homework was to write a poem with rhyme and meter. For ‘O’ level English Lit, we studied Milton’s “Comus”, of which I have absolutely no recollection. I was glad to say goodbye to poetry. I wonder if children nowadays have similar sentiments.

Linton Kwesi Johnson reading from
Kamau Brathwaite's "The Arrivants".
Photo courtesy of Susumba. 

 In the Gleaner of Thursday, July 13, 2017, section C, Lorna Goodison is quoted as saying:  “Though I had a wonderful education at St. Hugh’s, I was not taught any poetry by a Jamaican …writer. Things have changed drastically since then.” They may have in secondary schools, but what of the primary schools?

In perusing Rainbow Readers – A Jamaican Reading Series, Grade Four, by Roma Sinanan and Uriel Narinesingh, I found twenty-two poems. Only one of these is by a Jamaican – Andrew Salkey. There are fourteen by Caucasians, eight men and six women, from the USA or the UK, born before 1910; one Indian (Rabindranath Tagore, 1861-1941); one First Family American woman (born in 1896); and one African American (Langston Hughes, 1902-1967). About the remaining four poets, three women and one man, I can find out very little. I presume are contemporary, Caucasian, because of the subject matter of their poems.

Furthermore, in the selected poem by Langston Hughes, “Aunt Sue’s Stories”:

“Aunt Sue cuddles a brown-faced child …and tells him stories”

“And the dark-faced child listening…” knows the origin of the stories, which are about slavery. How would twenty-first century nine-year-olds react to such a poem?

Why are there no poems by Lorna Goodison herself, or Claude McKay, Mervyn Morris, Edward Baugh, Velma Pollard, Olive Senior, Kwame Dawes, Kei Miller, Louise Bennett, Jean Binta Breeze or any other Jamaican poet? It is sad that most of the poems fourth grade students will read were written by poets who lived so far away and long ago. 

Calabash Bay, Treasure Beach - Festival Venue in the distance.
2012 photo by HumphreyWallis

The Calabash Literary Festival, which takes place in Treasure Beach, St. Elizabeth, Jamaica, succeeds in being "The greatest little festival in the greatest little village, in the greatest little parish, in the greatest little country in the world." Its authors, patrons and audience come from all over the world. I wonder how many primary school children in Jamaica have heard of it. Perhaps all of us who have enjoyed Calabash over the years should, in addition to becoming patrons, pay back by taking the message of Calabash into primary schools by reading both poetry and prose in these schools and donating books to class and school libraries.

Reflections on Jamaica’s Primary Exit Profile (PEP)

Jamaica’s Primary Exit Profile (PEP) is being introduced to replace the Grade Six achievement Test (GSAT). In theory, it is not a pass/fail assessment, but in practice, as was GSAT, given the disparity between secondary schools,that is what it will be. As I said in my blog post of April 2012, “Reflections on GSAT” It is the pressure to perform to get into ‘brand-name schools’ which puts so much stress on the students and their parents.

It is claimed that under PEP emphasis will be placed on project-based and problem-solving learning, with Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics/ Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Mathematics (STEM/STEAM) integrated at all levels. The approaches will allow the learners to have hands-on experiences that are similar to real-world situations, making the learning experience less abstract and more concrete.

However, many concerns have been raised about PEP. On Wednesday, April 4, 2018, Dionne Jackson-Miller of TVJ’s All Angles hosted a panel from the Ministry of Education to discuss PEP. The panel consisted of Dr. Grace McLean, Chief Education Officer; Stacy Witter-Bailey, Assessment Officer in Mathematics; and Terry-Ann Thomas-Gayle, Manager of Students’ Assessment Unit. The general public was invited to participate via Twitter, Facebook and text messages.

Members of the public were greatly concerned about class size. With as many as fifty children in a class, teachers are hard pressed to implement the methodologies required by PEP. Dr. Grace McLean, Chief Education Officer, said that the teacher/pupil ratio has been reduced to 1:25, and that no classes should have more than 25 students. My question is this: Where are you going to put them? I know of a school in Montego Bay with approximately 1200 students. There are 6 grades with 4 streams, equivalent to 24 classes of approximately 50 children in 24 classrooms. You might be able to employ the teachers, but they would have to share classrooms, which are already overcrowded. Is this feasible?

An underpopulated school in
Mount Vernon, St. Thomas 2011 

One of the main problems for schools throughout Jamaica is that parents opt to send their children to the big urban schools, often by-passing rural schools. Referring to my blog post of September, 2011, Class Size and the Teaching of Reading, in two deep rural All Age Schools, the total enrolments were 40 and 45, and there were 3 teachers, each teaching 3 grade levels. At the other end of the scale was a school in the heart of an urban area, with a total enrollment of 1,720 and a ratio of 37:1. This school has a 6-stream entry, with about 48 children per class, for which 36 teachers would be required. With the stated ratio of 37:1, the school could employ 46 teachers. Why not a 7-stream entry? Because there was no space—all the classrooms were occupied.

One of my main concerns is that the curriculum is overloaded with too much content. Take for example the sense organs studied in Grade 4, Term 2, unit 1. I would have thought it sufficient for children to observe their eyes in a mirror and identify the parts they can see. They would unlikely to be able to determine their functions on their own, but would be able to understand them when told. I think it’s totally unnecessary for them to draw and study a section of the eye and learn the functions of the parts. That is certainly not a concrete activity. 9-year-olds do not have the mentally capacity to conceptualize the internal structure.

 Furthermore, this will be taught again in high school. In addition, the curriculum specifically states that the children should learn the terms cornea, iris, pupil, lens, retina and optic nerve only, but in their work book the sclera, choroid, rods and cones are also included! I think the terms cornea, iris and pupil are quite sufficient at this level. Care of the eyes is very important, but surely it doesn’t make sense to expound on the types of lenses needed to correct long and short sight. We are getting into CXC Biology topics here.

Similarly, at this level it is not necessary for children to learn the internal structure of the ear. The senses of smell and taste, and sensations felt by the skin lend themselves well to investigation by children, but it is unnecessary for them to identify parts on a diagram of a section of the skin. The time frame in which these topics are to be covered is very tight, allowing no time for re-teaching, review or helping less able children. My recommendation is that there should be a core curriculum with enrichment activities for the more able children.

This brings me to the most deleterious effect of large class size and overloaded curriculum. The less able children get left behind and end up learning very little. In 2017, 15% of the children failed to achieve mastery in the Grade 4 Literacy Test; and 40% in the Numeracy Test. In an article in The Gleaner on Monday, February 5, 2018: “To really fix education”, the Rev. Ronald Thwaites addressed this problem. He cited an example of a school of a school where the grade-four teachers report that only one-third of their students habitually do homework and only half came into their grade cognitively, emotionally and socially ready for this higher standard. The same teachers and their principal, all well-trained, dedicated and, in two instances, professionally acclaimed, report having to spend up to 40 per cent of class time trying to keep order, to induce children to stop talking, and to attract their sustained attention.

He asserted: “Promotion of underachieving students without satisfactory remediation is both folly and cruelty to all concerned. All we are doing is cascading the problem to the higher grades and, ultimately, to the national scene.” Does he recommend that these children not be promoted to higher grades?

In my opinion, this is not the solution. Why have these children been allowed to reach the end of Grade 4, barely being able to read? One reason is that the teachers in grades 1-3 had to get through the curriculum with large classes which allowed for no individual attention. The children who are not keeping up lose interest and motivation, hence act up. If the focus in grades 1-3 was not to complete the curriculum, but to ensure that all the children acquired basic literacy and numeracy skills, we would be in a better position. One teacher cannot listen to 50 children reading individually, but the children can listen to and help each other. This presents an opportunity for children to work in groups, and to introduce a spirit of volunteerism. To keep the above average children occupied, they can be given enrichment activities. They can also be allowed to read story books. The best way of encouraging children to improve their reading is to have an ample supply of suitable books. In many classes in Jamaica, there are no story books at all.  

This brings me to another concern, why is PEP being introduced at Grade 4, by which time children have been programmed to learn by rote? Why not introduce hands-on project based learning in Grade 1? Perhaps had this been done, the less able children would not have been so turned off education. There would have been something in it for them.
If you are in agreement with what I have said here, please add your voice to those clamouring for change.

 

 

 

We are teaching children, not the curriculum!