PROPOSAL FOR
THE SENSITIZATION OF PARENTS, PUPILS, TEACHER ON AFLATOUN AND EMBEDDING, OF
IDENTIFIED LOCAL SKILLS IN THREE(3) SCHOOLS IN THREE LOCAL GOVERNMENT AREAS IN
EBONYI STATE.
(PCR4 1R. 2.1)
SCALING UP OF AFLATOUN
Background/Introduction:
Aflatoun as a concept refers
to explorer. It also refers to plato, the great Greek philosopher, who is known
for his ideas on ethics, citizenship, social justice, respect, conservation,
friendship and love. The name Aflatoun was chosen by children who first participated
in the program in India
and the character a little fire ball from out space, is based on a Bollywood
movie they liked. It was created to lead children through their learning
journey and help to create emotional attachment between children and the program
materials. Aflatoun postulates that all children have the potential to be
agents of change in their own lives and that of others when inspired and given
the opportunity to act and think independently.
Aflatoun
builds on three building blocks namely. The concept of balancing social and
financial education, the program itself which brings the concept to the
children in the best and most efficient way and the network consisting of the
implementing partners such as donors, financial institutions, NGOs governmental
institutions academia and research institution. The concept has five core
elements that encapsulate the aflatoun concept of child social and financial
Education. They include: personal understanding and exploration, right and
responsibilities, saving and spending, planning and budgeting and child
enterprise (social and financial). The aflatoun program is anchored on the
believe that children are quite entrepreneurial, therefore if properly guided,
they should be able to understand their self-worth, rights and be able to
manage their own resources. The aflatoun philosophy is in tune with the overall
objective of basic education in Nigeria,
which is aimed at imparting a functional knowledge and skills (vocational and
life) to those that submit themselves to it (FRN 2004). It helps to complement
the effort currently made by government in introducing entrepreneurial
education in basic education program in Nigeria. Entrepreneur education on
the other hand is aimed at bringing about quality in basic education. To embraces
provision of life-long skill-based education that enables children to acquire
the relevant knowledge and “know-how” to adapt and develop in any society.
Entrepreneurial education is crucial in meeting contemporary challenges in the
society today. This is because it will go a long way to address the issue
ofgraduate unemployment in the society as graduate of our educational system at
all levels will finish schools and have idea of the type of enterprise to go
into. This is contrary to the current practice where school leavers wait on
government to provide the non-existing white colar jobs.
Aflatoun
program will also work suitably in a society like Ebonyi, which is considered
less developed than other sister states. The state is still lagging behind in
areas such as education, economy, politics e.t.c. The aflatoun program is also
aimed at achieving the UN convention on the rights of the child (CRC). It will
also help to achieve the millennium development goals (MDG). MDG is a UN
instrument for development and eradication of poverty. It therefore means that
aflatoun is most suitable for a state like Ebonyi where there are people who
live in extreme poverty. This is the reason why most basic school aged Ebonyi
children are found in big cities like Lagos, Port Harcourt, Onitsha, Calabar,
Benin, etc hawking instead of remaining in schools. Their parents prefer to
withdrew them from schools and send them away to earn a living due to the fact
that after school, the children do not acquire skills that will help them earn
a living in life. The Aflatoun program will help to reverse this ugly
impression in the mind of these illiterate parents. It will restore confidence
in the system. It will also impart the relevant skills in them that will enable
them break the cycle of poverty which the current get-rich-quick syndrome has
entrenched the people. This is obvious as the children will not only learn
about entrepreneurial education but will also learn about saving culture. This
is lacking in the current educational system which places much emphasis on the
cognitive development, leaving out the psychomotor. This is the season why this
proposal is been made to the state planning commission (SPC) for funding as it
will help establish a pilot aflatoun schools in each of the thirteen LGAs of
Ebonyi State. The impact will be numerous as the program addresses the
fundamental challenge in the state.
Statement of
Need
In some states in UNICEF ‘A’ field office, most
especially in Ebonyi State, parents prefer to send their wards to roadside
vocational skills centres or big cities to learn trade or hawk rather than
allowing them remain in school until completion (UNICEF 2001). The reasons for
this amongst others include their believe that formal school system as it is now
is a gross waste of children’s time. Children currently complete basic
education but are unable to acquire relevant skills to earn a living in life.
They rater are financially dependent on their parents. Moreover, when the
children earn money, they do not know how to prudently utilize it. This shows
that the school is still incapable of preparing the children to face the real
challenges of life. Therefore the school is not meeting the real needs of
children. Aflatoun has come to reverse this trend. Although there is
government’s current drive in introducing entrepreneurial education in the
school system, but nobody can vouch that, the content of the curriculum takes
care of all aspect of the challenges that have eroded the confidence of the
society on basic education. This is the reason why this proposal is being made
as it will help to address all the aspects of short comings in basic education.
It will help to break the cycle of poverty that is currently ravaging the
citizens of Ebonyi Sate, which has made them be classified as less developed
state in Nigeria.
Planned
Results:
* Children acquire skill-based education and utilize them for
their proper functioning in life.
* There will be break in the cycle of poverty in the state as
children will acquire saving and investment skills.
* Children act as change agents in the society by acting as
advocates of conservation, child rights, friendship, and social justice e.t.c.
Methodology
In a bid to institutionalize the practice, the
following are activity to be carried out in each of the schools to be selected:
1. Sensitization
of pupils
2. Sensitization
of teachers
3. Training of pupils on identification of local skill of
interest and embedding it.
4. Sensitization
of parents on aflatoun in order to win their support.
There will be paper presentation brains storming and
group work
Target
Audience
The target audiences are the children who are the
primary beneficiary of the program.
PROPOSAL ON A
TWO (2) DAY LOCAL GOVERNMENT AREA BASED TRAINING/WORKSHOP FOR TEACHERS ON
SCHOOL BASED TEACHER DEVELOPMENT (SBTD) IN THREE LOCAL GOVERNMENT AREAs IN
EBONYI STATE (PCR 4, IR, 1.3) SCALING UP OF SBTD IN EBONYI.
Background/Introduction
The school-based Teacher Development is an approach
to in-service teacher education (INSET) using carefully prepared materials for
training, self-instruction and development of enabling skills for reflective
practice. It is a cost effective teacher capacity development approach which
encourages teachers to adopt activity-based methodology in the classroom. It is
delivered through a school-based approach, which allows the teacher to benefit
from professional development opportunities while continuing to teach full time
in the classroom.
Teachers’
interaction opportunities on the program are offered through school based and
cluster meetings. At the school-based meeting, teachers will have the
opportunity to interact with their peers and mentors for support and also to
share experiences.
The
cluster meetings get teachers from various schools together so that issues at
cluster level could be tabled and discussed with the support of Master trainers
(MTS) at a teachers’ forum. The programme offers a model for delivery of
continuing professional development which not only changes classroom practice
but is also cost effective.
Data
and statistics from survey and research show that out of the 10 million children
out of school in Nigeria,
62% are girls. Researchers have shown that one of the reasons for this is the
low teacher quality, poor teaching and gender insensitive child friendly
teaching methodologies among others (FME 2011). SBTD seeks to address the lack
of professional development opportunities for basic education teachers in
general, specifically support government’s intentions as expressed in the draft
Education sector plan and Education Road MAP (FME 2009). It comprises
self-instructional modules and training packaged teaching resources to support
the school-based INSET, gender sensitivity and modalities to ensure
cost-effective system.
It
consists of a core pedagogy professional development module and four subject
specific modules covering the application of an active pupil-centred and
participating methodology in the teaching of Basic Science and technology;
English, mathematic and social studies.
Following
participation in the programme, teachers in the LGEAs will be able to plan and
organize activities that will promote active teaching in their learners and
will be able to reflect and improve on their practice; promoting active
learning will result in a more child-centred approach in teaching and learning.
The
biggest set back to effective implementation of the basic education programe in
Nigeria
and Ebonyi State in particular is the absence of a
well co-ordinated in-service teacher training program that engages all the
serving teachers in the state. In-service program for teachers is very vital and
remains the pivot for improved teachers practice. This is because teachers
still need constant retraining after their graduation from teacher training
institutions to enable them perform effectively. Constant retraining program is
needed in an educationally less
developed state like Ebonyi, to enable the teachers develop the skills to
impart the right knowledge that enables the Ebonyi children catch up with other
educationally developed ones. One way of providing this continuous professional
Development for teachers at the basic education level in the state is the
school based teacher Development programme. This is the reason why this
proposal is being made. It will help to synergize the knowledge which the
teachers had acquired in other retraining programme earlier organized for them
and the knowledge they acquired in their teacher training institution.
Statement of
need/Justification
In Ebonyi State
which was created from Enugu
and Abia states in 1997, there is glaring lack in teacher proficiency. This is
to say that teachers capacity development is low. The worst aspect is that
there is no well co-ordinate teacher development packages. Furthermore, there
is also no in-service training programmes for teachers. The ones organized by
the Universal Basic Education Board through the assistance of Universal Basic
Education Commission, and donor agencies such as UNICEF is sometime haphazard,
atomistic and irregular. As a result of the above short comings, the objectives
of improving the teachers capacity are not achieved. Secondly, the method is
not cost effective nor is it continuous. It does not also cover all the
teachers in the state. But SbTD targets every teacher and is a continuous
teacher capacity development process.
What
the SbTD methodology requires is the right political will by education
stakeholders. Indeed, if it is given the needed support, SbTD will greatly
enhance the capacity of teachers in the basic education sector. This is why
this proposal is being made. If it is approved and implemented and thereafter
supported it will go a long way to enhance the capacity of teachers in the
state.
SbTD
is most suitable for professional capacity development of teachers in Ebonyi
state, because there is acute shortage of teachers in the basic school system,
as such the few available ones cannot be lost by allowing them to undertake a
full time teacher in service training INSET), this will deplet the system the
more. It is hoped that if this activity is supported and implemented, it will
help to fill the current existing gap created by the non-existence of well
organized, coordinated and systematically implemented in-service teacher
training program.
Methodology
Due
to the crucial nature of this training and in a bid to ensure a greater
coverage the training workshop will be LGA based. Three LGAs will be selected
with one LGA drawn from each of the three educational zones of the state. To
achieve the full objectives of the training, both plenary and group sessions
will be used. The resource person drawn from the state college of Education who
have earlier in 2011 been trained by UNICEF will be the resource persons. At
the end of the training the participants will be divided into clusters, so that
they will train other teachers.
Planned
Results
* A
frame work for gender sensitive INSET developed.
* Availability of a modality that supports teacher with self
learning module and training packages/teaching resources that support school
based professional development in place.
* Cost
effective system of in-service teacher education in place.
Sustainability
It is going to be sustained as both the ministry and
UBEB are already appreciating the need to put in place a training package of
this form. The absence has impacted negatively on the system.