UWEZO TANZANIA NATIONAL ASSESSMENT 2012

Uwezo Tanzania is affiliated to:

TWAWEZA/HIVOS TANZANIAUluguru StreetP.O Box 38600Dar es Salaam

E mail: Tanzania@ uwezo.net

Acknowledgement: Some of the content is adopted from ASER and Uwezo-Kenya

Volunteer Training Manual

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Table of contentTable of content ................................................................................................................................................................ 2

Introduction ....................................................................................................................................................... ................

Chapter 1: Introducing Uwezo.... 5

Chapter 2: Visiting the Village Chair .7

Chapter 3: Visiting the Primary School .9

Chapter 4: Visiting the Households...11

Households to be included in the survey........................................................................................................12 Houses not to be included in the survey.......................................................................................................... 12

Chapter 5: Literacy and Numeracy Assessment .................................................................................................................17

Chapter 6: Giving Feedback 19

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INTRODUCTION

Greetings to our esteemed Uwezo Tanzania volunteers!

This week, you have enrolled your name to the list of more than 70,000 heroes in Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda, Mali, India and Pakistan, ordinary citizens standing tall to promote education in their villages.

You are now among the over 8,000 dedicated volunteers who will walk in over 3,990 villages in Tanzania, assessing more than 125,000 children aged 7-16 years in literacy and numeracy. Your role is a noble one, your commitment is worth admiration!

You have left your work, to join this team as a volunteer, for no pay, because you believe in education. You are

now volunteering your time and energy, for the sake of the children in your village. Truly, you are a hero. Uwezo Tanzania welcomes you and thanks you, for wanting to become a partner in promoting learning.

For you to make most impact as a volunteer, you need to do five things:

1. Concentrate on the training, and make sure you get all the skills needed to test children and conduct the Uwezo survey

2. Conduct the survey and assessment as accurately and truthfully as possible, so that you can know the status of learning in your village, and the country can be informed about the status of learning

3. During the household visits, give instant feedback to all parents and guardians as carefully as possible, as per the Uwezo assessment procedure

4. Ensure that you remain with a copy of the village compilation sheet (you can note the findings in a notebook). Discuss the findings with the chief, village elder, parents and leaders in your community. Request to discuss the findings in barazas, village meetings, school meetings and religious meetings – let everyone know the status of learning, so that they can do something to improve it

5. Be active! Participate in discussions or on radio, facebook and other forums where the status of learning is being discussed. Identify yourselves as a volunteer, who stands up to be counted, promoting learning in Tanzania.

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I wish you all the best as you start off. Remember, your responsibility as Uwezo volunteer does not end with the assessment we are just about to conduct, but rather, it starts with the assessment.

Please get in touch with us, if you want to contribute anything to the ongoing discussions, or you want to let us know about what is happening in your village, there are several ways you can share your ideas with us.

You can send your comments to: UWEZO Tanzania, P.O Box 38600, Daressalaam, Plot 550A,Uluguru Street, Upanga area.

Also, find us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/uwezotz find us at www.uwezo.net or e-mail us at Tanzania@uwezo.net; or text ‘Uwezo’ to SMS to +255 784 984 777. Good luck!

Yours,

Zaida MgallaCountry CoordinatorUwezo Tanzania

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Chapter1:

1.1 Introducing Uwezo

What is Uwezo East Africa?

Uwezo East Africa is a four-year initiative that conducts annual assessments in basic literacy and numeracy in Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania. Uwezo Tanzania carried out its first assessment in March 2010.

The first Tanzanian assessment covered 40 districts. In each district, 30 villages were randomly sampled. In each village, all children aged between 5 and 16 years in 20 households were assessed in English and Kiswahili literacy and numeracy.

Uwezo East Africa is now entering its third year, and each country is covering a larger number of districts than in its first and second year. For Uwezo Tanzania, that means conducting assessments in 133 districts.

One of the key features of Uwezo is its collaborative spirit. In order to live up to this key feature, Uwezo Tanzania has identified organisations, institutions and individuals across the country to partner with in conducting the survey and communicating the findings to the key actors and stakeholders with keen interest in the performance of education sector.

What is Uwezo trying to achieve?

The specific objectives Uwezo seeks to achieve within a period of 4 years are to:

1. Develop and promote a simple broad-based method to assess school age children’s competencies, particularly in literacy and numeracy;

2. Obtain reliable and comprehensive data that can inform on learners’ competencies at national and district level;

3. Disseminate the information in a comprehensive and simple manner that can be understood by parents, the public and the government; and

4. Raise the issue of learning outcomes to the forefront of the public debate.

Review

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1. For how many years has Uwezo been conducting learning assessments in East Africa?

2. What is Uwezo’s purpose?

3. How many districts in Tanzania will the 2012 assessment cover?

4. Name one key feature of Uwezo?

1.2. Timeline of UWEZO activitiesThe following timeline will help you gain an overview of the tasks ahead; the remainder of this manual will then go into detail regarding each of the steps.

Days Activity People Involved Tuesday- Wednesday District Training for Volunteers District Coordinators and Volunteers

Thursday Volunteers travel back to their villages Volunteers

Friday Data Collection Day 1: In the morning visit village/ Mtaa office. Introduce yourself and the purpose of your visit to the Village/ Mtaa chairperson and fill in the village data form. There after Collect data from school.

Volunteers

Saturday Data Collection Day 2: Visit 20 sampled households and assesses all the children in these households between the ages of 7 and 17. (Ch. 5-8)

Volunteers

Sunday Data Collection Day 3: Finalise data collection in households, cross check your forms for correctness and Return data books to District Coordinators.

Volunteers

IMPORTANT THINGS TO CONSIDER WHEN DOING THE ASSESSMENT

1. Dressing: Ensure that your dress and behaviour are culturally appropriate.2. Consent: You must obtain verbal consent from all participants for their desire to participate in

the assessment. This includes consent from each child. Parental consent is not a substitute for a child’s consent

1. Transparency: Ensure that everyone is informed of the purpose of the research: “Why we are doing the research? What data are required? How data will be collected & used?

2. Gifts: Politely refuse offers of gifts.3. Promises: Do not make any promises to children or parents that you cannot fulfil.4. Do not judge: Do not point out mistakes to children or adults. Do not judge any information

provided. Do not act as a teacher

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Chapter 2: Visiting the Village Chairperson

After the volunteer training has finished, you will be returning to your district. You will begin your data collection on Friday morning with a visit to the village chair. You should present your research permits to the chair and introduce yourselves and Uwezo.

Completing the Village Survey Form

After introducing yourselves and Uwezo, you will complete the Village Form through your conversation with the chair. The Village Form contains 18 questions, arranged in four categories:

V1- V9: These questions address the number of people in the village and the level of available services.

V10- V12: These questions ask about schools. For pre-primary, primary and secondary, enter the number of government and non-government schools.

V13- V15: Ask about roads. Enter information on the road quality and travel to district headquarters.

V16-V19: Ask about communication with UWEZO, and other NGOs. Finally, ask the Mtaa/Village chair person if she/he was familiar with Uwezo prior to your visit.

After completing the form, you are ready to visit the primary school.

Let’s Practice

In pairs, practice completing the village form with one person playing the role of the village chair person and one person playing the role of the volunteer.

Population & Facilities/services

Schools

Transportation

Uwezo Communication

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Review:

1. Did you manage to complete the Village Chair form accurately?

2. What challenges did you observe?

3. How can those challenges be avoided?

REMEMBER!

THINGS TO LEAVE AT THE VILLAGE/ MTAA OFFICEBefore you leave the Village after data collection make sure you give the local leader with the following:

a) UWEZO flier, b) Calendar

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Chapter 3: Visiting the Primary School

You will visit one primary school in your village. If there is more than one primary school, you should select the largest. You will speak with the head teacher and present her/him with their research permits. After introducing yourselves and Uwezo, you will ask for consent to fill out the School Survey form.

The first 37 questions on the School Survey form are to be answered by the head teacher or the assistant head teacher if the head teacher is not available. The final four questions are for the volunteers to answer through your own observation in walking around the school. If the head teacher refuses to answer a question, write XX in the answer space. If the head teacher does not know an answer, write YY. If the question is not applicable write NN.

Head Teacher’s Bio Data S1-S9 detail the head teacher’s experience and training. Use the coding instructions to fill in the blanks.

Pupil Enrolment S10-S13 ask for male/female/total enrolment among the pupils

School Information S14-S19 relate to any outside projects (such as the Children’s Book Project) that may be at the school, as well as school inspection, the type of school and the presence of the academic committee and school baraza/student board

Teachers S20-S21 ask for the number of teachers in pay role and by gender

Teacher-Pupil attendance S22-S25 ask for attendance. For S24, write the total number of children present each day of the current week.

Resources S26 asks for the amount of capitation grant received in 2011/2012, broken down by amount and date received.

Facilities S27-S35 ask about school facilities, including textbooks, lunches and toilets.

Communication S36-S37 ask about communication with UWEZO. This will help evaluate Uwezo’s communication strategy by determining if the head teacher is familiar with the initiative.

Other activities S38– Observing Pupils attendance: Volunteers will go to one class for each standard and count the number of children present, as well as noting the total number that are enrolled by asking the teacher.

Observation by data collectors S39-Textbook Availability: For Standards 1-3, while checking attendance for question S38 also ask pupils whether or not they have English, Kiswahili and Numeracy textbooks.

-do- S40- School Library: If there is a library, go there and record observations on the books and register.

-do- S41 – Teacher Attendance: 15 minutes after the start of a period/lesson, see how many classrooms are without teachers.

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Review

1. What information must you collect from the head teacher?

2. What should you do if the head teacher is unavailable?

Let’s Practice

In pairs, practice completing the School data form with one person pretending to be the head teacher.

Questions

1. Did you manage to complete the School Data Form Accurately?

2. What challenges did you observe?

3. How can those challenges be avoided?

REMEMBER!

THINGS TO LEAVE AT THE SCHOOLBefore you leave the School after data collection make sure you give the Head Teacher the following:

c) Teachers’ posterd) UWEZO flier, e) Calendar

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Chapter 4: Visiting the Households

Visiting the Households.

Volunteers will have the list of 20 randomly sampled households and 5 replacement households that you created with the help of the village chief. As the volunteers conduct the assessment, they must determine when to exclude a household and use a replacement household instead. The following is a summary of the houses to be included in the survey and for those not to be included in the survey.

REMEMBER!

In every household, ask about all children in the age group of 7 to 16.

Households not to be included in the survey

3. Houses that are closed

4. Household that refuse to participate in the survey

5. Houses where there are children but there is no adult to give consent for

Households to be included in the survey

1. Household with inhabitants even if there are no children between the ages of 7-16 years

2. Household where the inhabitant is a single man or woman so long as they

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NO CHILDREN: If there are no children in the age group 7 – 16 in a household but there are inhabitants, INCLUDE THAT HOUSEHOLD in the sample of 20 households. Record relevant information like name of head of the household, and total number of members of the household. Such a household WILL COUNT as one of the 20 surveyed households in the village.

HOUSE CLOSED: If the selected house is closed or if there is nobody at home, note that down on your compilation sheet as “house closed”. THIS HOUSEHOLD DOES NOT COUNT AS A SURVEYED HOUSEHOLD. DO NOT INCLUDE THIS HOUSEHOLD IN THE SURVEY SHEET. Move to the next sampled household. Please indicate on the village list the new household that has been selected and surveyed (from the five extra).

REFUSAL: If a household refuses to participate, note that down on your compilation sheet as “No response”. However, as above, THIS HOUSEHOLD DOES NOT COUNT AS A SURVEYED HOUSEHOLD. DO NOT INCLUDE THIS HOUSEHOLD IN THE SURVEY SHEET. Move on to the next sampled house. Please indicate on the village list the new household that has been selected and surveyed.

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What to do at the household?

Follow these steps for each household you visit:

6. When you go to a household, first confirm that it is the correct household as listed in your Sampling List.

7. Introduce yourself to the members of that household if you are not familiar to them. Get verbal consent of the head to participate in the exercise. Proceed only if permission is granted. Move on to the next household in the list if permission is not granted.

8. Members of the household may or may not invite you into the house. If you are not invited inside do not insist on carrying out the survey in the house. Look for a comfortable place outside to sit.

9. Talk to them about Uwezo and the reasons for your visit. Ask for permission to survey that particular household. It is only after you are given permission that you can begin to take details of the household beginning with the official name of the head of the household.

10. In the form Sampled Household Summary Sheet fill in the name of the head of the household, the sex, number of all the people in the household (people eating from the same pot – remember!) and the total number of children between the ages of 7 to 16.

11. Ask about children between the age of 7 – 16 years and request for permission to test them.

12. In every household, one of the volunteers should take the lead in testing the children while the other one should be recording the information. The only exception to this is if there are many household members who crowd around the child being assessed and interfere with the assessment. In such a case, then one of the volunteers should engage the other household members away from the child who is being assessed.

13. When testing the child, be careful about seating arrangement. Do not sit on a chair while the child is on the floor. This will create unnecessary inequality.

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Completing the Household Form

Once you have spoken with the head of household and determined that this household will be included in the 20 required households, it is time to complete the Household Survey form. The form has two main sections. Questions HH1-HH37 are for the head of household, and Questions HH38-HH53 are for each child between the ages of 7-16 (some may need their parents’ help in answering the questions.)

1. Questions for Head of Household: Questions HH1-HH37ask for basic data about the household. If the respondent does not want to answer any of the questions, code a XX and move to the next question.

2. Questions for Children: Questions H37-H51 ask for data on the children, including their schooling and their parents’ education. Young children in particular may need assistance from their parents in answering some of the questions. From H52, give the child the assessment, which is covered in the following chapters of this manual. Questions H52-H64 give you guidance on how to grade a child on literacy (Kishwahili and English) and numeracy levels reached while questions H65-H67 are for the bonus question. After the assessment, then move on to the next child. If there are not enough spaces for each child on the form, use another form and indicate that it is a continuation of the current household by using the same Household number – you do not need to repeat the head of household information.

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Children who are not at home but somewhere in the village

1. Often children are busy working in the household or in the fields. If the child is in the village, but not at home, take down information about the child, like name, age, and schooling status.

2. Ask family members to call the child so that you can speak to her/him directly. If s/he does not come immediately, mark that household and revisit it once you are done with surveying the other households.

Children out of the village 3. If there are children in the family but who are not present in the village on the day of the visit, do not take their details.

Children visiting the house 4. Do not survey or test children who are visiting their relatives or friends in the sampled village or household.

5. Many children may come up to you and want to be included out of curiosity. Do not discourage children who want to be tested. You can interact with them. But concentrate on the fact that data must be noted down ONLY for children from households that have been randomly selected.

Out of school children who are not currently in school

6. Probe carefully to find out the class in which the child was in when he/she left/dropped out of school.

7. Note the drop out class/form irrespective of the fact whether the child passed or failed in that class.

Speaking with Children

Two categories of children may be found in a household

(a) Children to be tested (ages 7-16)

(b) Children not to be tested but still to be included in the total number of household members (ages 0-6).

Make the difference clear between an out of school child/dropout and school age child who has completed primary education.

14. A dropout is a child who did not complete seven years of education) or secondary education (Form four). They left/dropped out somewhere in the middle.

15. An out of school child could either be a dropout or had never enrolled in school in the first place.

16. A child who completed Std. 7 but did not proceed to secondary is NOT considered

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Review

1. What are the first things you should do at each household?

2. Which households need to be replaced with replacement households?

3. Which children should you assess?

Let’s Practice

As a group, brainstorm different scenarios that the volunteer might encounter. Which households should be included or replaced? Which children should be assessed?

Questions

1. Was UWEZO and its objectives well introduced?

4. Was the HH form completed appropriately?

5. What challenges did you observe?

6. How can those challenges be avoided?

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Chapter 5: Literacy and Numeracy Assessment

Beginning the Assessment

It is important to be in the right frame of mind when assessing children. We are not going to the village to “test” children or to be evaluators. We are going to find out what children can do comfortably in terms of reading and numeracy.

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Mistakes

1. As you listen to children read, there may be variations in children’s reading due to local pronunciation or usage. Do not consider this a mistake. Usually if a child is told to read again carefully, s/he will read again and in most situations does not make these mistakes.

2. A child may read the word wrong or skip a word. As with the case above, if told to read again carefully, either s/he reads correctly or s/he continues to make the same mistake.

3. If despite reading the same text several times, the child continues reading a word wrong or not reading it at all, this is treated as a “mistake” and this means that the child is having difficulty in reading that level.

4. In a paragraph, if a child makes 3 or more “mistakes” of this type then s/he cannot be considered a “sentence” child. Similarly in the reading of a story.

Review

1. Where should you start in the literacy assessment?

2. How many attempts should you give a child to read the story?

1. Note:2. When conducting the assessments, we are not simply waiting to catch mistakes.

Appreciate and understand the attempt that the child is making. Encourage the child. Be patient. Give the child ample time to read, to solve and to think.

2. It is essential that children are relaxed and not worried about how they are going to perform. If at any stage you feel that the child is getting stressed, stop the questioning or the assessment. You can restart the questioning only after the child feels relaxed. A friendly chat with the child prior to testing always helps to make friends and create a more relaxed atmosphere.

3. Our attempt in the Uwezo survey is to establish the highest level at which the child can do different tasks (reading, numeracy and comprehension) comfortably.

4. Often family members and neighborsgather together to watch what the child is doing. This could potentially create tension for the child. The Uwezo team should make sure that the child is not getting pressured by speaking in a friendly way to her/him and also to those who are watching.

5. One member of the team can talk to the others, while the other member of the team works with the child.

6. You may need to take a child through the series of tasks until you can decide where s/he is really at. Practice and familiarity with a taskimproves the child’s performance.

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Let’s Practice

In pairs in front of the group, practice giving the literacy assessment. The person pretending to be the child should randomly select a level, and then complete the test as though she/he were at that level without revealing it.

Questions

1. Were the tests administered appropriately to the child?

2. Was there any consistency in the selection of the test sets?

3. Was the assessment results recorded correctly in the HH form?

4. What challenges did you observe?

5. How can those challenges be avoided?

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Chapter 6: Giving Feedback

One of the key features of Uwezo is the instant feedback of the results. After all of the assessments are complete, the volunteer has two final tasks:

A: Give Feedback to parents/ caretakers

1. Remember: the assessments are aimed at Standard 2. So children Standard 3 and above should be able to complete the highest levels; children in Standard 2 should be able to get close to the highest level, but may still need support; and many children in Standard 1 will likely not be able to reach the highest levels.

2. Give the parent feedback on the level reached by a child. Relay the results truthfully but gently if the results are not at the highest level. Do not exaggerate the children’s learning abilities. However, you must be sensitive when you discuss the results with the children and their parents to ensure that the feedback does not result to a negative response by parents.

B: Complete the Parents’ Ask Checklist

1. Go through the poster containing suggestions on what the parents can begin to do as a way of supporting their children’s learning.

2. Ask the parents whether they perform any of the actions stated in the checklist.

1. Tick the correct box on the poster and ask the parents to hang it in a place where they can easily keep referring to it.

Review

1. What would you say to a Standard 1 child who can read the English story?

2. What would you say to a Standard 4 child who cannot subtract?

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Let’s Practice

In pairs in front of the group, practice giving feedback. The person pretending to be the child should randomly select a Standard, subject and competency level.

Questions/Observation

1. Did the volunteers manage to give feedback appropriately as per instructions?

2. What challenges did you observe that may affect effective feedback giving?

3. How can those challenges be overcomed?

REMEMBER!

THINGS TO LEAVE AT THE HOUSEHOLD AFTER ASSESSING THE CHILDREN

Before you leave each household make sure you give them the following:a) 2 copies of story booklets (from last year’s test stories). One for Kiswahili and another one for

English story. Ask parents to help their children to read the stories. b) UWEZO flier, ask parents and children to read the flier to understand more about UWEZO Tanzania.c) Calendar, ask parents to put the calendar at a place where everyone in the family can see easily

All the Best!