Aplicación de visualización

Juliet is the class teacher for primary two, as well as the Senior woman teacher and head of co-curricular. I interviewed her twice over the course of four months, each interview lasting about one hour. She possesses a grade three teaching certificate and has over twenty-five years’ teaching experience in two schools, of which she had spent the last twenty in Elgonia. I discovered that her monthly salary is under four hundred fifty thousand shillings (approx. $125) and that she lives in her own home due to the lack of staff accommodation.

I conducted an observation of Juliet’s English lesson to get an impression of her teaching approach. She commenced the lesson after presenting me with her scheme of work and lesson plan, although they were not fully updated. She presented the lesson using a combination of drills and audio-lingual chorus, with elements of child-centredness such as participation and groupwork. She also made use of self-prepared learning charts. She succeeded in getting good learner participation in the lesson (c.f. Ssentanda 2014).

I learnt that Juliet had participated in the orientation workshops for the thematic curriculum, which she commended for enhancing her local language teaching skills, although she noted that it was not enough. She also highlighted some pedagogical strategies which she is currently adopting. She observed that ‘when I am teaching music, then it must be demonstration. Then when I am coming to free-activity, then I must use discovery method’, which indicates her skilful selection of methods (c.f. Altinyelken 2010b). Juliet had also

improvised a system of grouping her pupils based on ability, in order to monitor their progress. She explained that:

Like in my class, what I do is, I look at the best one, I give to their row. The other ones which are medium comes to this one and the other ones which are very slow, in the other row. So that I will be able to help them in the way they are supposed to be. Because when I just teach them like that, the other ones will be faster and this one will be somehow better, but the other ones will be left behind all the time. So, what I do is, I have to teach and then when I check the other ones; much of the time I spend on these slow learners to help them to come up.

Regarding attitude, Juliet endorsed UPE both as her source of livelihood, as well as for improving the learning conditions in Elgonia. She noted that ‘when this UPE came, they came and helped us with a lot of learning aids, which of course promotes the learning of a child’. Furthermore, Juliet is striving to be professional, which I noted in her use of appropriate pedagogies and teaching instruments in her classroom.

She is critical of the large classes in Elgonia. She noted that she experiences difficulty in teaching her large class. Furthermore, she opposes automatic promotion, as well as local language teaching on the grounds that they undermine learning. She noted that local language teaching is discriminatory and is thus advocating for its annulment:

there should be some change that they should allow us to teach in English for the sake of promoting education in our schools. When you look at the private schools, they teach English right from nursery to P7 and that’s why they are performing better. But when you come to UPE schools, we are supposed to teach in vernacular, P1, P2, even up to P3. We begin now teaching in English in P4. And all these three classes affects so much and that is why the performance is not all that.

She further criticised thematic teaching, in contrast to Mirembe’s teachers. She blamed it for splitting literacy into two subject areas, which has made it more difficult to teach, a challenge which has also been noted by Ssentanda (2014). Juliet observed that:

The old curriculum was very nice, but this one, we were just forced conditionally. Because there are so many changes they are just dipping (sic) you to follow. But the other one of course there was flexibility. But this one now, it is instructed, you have to follow

Juliet is also concerned about Elgonia’s adoption of an attendance register to monitor teachers. She argued that it downplays their challenges, while focusing on absenteeism. She was also irked by the rampant late-coming and absenteeism among the pupils, which she partially attributed to their parents. She observed that:

you may need to teach the subject, but the children arrive late, so you find that you may not teach them all. The other ones may arrive late when you have already entered in the middle of the subject. Then it becomes difficult for you to help the other one, because already the subject is ahead. There's also a problem in a community. The community is not so much responsible, as far as sending their children early to school. You find, the teacher may arrive here early, the children will come very late and then you may not be able to help in the way you wanted to do.

As regards her professional beliefs, it is evident that Juliet attaches high priority to her pupils’ learning, which Biesta et al. (2015) have noted among the key aspirations of teachers. This was evident both in her emphasis on using locally prepared learning charts, as well as in monitoring her pupils’ progress. Furthermore, it was evident in her opposition to local language teaching, automatic promotion and the large classes in Elgonia. It was also clear that Juliet attaches high value to the creative input of teachers, which was discernible from her criticism of the new curriculum’s rigidity.

The above analysis of Juliet’s biography therefore reveals that she is a qualified teacher, with wide experience and skills. Furthermore, she attaches high value to her pupils’ learning, whilst opposing the policies and conditions that hinder it. Thus, from the combination of her skill and concern for her pupils’ learning, we find that Juliet achieves agency through ventures like preparing her own teaching charts, amidst the shortages in Elgonia, as well as devising her own system for monitoring her pupils’ progress.