It was one of those days again when you wake up in the morning and say to yourself I am getting out of here. I was tired of the daily grind and ready to chi-relax my mind by hitting up some trails in a nearby town named Social Circle. So, we left the house after breakfast and headed for nature.
We stopped at Social Circle for lunch at the historic Blue Willow Inn. This place has a great customer service, great atmosphere, and great southern Food. The food was amazing—corn on the cob, collard greens, roast beef with gravy, and the best shrimp rice in town. When you eat in the south, you take your meal down with either a glass of cold sweetened ice tea or a glass of cold lemonade.You know my choice already, LEMONADE.
After lunch we headed down to Hard Labor Creek Blueberry Farm to pick some yummy blueberries. As always, they farm did not disappoint. We spent an hour or so in the hot summer sun filling our basket full of blueberries.
We left the farm with full supply of cold water and Gatorade bottles ready to hit the trails at Hard Labor Creek Park. I love the trails there. They are neither too steep nor too flat for my taste. We did the yellow and red trails just next to the trading post for a combination of 2.5 miles. Yeah, you guessed it right. We were completely tired after all the walking in the bush. <
To cool ourselves down we decided to head to the beach. Yeah, they do have a beach. Sat down and watched people swim in the lake water drinking our Gatorade and ice cold waters. Till next time……
Title of the Article: ChemVLab+: Evaluating a Lab Tutor for High School Chemistry
Overview
In the article entitled, “ChemLab+: evaluating a virtual lab tutor for high school chemistry” by Devenport and colleagues., the authors argue that teaching high school chemistry typically involves quantitative problem solving activities with the assumption that students will learn core concepts through manipulation of numbers and symbols. Another assumption is that students who are able to successfully perform complex calculations have mastered these core concepts and this mastery reflects conceptual understanding. Research in chemistry education, however, questions these assumptions. For example, it is unclear if quantitative ability is an indication of conceptual understanding and even high achieving students may lack basic knowledge of core principles.
In their article, Devenport et al., provide several examples to illustrate the lack of validity in the assumption that quantitative ability reflects conceptual understanding. In their first example, they cite a study by Smith & Metz, (1996) which found that students performed well in traditional acid/base assessment using quantitative assessment methods, but failed to identify strong versus weak acids when shown examples in diagrams and/or graphic forms. They argue that this example indicates “that definition terms were used without true comprehension of the concept”.
In addition, the authors argued that the current emphasis on algorithmic problem solving does not adequately prepare students with the conceptual understanding they need to reason in chemistry. To support this view, they use a study by Nakhleh and Mitchel (1993), which found that “when students are given both algorithmic and conceptual items paired for identical concepts, more students were successful on solving algorithmic items rather than conceptual items”. In this study, half of students with high algorithmic performance had low conceptual performance indicating difficulty connecting the mathematical representations with the underlying chemistry concepts. From this study, the authors conclude that the “current emphasis on algorithmic problem solving does not prepare students well with the conceptual understanding needed to reason properly in the world of chemistry”.
Study Design
Due to the mounting evidence (e.g., Bodner & Herron, 2002; Gabel & Bunce, 1994; Nakhleh & Mitchel, 1993; Smith and Metz, 1996) discrediting the assumption that quantitative abilities reflect conceptual understanding, the authors of this study designed an experiment to test an intervention aimed at improving chemistry students’ conceptual knowledge in addition to their quantitative skills. The intervention, ChemCollective Virtual Lab, engages students in meaningful problem solving of complex chemistry concepts to improve their conceptual understanding of core concepts. The authors employ a mixed-methods approach involving classroom observations (the student engagement aspects), pretests and posttests (cognitive and conceptual achievement of both quantitative and conceptual skills), log-file analyses (an instrument to analyze learning as it occurs through repeated student learning growth), and teacher interviews (soliciting input from teachers on what worked and what needed improvement) to evaluate the effectiveness of ChemCollective Virtual Lab.
Strength of the Article
The authors provide a strong justification for their assertion that quantitative ability does not necessarily indicate conceptual understanding of core concepts in chemistry by providing several examples from the literature. Conceptual learning, the authors argue, can only be achieved through authentic manipulation of real world examples, informed negotiation, short-term feedback, and live tutoring. They test this hypothesis by evaluating a chemistry teaching tool they developed, ChemCollective Virtual Labs, which includes exercises to improve both quantitative skills and conceptual learning, the two skills necessary to master chemistry. Through ChemCollective Virtual Labs, students have the opportunity to apply chemistry knowledge to real world examples and receive immediate, individualized feedback
while the system estimates their proficiency in understanding core concepts. The results of the mixed methods evaluation suggest that students were actively engaged with the tool and that they improved their understanding of chemistry. Teachers also found the activities to be worthwhile.
Overall, the authors make a strong case to discredit the assumption that quantitative ability reflects conceptual mastery in chemistry. Their argument is further strengthened by providing evidence of the effectiveness of the ChemCollective Virtual Lab at improving students’ understanding of chemistry by focusing on both quantitative skills and conceptual learning. This article is a good example of how to develop an intervention based on an identified gap in the literature, to test that intervention using a rigorous evaluation, and report the results of the evaluation in a way that can be useful to other educators and researchers.
Weakness of the Article
While I agree mostly with the authors’ argument that quantitative skills do not necessarily reflect conceptual understanding, I question their assertion that virtual tutoring alone can lead to sustained student motivation and engagement over long periods of time. I feel as though a teacher’s role in motivating, monitoring, and explaining the activity and what students need to get from the activity is also important and is insufficiently addressed in this article.
I also question the assertion that computer tutoring alone can improve students’ conceptual understanding of chemistry concepts. Students misunderstanding of key chemistry concepts often arise from deeply held beliefs that they have developed over a long period of time. A single lesson from a computer with simple explanations may not be able to sufficiently address and correct these misconceptions. Teachers, through ongoing observation and engagement with students, can identify and correct these misconceptions. Therefore, while I value the ChemCollective Virtual Lab as a teaching tool, I do not believe that it is a substitute for quality teaching. Without teacher input and engagement, I do not believe that ChemCollective Virtual Lab and tools like it will be successful in the long run. Thus, while ChemCollective Virtual Lab may be an important tool in my arsenal for teaching chemistry, it can’t be the only tool.
Lessons Learned
Since I am interested in evaluating the effectiveness of virtual labs in improving students’ understanding of chemistry concepts for my own thesis, I found this article to be very useful for several reasons:
1. It has provided me with some insights on how I should approach my literature review and in the writing of my conceptual framework. I have discovered that searching the reference lists of relevant articles can help me discover articles directly related to my thesis.
2. I also liked how they used a mixed methods approach including: a) student engagement, b) pretests and posttests, c) and teacher interviews to evaluate their intervention. In my own study, I intend to look at engagement, student achievement on virtual labs versus paper and pencil instructional approaches, and student perceptions to compare the two teaching methods.
3. This article also helped me think about my data analysis plan. The authors used a paired-samples t-test to compare student pre and posttest scores. I may use a similar approach in my thesis. Therefore, I have enhanced my understanding of various approaches for data analysis that I might employ in my own thesis study.
Reference
Devenport, J. L., Rafferty, A., Timms, M. J., Yaron, D., & Karabinos, M. (2012). ChemLab+: Evaluating a virtual lab tutor for high school chemistry. The Proceedings of the 2012 International Conference of the Learning Sciences.
Each year and each time the National Examination results (Standard Seven, Form Four, and Form Six) are announced, the discussion regarding the failures of the education system in Tanzania pops up. The central question in these discussions is whether or not the education system is meeting its goals of educating the Tanzanian youth? TWAWEZA’s data (2011-2012) from a cross-sectional studies in over 38 districts of the Tanzanian education system highlights some of the issues and the difficulties facing the system. Access the report here. Findings from this cross-sectional study paints a gleam picture. At the primary, secondary, and high school levels, majority of our children are not learning and not acquiring practical and problem-solving skills needed to be successful in life and for post primary education. The skills gap is much wider between rural and urban primary, secondary, and high schools. This skill gap has created a rural-urban divide on how children access quality education in Tanzania.
Major Issues Facing the Education System in Tanzania
Tanzania has a K-13 education system. It starts with the kindergarten level for one year, the primary level for seven years, the secondary school level for four years, and the advanced secondary school level for two years. Currently, there is a multifaceted primary school education in Tanzania composed of English Medium Schools (the very minority) from political and affluent families and those attending regular primary education (the majority). And Within the regular education system, the facility and staffing quality differences between schools in rural areas and those in urban areas are quite staggering.
Those attending regular primary schools in rural areas normally lack books, teaching aids, and are schooled in dilapidated teaching environment. Furthermore, they have teachers who are ill-prepared to teach the courses that are assigned to them to teach. Furthermore, there are no professional development opportunity for the teachers to engage in professional learning and development. Professional development activities that will enhance proficiency in their teaching, teaching methods, in the medium of instruction, and finally mastery of content.
The teaching culture also needs to change to reflect the changing student needs. It should be reasonable for student to engage in a discussion with the teacher and other students without fearing retaliations. The fact that students are scared to ask questions in class is very troublesome. Teachers are supposed to be facilitators of children’s search for knowledge. It is the duty and responsibility of each teacher to encourage children to ask questions, to guide children in their thirsty and hunger for knowledge. How are children going to learn if they do not have the opportunity to ask questions? What type of citizens are we producing? Citizens who cannot ask questions? Citizens who cannot analyze issues? I always ask myself why we entirely depend on the people who failed to teach our kids. Failures produce failures in my book.
Change Requires Clear Vision
To counteract these issues, the government of Tanzania needs to be at the forefront. The government needs to develop goals on how the educations system in Tanzania should look like for the short and long term.
Questions like:
What knowledge is of most worth to the youth in Tanzania?
What research based-teaching strategies are best for achieving this knowledge?
What educational management model would be best for achieving the knowledge we seek to impart to our children?
Who will pay for the cost of providing this knowledge?
These questions needs to be asked and thoroughly explored. Without a clear plan, it will be impossible to measure if the education system is actually addressing the needs for the short and long terms. In assessing the education program we need to ask ourselves:
What our standard seven graduates need to know and be able to do?
What our form four graduates need to know and be able to do?
What our Form Six graduates need to know and be able to do?
Further Issues to Explore: Why are Tanzanian Youngsters not Learning?
There is not a single answer to this question. Several factors contribute this issue in one way or the other.
Learning Activities
Learning activities used in most classrooms do not reflect the interests of children. We are still using teaching strategies that are outdated, non-engaging and based on memorization to teach children whose attention spans have changed over the years. Most of the digital-age children have very short attention and memory spans. Lecturing for hours without interactive activities, hands-on-activities, and experiential learning activities will not be beneficial to them. In my opinion, we cannot continue to teach non interactive lessons, lessons that don’t address children brain development theories, motivation theories, cognitive theories, and expect our children to learn. In addition, teacher absenteeism, lack of classroom resources, and pathetic salaries contribute to the failures seen.
Research to what interests our kids to learn is needed
I plea for Colleges “UDSM , SUA, and UDOM” to do research aimed at finding out what exactly interests our young people today. Our this is known, these colleges could be at the forefront in the development of curricula that reflects these interests. A bottom up approach for developing curricula from the the school level, the district level, the regional level, and the country at large needs to be used. Matching students interests, intelligences, learning style preferences with instruction has been shown to improve students’ interests and academic performance.
Curricular Should be Regional Rather Than National
Tanzania is a huge country. Curricula diversification is very important. What kids learn in Mtwara should reflect the challenges and opportunities available to them. Kids should learn through solving real life problems facing their community. What kids learn in Tabora, should reflect issues that are directly linked to their own society. We need to move past the one-size-fits-all mentality in education policy formulation, delivery, and especially the curricula itself.
The Age Factor
For primary education the age factor needs to be seriously discussed. In my views, Standard Seven graduates are indeed too young to participate meaningfully in any civil and citizenship responsibilities. For example, getting a job at the age of 13-to-14 years is almost impossible in the current work-force-system or structure in Tanzania. I certainly believe that raising the end of school age to Form Four for all will adequately help to give our youth enough time to grow physically, mentally, and academically for them to participate fully in their nation building work and in realizing their potentials.
Secondary School for All Kids
The money factor and the school structure needs to be discussed openly. Like I said earlier a bottom-up approach will do more good than harm. It will be a huge undertaking but it would be worth the effort in the end. Indeed, a whole generation of talented Tanzanians are left behind with the current system. For example, I was one of those luck persons who passed the Standard Seven examination alone in my school. I do not believe that I was the smartest. I have no idea where the standard seven friends I left behind are doing right now. It is a shame that I left a lot of them behind to fend for themselves at the age of 13-to-14 years old.
Probably knowing the life time income differential between a primary school graduate and a secondary school graduate in Tanzania will help in narrowing down the options on which way to go. There are no data at the moment, however, I believe those who attends secondary schools will have an upper hand on this. Once it is known for fact that secondary school graduates earn more on average that primary school graduates, then, the government can be compelled to allow secondary education for all kids. If indeed, secondary school graduates make substantially more income over the course of their lives, then I am for expanding those opportunities to all our young men and girls.
There are so many ways to spend your week-end here in Atlanta without going into your wallet. Don’t take this literally though, because you will have to shell some cash for gas, drinks, and food. For starters, there are numerous outdoor festivals going on each week-end; the many parks, lake Lanier activities, and the nearby (Smokey) Smoky Mountains in Tennessee. You can do it all if you happen to like a week-end filled with fun and excitement.
It has become our tradition to spend a week-end away from home every now and then during spring, summer, and fall. The weather is just too nice to spend the whole week-end in the gloomy and traffic ridden Atlanta. I am not trying to say that Atlanta’s week ends aren’t fun. I live in the city each and every-day and therefore a change of venue now and then is warranted. I feel like week-ends are times well spent somewhere close to Mother Nature. Week-ends are times to explore a different landscape, a different way of earning a living, a different of way of approaching the daunting task that is life.
Thus last week-end was no different. We took off Friday evening for a time on the slopes of the Smokey. A great a place to visit and to distress. There are plenty of hiking trails, river flows, and water-falls to see and indulge on. We had a blast! Probably we might consider the Smokey again before the summer gets-out.
On another note, yesterday evening was my daughter’s recitals for her ballet classes. So we rushed down from the Smokey after an early lunch so we can be with her and her friends. It was awesome. The dancers represented not only ballet dance but also all sorts of dances from around the globe. So, I will leave you with the photos of Pili from the recitals.
“While others accumulate things, I chose to accumulate memories”
This essay will explore the history of testing in American education, the introduction of standardized testing in American Secondary Education, the philosophical underpinning of these events, the historical perspectives, and the ethical standpoint that led to where we are today. In addition, the essay will also touch on the ontological perspectives, axiological perspectives, and the epistemological perspectives regarding testing and what it means for students to KNOW something that they were taught and how we measure/define knowing.
The frequency with which students are assessed for content understanding and general attainment of information has been rising in the American Education System (Madaus & Clarke, 2001). Currently in Most County Schools students are tested 8-14 times per semester. Those are just state and county mandated tests including benchmarks, Students’ Learning Outcomes (SLOs), and high school graduation tests. When teacher created tests and quizzes are included, an individual student taking a four class load in a block schedule would have been tested 20-25 times by the end of each semester. It is my belief that this frequency of testing is excessive. Subjecting students to this high frequency of testing and the magnitude some of these tests bear each testing period is ridiculous to say the least. In my view, I do not believe that the high-stakes tests and the frequency in which they are offered improve accountability for teachers, administrators or school districts. If this was the case, Finland would not be ranked number 1 in the world for science and mathematics since Finland only test its secondary students just twice in their secondary education careers (Washington Post, 2012).
In America, policymakers argue that in-order to improve students’ performance teacher, administrators, and school districts need to be held accountable for students’ achievement (Ravitch, 2002). However, the frequency under which these tests are offered has been found to be associated with students not taking testing in general seriously anymore (Ravitch, 2002). Despite of the increase in testing frequency, American students’ scores when ranked with their peers in the developed world around the world has been declining steadily (Washington Post, 2012).
Testing and methods for measuring students understanding of content can be traced to the Socratic era in ancient Greece. During the Socratic era, students were asked to respond to questions posed by their instructor to gauge their understanding of concepts and to encourage their critical thinking. Socrates used a dialogue between himself and his students to gauge their understanding and to help them create their own understanding of concept. Even before Socrates, conversational dialogue was used to assess students’ understanding and knowing (Frost, 1989).
Testing in the American Education System was modeled after education systems in Europe. Colonists brought the idea of testing with them when they founded schools in the newly formed United States (Urban & Wagoner, 2009). Testing can be traced directly to the one-room schools and the church schools in colonial America (Urban & Wagoner, 2009). Even apprenticeship schools used testing to gauge mastery of student’s learning. Testing was never used to evaluate the teachers’ effectiveness at that time and students who failed were deemed to be incapable of learning and therefore were subsequently left behind (Madaus & Clarke, 2001).
In the late 1800s, prestigious universities including Harvard, Princeton, Johns Hopkins, and Yale introduced college entrance examinations as a basis for admission. Other universities did not have this requirement. To further complicate the issue, each prestigious university had its own separate entrance exam. The different requirements for admission at each of the universities, led school principals and parents to complain that is was difficult to prepare students for the multitude of college entrance exams at these universities. To harmonize the process, the College Entrance Examination Board was created to prepare and oversee a single test for college admission (Urban & Wagoner, 2009). This was the beginning of the standardized tests phenomenon that we see today in the education system in America.
In the early 1900s teachers also were required to take entrance exams. But, once they were interviewed and offered a job with an interviewing panel that included a clergy and the local school board members, a teacher would never again be subjected to testing related to their performance, suitability and/or capacity to teach. Testing for results based accountability in the American education is a contemporary phenomenon (Ravitch, 2002).
Moreover, the early 1900s was a tumultuous time in education. This is the time when educational psychology was introduced into the education field. Education psychologists believe that there is a need to justify education as a scientific endeavor. Thus, demonstrating that education can be measured through experimentation and testing was a major aim of educational psychologists at the time. The leading educational psychologist of the early 20th century, Edward L Thondike, was determined to demonstrate that education is an exact science through education testing. Most education psychologists of the 1920s and the 1930s were heavily interested in devising a testing instrument to help teachers diagnose students’ understanding of concepts and consequently to develop interventions based on data. However, the educational psychologists of the time never intended for their tests and data accumulated from the testing to be used for educational accountability.
The 1930s witnessed the Great Depression. Due to e economic hardship of the period, education progressives gained huge influence. They wanted schools to be friendly to students who were not interested in traditional schooling. Educational progressives of the time cared more about students’ adjustment in schools. The emphasis on a child’s social adjustment took the front seat over grades, subject mastery and discipline (Urban & Wagoner, 2009). They started using the testing instrument developed by educational psychologists to identify and develop remedial education for disinterested kids in schools. These educational progressive felt that education was a right for all children and believed in the philosophy that every child can learn. This era was the beginning of social promotion as we know it today. All these events happened at the time when there were no job to be had by high school dropout during the peak of the depression and therefore keeping kids in school was a better option at the time. The testing that was done during this period was mainly to inform teachers where students were and how to device learning goals to help them learn. The data collected had no bearing to student’s promotion nor was it used as a tool for evaluating the performance of teachers, administrators, or school districts.
The 1950s and early 1960s were a special time in American education. From the Sputnik report, the decisions of Wade vs. Board of Education, and the release of the book “What Ivan knows that Jonny Doesn’t?” created an atmosphere for educationists and policymakers to try to find answers to what was perceived to be going wrong with the education system in America (Urban & Wagoner, 2009). The reports, the book, and the decisions for equal education opportunities for all Americans lead in one way or another to the introduction of data driven accountability in the American Secondary Education System.
The report by sociologist James Coleman in 1966 entitled “Equality of Educational Opportunities” was the landmark report that started to pique the interest of policymakers in using achievement data to hold teachers, administrators, and districts accountable for student’s low performance. The report was significant in many ways including its emphasis on a shift from input oriented education system to results oriented education system. Prior to this report, educationalists believed that many of the low achieving problems in the school systems will eventually be eliminated through more funding. The Coleman report shifted the emphasis onto accountability. This shift led many policymakers to start examining how school resources affected student’s performance and achievement. The 1960s was a very interesting time in America. Events such as the civil rights movement provided most of the impetus to what was happening in the education system. The drive for education equality and opportunities for all Americans led to more scrutiny on student’s score data. The gap that existed and that continues to exist between white Americans and other minorities groups especially African Americans, pushed for accountability in education to improve achievement for the racially disadvantaged groups.
The establishment of the National Assessment of Education Progress and the Department of Education in the 1970s also led to a shift from inputs (resource) to outputs (results). This shift was fueled by the readily available testing data which allowed policy makers to compare student achievement across regions and ethnic groups. The international testing of mathematics and science provided even more data on how American secondary school students faired when compared to students from other industrialized nations. The fact that American students performed poorly on mathematics and science tests when compared to other industrialized countries added more pressure for policymakers to tie student’s achievement to teachers, administrators, and districts and to hold them accountable for poor student performance.
The 1960s and 1970s also witnessed a growing tension between the professional educators who believed in the input model (resources will solve the underachievement problems) and the policymakers’ output model (results and accountability will drive instruction). Public pressures from parents, stakeholders and policymakers to see improvement in the low achievement scores among minority groups have kept the focus on using standardized testing for accountability. In the 2000s, laws like “The No Child Left Behind Act” and “Race To The Top,” new evaluation systems such as Teacher Keys were introduced. These laws and evaluation systems placed renewed emphasis on using standardized testing as a mechanism for accountability.
Currently, there is a war between these two camps or paradigms in the American Education System. On one hand, the results from accountability and data driven evaluation have shown some promise in states such as Massachusetts, Virginia, Texas, and North Carolina (Ravitch, 2002). The achievement gap between blacks and white students in these states has narrowed after the introduction of results based assessment for teachers, administrators, and school districts. However, elsewhere in the country the results are mixed, and in many states and districts across the country, the achievement gap between the racial groups—whites and Asians on one hand and blacks and Latinos on the other—is widening even faster. On the other hand, professional educators argue that more resources are needed to narrow this achievement gap as educational budgets have been continually slashed over the past decade.
Presently, American education will continue to be dominated with these two paradigms: the professional education paradigm who believes increased resources will solve the problems and the policymaker paradigm who believes public education should follow the business model of incentives and sanctions based on performance. As the war wages on, whatever paradigm wins will determine the direction that the American education system will go. In my view, it is going to be very difficult to change the current testing culture to include performance-based assessment that measure what students’ can do. The pressure put forth by the testing companies, businesses and universities who are profiting magnificently from the current testing environment is too great for policymakers to ignore. I am most definitely sure that all the testing companies will join hands to fight tooth and nails whoever is trying to change the current system that is benefiting them greatly (Frediriksen, 1984).
While the battle rages on, both camps need to realize that:
Throwing money at education by and in itself rarely produce results. To achieve improvement system-wide, focused approach and long-term strategies are needed.
Good teachers are essential to high-quality education. Treatment of teachers as valuable professionals including a living wage will be helpful.
The cultural assumptions and values surrounding education can do more to support or undermine it.
Education system should strive to keep parents informed and work with them. Parents are neither impediments to nor saviors of education.
Education systems need to consider what skills today’s students will need in future and teach accordingly. Teaching for the present job opportunities is a disservice to our young people because most of jobs they will be working on are possibly not created yet.
There is no argument that knowledge is important. The question, however, is how we assess that knowledge. While in today’s school environment standardized testing is the main method utilized for assessing students’ knowledge, Socratic dialogue and other dialogue techniques is a better method for assessing student knowledge. For the Greeks being able to articulate concepts and being able to do the task or the skills associated with the learning experience was a basis for ensuring students had adequately grasped the concepts conveyed by the teacher (Frost, 1989). In contrast, standardized tests merely diagnose what students have learned on a prescribed curriculum rather than what they can do or perform (e.g. report writing, synthesizing information, conducting basic and advanced research topic). These tests are therefore, limited in their ability to truly measure what students have learned during a course (Madaus & Clarke, 2001).
For me, the pendulum has swung too far over to using standardized tests as measures of accountability. Instead, I would like to see more performance based testing used in the classroom which measures what students can do with their knowledge and less standardized testing which only simplistically measures recall of basic information. Others, however, have argued that performance based assessment also has limitations including time constraints, resource constraints, and the training required to effectively assess students’ knowledge with these methods (Linn, 2013). While I acknowledge these potential limitations, I firmly believe that performance based assessment is a critical component of a comprehensive assessment of student achievement based on my years of teaching. The use of standardized testing as the sole method for assessing student performance is inadequate and short sighted. If we truly want to understand if students have absorbed the material and are able to apply this knowledge in their everyday lives, we need to include performance based testing as part of a comprehensive assessment strategy.
Frederiksen, N. (1984). The real test bias: Influences of testing on teaching and learning.
American Psychologist 39(2), 78-81.
Frost, S. E. (1989). Basic teachings of the great philosophers. Garden City, NY: Random House, Inc.
Madaus, G. F., & Clarke, M.(2001). The adverse impact of high stakes testing on minority students: evidence from 100 years of test data. In G. Orfield and M. Kornhaber (Eds.), Raising standards or raising barriers? Inequality and high stakes testing in public education. New York: The Century Foundation.
The Tanzania form IV results 2013 are out and the picture they paint isn’t pretty. Let me get straight to the numbers first. The breakdowns by divisions are as follows: division I-1,641; division 2-6,453; division 3- 15,426; division 4- 103,327, and division 0-240,903. And the breakdown by gender for those who received divisions 1-3 are as follows: girls =7, 178 and boys = 16, 342.
Once again I have written and spoke about this trend for the past 3 years on the kibogoji blog. I guess you can read some of my previous posts on this issue to better inform yourself about the factors that have led to the scores to drop over the years. In some of those posts I attempted to offer solutions to this problem. Increasing the budget to education isn’t the solution, but most politicians in Tanzania seem to think and believe that it is.
On the numbers above, I feel like it is a letdown to women in Tanzania who have against all odds worked so hard to compete with men over the years and they had been doing really well on the education front. Looking at the gender disaggregated data, less than one half of the students who received divisions 1-3 are females. This is pathetic and is a major letdown to the women in Tanzania.
In this article I will not discuss what needs to be done from now forward. What I will say is this, action is needed and now. Tanzanian Kids Going to School
This trend of failures cannot be sustained if the country wants to stay in the race to compete with other nations—academically, economically, and socially. I am damn sure that these results will prompt a knee jerk reaction through which committees will be formed and none in terms of their recommendations will be implemented.
It is high time for a reshuffle at the ministry level. The president cannot keep quiet no longer on the future of Tanzania, which is education to the youth. The minister and his high ranking files have failed to offer solutions to this problem for the past three years. Some heads need to roll.
Who will stand up and take responsibility for this if the president can’t do it? Can the good and law abiding citizens of Tanzania demand accountability? Accountability on how their tax money is spent? who spends it? and for what? To be exact, only 5.6% of those who sat for this exam got divisions 1-3 and the rest failed. That is 94.4%. Getting a division IV is equivalent to failing in my book—I do not know about you?
This debate comes and goes. The debate normally arise whenever secondary schools results comes out. And, it is especially true when students achievement scores are terrible. Educationists in Tanzania will normally and easily point their fingers to English as the culprit. The argument always goes like, “see, I told you so, we can’t test them in English. It is unfair to them. They don’t know English. Let us switch to Swahili alone as the medium of instruction.”
The argument above is flawed in several ways. One way of debunking this argument is by looking at primary school results. The pass rate there is not great either. In 2011 the numbers were 30% passing to 70% effective failures. In primary schools Swahili is the only medium of instruction for all subjects. If English is the only reason for all these massive failures at the secondary level, then, why are the primary school students failing miserably despite the fact that all subjects are taught in Swahili?
This shows that it isn’t the language of instruction alone that is causing these massive failures.
As an educationalist myself, I knew all along that there are many variables that co-vary with the language of instruction. These may include: 1) teacher absenteeism, 2) a disconnect between the test and material taught, 3) lower pay, 4) instructional strategies used, 5) language of instruction, and the list doesn’t end there. Watch my Factors Affecting the Education System in Tanzania video on you tube under Kibogoji Conversations and read my other articles on the state of the education system in Tanzania here. In some of these articles I attempted to explain in detail the solutions to this year in and year out problem in exam achievement.
Here is a blog post with more information on the same subject. Click here to read the post.
To add salt to a wound, here are this year’s standard seven results as broken down by the IPP MEDIAs’ newspaper. Of-course, standard seven students are all taught in Swahili except for the subject of English. Below are the numbers showing how they did in the examination.
Total number of students who took the exam: 456,082.
Breakdown by gender: girls (52.68 per cent) and 409,745 boys (47.32 per cent).
Of those who passed: 3,087 candidates scored grade A, 40,683 grade B, 222,103 grade C.
Total pass rate: 265,873 (30%).
Of those who failed: 526,397 grade D, 73, 264 grade E.
Total failure rate: 599,661 (70%).
From all this data, one can conclude that the evidence is overwhelming. The evidence clearly indicate that English is not the only variable that is ailing the Tanzanian education system. Maybe it is the right time to say that Swahili is the cause of all these massive failures. I believe it is high time to ask ourselves what are the causes (a variety of them) of the under-performance rather than looking for a single cause. When we ask ourselves the right questions, we normally come up with the right answers to complex problems such as this one.
Scientific Cheating Catalog: The Mismeasure of Man
The book “the mismeasure of man” chapters 3 and 4, Gould discusses further some of the ways that scientists have cheated either intentionally or unintentionally. I have cataloged some of those instances I found to be fascinating in these two chapters below.
1) Francis Galton (1822-1911) was Darwin’s cousin. He used numbers to construct the so called beauty map of the British Isles and he also suggested a method for quantifying boredom. He could back up his methods by numbers; however as we all have come to know–interpreters of numbers as Galton was are often times trapped by their own priori convictions (page 107).
2) Robert Bennett Bean in 1906 published a long technical article comparing the brains of American blacks and whites. He was a practicing physician and through his research he found –according to him, meaningful differences in that black are inferior to whites. He used the relative sizes of the parts of the corpus callosum to justify that blacks are inferior to whites since they have smaller genu, hence less brain in the front seat of intelligence (page 109).
3) Paul Broca (1861) was a professor of clinical surgery in the faculty of medicine and the founder of the Anthropological Society of Paris in 1859. He was the strongest supporter of the ideas that brain sizes constituted the differences in intelligence among the races. Again, even after extensively restudying Morton’s method, Broca still was another victim of his own preconceived notion about blacks. He and the society he lived in held deep beliefs that blacks were an inferior race (page 114-125).
4) E. D. Cope was the most celebrated American paleontologist who came up with the idea of recapitulation. In recapitulation the idea is that adults of inferior groups (i.e., blacks) are like children of superior groups (i.e., white male). Cope identified 4 groups of human forms following this criterion: nonwhite races, all women, southern as opposed to northern European whites, and lower classes within superior races (page 144).
5) B. Kidd used the recapitulation argument to justify colonial expansion into tropical Africa. He wrote “dealing with peoples who represent the same stage as that of children in the history of the development of individuals in the white race. The tropics will not, therefore, be developed by the natives themselves”. To that end, recapitulation is indeed still used in many circles in the west as a justification for imperialism and economic colonization of Africa (page 147).
This does remind me of the many things I have heard and seen on TV this and many years past. I will use the past presidential election as an example. If you happened to watch MSNBC and Fox news simultaneously, you would have thought the election was too close to call. Each of these TV news channels had their own statisticians manipulating the numbers to meet the expectations of the pre-conceived notions of their viewers. For Fox news, Mitt Romney was a winner long before the election-day and for MSNBC news, Obama was a declared winner weeks ahead of the election-day. This shows how prior convictions can have a huge impact on the way data is collected and computed to fit the fore mentioned prior notion.
In addition, another contentious today’s issue that priori conviction is at play is global warming. Global warming is one of those issues that scientific consensus has almost been reached. However, you still have few scientists who are using data from geological times to justify the fact the earth has cooled and warmed in times past and that, perhaps what we are experiencing now—might just be one of those natural circles. Therefore, there should be no cause for concern.
On the other hand you have scientists who have accumulated great amount of data supporting the argument that global warming is caused by excessive burning of fossil fuel causing the accumulation of greenhouse gasses. I am leaning on the latter camp. It might be just because of the environment awareness time that I am in and if the former a proven to be collect—future generations will debate this issue in light of our prior conventions the same way we are talking about scientists such as Broca and their ideas regarding biological determinism and inferiority of the blacks and other minority races to whites.
To conclude, most of the research we are conducting as researchers today are somewhat clouded by our own views and the societal expectations of the time—our time. Yes, better scientific method have been developed to minimize the effect of priori conventions in data collection and interpretations through the development of the scientific method, but still as we are humans, our prior notions most times shows up in the results sections. Therefore, numbers alone are not all that important at all if confounded with prior-convictions.
Reference
Gould, J. S. (1996). The mismeasure of man. New York: NY. W.W. Norton &Company, Inc.
By: Shaaban Fundi
In this essay I will discuss transformative theory of learning through four different lenses or approaches. These approaches include Mezirow’s psychocrtitical approach/theory, Daloz’s psychodevelopmental perspectives, Paulo Freire’s sociocultural theory and Boyd’s psychoanalytical approach. I will then, discuss the similarities and differences among these four lenses of transformative learning. Furthermore, I will discuss my views regarding the theories of transformative learning and to whether or not the theories have changing my world view (epistemology) over the years.
Mezirow (1997) defines transformative learning as the process that affects change in persons’ frame of reference. He argues that adults have over the years developed experiences that define their world. Because of this body of experience we tend to “reject ideas that fail to fit our preconceptions” (Mezirow, 1197, p.5). In Mezirow’s psychocritical approach, meaning structures are differentiated into three categories–frame of reference, habits of mind and point of view. In addition, for transformative learning to take place Mezirow argues that transformation must take place in our belief system, attitude and our entire perspectives. And, experience, critical reflection, reflective discourse, and action are central phenomenon in Mezirow’s psychocritical transformative learning theory.
Despite a well-developed theory put forth by Mezirow, critics argue that there is too much overreliance on rationality. According to Merrian, 2004 (as cited on Merrian, S., Caffarerra, R., & Baumgartner, L, 2007, p.136) “one’s cognitive development may influence his or her ability to experience a perspective transformation.” Thus, refuting rationality as the major cause of transformative learning.
According to Daloz, 1986 education is a transformational journey geared at enhancing development in an individual. The focus of transformation in Daloz’psychodevelopmental perspective relies on stories of the journey that someone takes to expand his or her world view. Dialogues and discourse are integral part of the transformation process his perspectives. On the other hand, Boyd “sees transformation as an inner journey resulting into greater personal consciousness (Merrian at al., 2007, p. 139). Boyd also places greater emphasis on the importance of dialogue or discourse for transformation to occur.
The major similarity amongst all these three theories of transformational learning is that they all place a greater emphasis on the discourse and/or dialogue. The difference between Boyd’s perspectives and Mezirow’s theory are that Boyd focused on the importance of stories on the journey towards transformation and Mezirow does not.
The last theory of transformation I will briefly discuss is the sociocultural transformation learning theory by Brazilian educator Paulo Freire. His theory emerged from the context of poverty, illiteracy, and oppression and focuses mainly on social change. Paulo classifies consciousness in three categories: i) magical (no control over own life, everything is externally influenced), ii) Midway (people starting understanding that they have some level of control and can change their circumstances), iii) critical consciousness (people are fully aware of forces that shape one’ life) (Merrian at al., 2007, p.141).
Central to all the four theories of transformational learning is the idea that through dialogue and/or discourse a person involved in a transformative learning experience can move to a frame of reference that is “more inclusive, discriminating, self-reflective, and integrative of all experiences” (Mezirow, 1997, p. 5). I see myself going through this transformation, especially in the sociocultural view point. Over the years I was stuck in the mindset that the problems in my community were too big and I thought too much external forces beyond my control were at play. But as I engaged in self-reflection and dialogue with others, I am now seriously thinking that most of the problems I have seen and continue to see in my community have solutions from within rather than from without.
I will highlight one issue here as an example. The village I grew up in, does not have a library or a computer center where young people and others can access information. There are three secondary schools and one teacher’s college in the area. I looked at the problem and felt helpless in the beginning. But, last year I decided to take action and started to collect used laptop and desktop computers from friends and co-workers for a small learning center. I named the center Kibogoji Experiential Learning Center, Inc. Currently I have 7 computers and bought enough bricks to build just a single room for the center. It is not operational yet, but I feel like this will no longer be a problem in my village the near future.
This example shows the power of transformation through education. It is imperative through education to understand forces that shape one’s life and in the process to become an active agent of change by creating a more just reality for all. I have changed from the mindset that external forces are in charge (the blame game) to becoming a person that will transform part of my previous world. Thanks to education and its transformative forces.
I am trying to instill this kind of transformative education to my students. Teaching them not just lecture hall related subjects but also “teaching them the ability to lift themselves by rethinking and reconfiguring their frame of reference.” To achieve this transformative education, I use research based and theory derived teaching strategies such as blending gizmos with tradition teaching to empower students to create their own meaning from text and/or concepts (Shunk, 2012, p.293).
Reference
Shunk, D. H.(2012). Learning theories:An educational perspectives (6th. Ed.). New York: Pearson.
Merrian, S. B., Caffarella, R. S., & Baumgartner, L. M. (2007). Learning in adulthood: A comprehensive guide (3rd ed.). San Fransisco: Jossey-Bass.
Mezirow, J. (1997). Transformative learning: Theory to practice. New Directions for Adult and Continuing Education, 74
In this essay I will reflect on one educational topic presented I at the Georgia Educational Researchers Association (GERA) 2012 conference in Savannah, Georgia. I will discuss what I thought was interesting in the presentation and also discuss the applicability of the research to my own teaching and research.
Friday morning I attended several presentations. The presentation I will reflect on was an evaluation research presentation. We all know that professional development training for teachers happens in many places throughout the year in the state of Georgia. As it is customary, Many of the training are immediately followed by an evaluative survey to gauge how the participants viewed the training usefulness and applicability. Most of the evaluative surveys at the end of each training sessions have questions such as: 1) on a scale of 1-10 how satisfied were you with the training? 2) will you recommend the training to others?, and 3) did you learn anything useful from the training? Off course many other useful questions are also asked in these surveys besides the ones mentioned.
In the presentation I attended, the presenters argued that as good as these survey questions maybe at assessing participants’ levels of satisfaction with the training, they don’t go far enough to assess the usefulness of the training in changing practice. The presenter further argued that, if a researcher want to understand whether the trainings are achieving their intended goals, that is influencing best practices at the work place–then they need to go a little further in their evaluative research by visiting training participants in their work places to observe and see whether or not practices are actually changing as a result of the training participants received.
The Presenter had done a research evaluating the effectiveness of training and/or professional development at changing practices. She did an evaluation of a middle school training session on the use of best practices to teach science in middle schools. The training was aimed at teaching middle grade science teachers to use discovery learning approaches in their classrooms. The researchers asked attendees to fill out a survey asking them about their satisfaction with the training and whether or not they will use the best practices learned in their own work places.
The finding from the survey was that a significant numbers of training participants are not using the best practices learned during the training. However, approximately 87% of respondents were satisfied with the training and expressed that they will more likely than not use the teaching methods in their classrooms. When the researcher visited the participants at their work place– only 15% were using or trying to use best practices methodology of teaching in their classes. The findings from this study shows how difficult it sometime is to get educators’ buy in in implementing innovative teaching methods.
For my experience, I have attended numerous professional development in my teaching career, I have not really integrated wholly what I learned in a single training session into my classroom or lecture hall. I feel as though educators attending training session, most often pick and choose what is more important to their teaching and leave the other information that they don’t find interesting and/or useful in their own situations. Training effectiveness evaluators need to realize that most educators are not going to adopt each and every single segment of the training information into their daily practice. More likely than not, they will take what is useful to them and use that rather than adopting the entire new system into their own. There are various reasons contributing to this phenomenon from the educators’ point of view: 1) like many educators, I somewhat believe that if it is working why change it? 2) I feel like traditional educators would not like discovery learning approaches as it takes away authority from them and hands autonomy to students, 3) most schools are concerned more with students’ scores in standardized tests; therefore more emphasis is put into teaching to the test rather than teaching for understanding.
Furthermore, the challenges of implementing a discovery learning approach in a classroom are many. In my own experience, it takes more time to create lesson plans centered in the constructivist learning approaches such as discovery learning as compared to traditional learning approaches. Most often constructivist teaching approaches create classrooms that are louder because of the amount of discussions that are instrumental in meaning making for students. Therefore, creating classroom rules and procedure early on is paramount. In this type of learning, students become autonomous and also take more responsibility of their own learning.
I attended many presentations at the conference, but I was really interested in understanding whether professional development sessions have a positive impact on changing the way educators teach. The evidence from this research suggests that most teachers do not change the way they teach from attending just a single training session. It is possible that more teachers will adapt these learning methods if trainings are conducted over a long period of time or done in chunks.
Overall, I feel that GERA is a very informative conference for teachers and educational researchers. I enjoyed spending time with like minded educators and observing how other educational researchers go about conducting and presenting their findings. Most of all, it was a perfect opportunity to connect, build friendship, and long lasting connections for future research and job opportunities. I am already looking forward to next year!
I believe that education is a collaborative process between the educator and the students. I feel that educators should recognize that students bring their own experience and skills to the classroom. In other words educators should view their students as active partners in the learning process and not as passive participants. In so doing, the educator and the students can learn from each-other to enhance content and general knowledge understanding for both parties. In this essay, I will present a brief overview of my personal belief about education and educating students, I will explain my views on what roles educators should play and what roles students should play to making learning a meaningful experience for both students and educators.
First, I believe that the role of an educator is to introduce students to new ideas and skills and then assist them in integrating those ideas and skills into their own experiences. I am not fond of the uni-directional learning approach whereby the educator imparts knowledge to the learner. Instead I subscribe to the bi-directional learning approach whereby the educator and students work hand in hand/together to discover knowledge and meaning. In this era of multiple accesses to information, educators cannot be and should not try to be the sole source of information to students. In fact, educators should use different type of presenting information to students such as lecture, video, computer related technologies, guest speakers and field trips.
In addition, educators should help students to think through issues critically. And challenge students to see the relevance of education to their lives. By doing so, the educator would cultivate a student culture that values new information and also are able to integrate the skills and ideas they have learned into their own world view and perspectives. In addition, educators should foster a lifelong love of learning in their students that will continue on long after class has ended.
Second, educators have a responsibility to create an environment in the classroom that encourages students to actively participate in their learning. Students should be made to feel that it is safe to express their thoughts and feelings without fear of reprisals from either the educator or other students. I strongly believe that this is one of the responsibilities of a reflective and professional educator. And again, without creating an environment of mutual respect between the educator and the students; and amongst the students themselves, no real learning will happen. Therefore it is paramount for educators to take their responsibilities serious and to create a classroom environment and culture that is conducive and receptive to learning for all. For instance, the educator is responsible for setting the tone of all discussions as one of mutual respect where everyone’s ideas are viewed as important contribution. It is important that the educator create an atmosphere where certain students-whether because of race, gender, national origin, or educational attainment- do not feel marginalized. All students should feel equally valuable to the learning process.
Third, educators also have the responsibility to come fully prepared for the classroom session. I believe that educators have the responsibility to fully research the topic and have a good grasp of the subject matter before making any demonstration and/or presentation to the students. Being well prepared helps an educator to reduce a lot of the commotion and misbehavior issues that impedes students’ learning. Educators have the responsibility to develop clear, straightforward presentations of material that can be easily understood by students. Educators should facilitate student participation by encouraging students to ask questions throughout the presentation and by pausing at specific junctures to ask students their thought and/or opinion on the material. The learning material needs to be chunked-up and delivered in a way that meets the multiple learning styles and needs of the students. Educators should make their lessons and all the learning activities relevant to their students’ lives and interests.
Undoubtedly, technology and other social media usage in the classroom help students to stay engaged and on task throughout the lesson. Therefore, educators should use multiple teaching strategies to meet all their students’ learning needs inside and outside the class sessions. Tapping into the social media can potentially be a helpful learning experience for both the students and the teachers. Currently there are several social media gadgets that are educator and student friendly. These gadgets can be used to provide instant assessment and feedback to student and also to keep students interest in the lesson for the entire length of the period.
In terms of students’ responsibilities to the learning process, first, I think that students have a responsibility to be prepared when they come to class by doing the necessary readings, and bringing the required supplies. I also believe that they have the responsibility to be active participants in their own learning. Students who are well prepared for class by doing the necessary reading and by attending tutorials generally do better on tests and quizzes. They also appear to really enjoy the course and the material presented in class. This is just speaking from my own observations and experience as a classroom/lecture hall educator.
Second, students must also be willing to critically examine their own attitudes and be open to new ideas and ways of viewing the world. Students, who are open to new information, will likely be able to integrate the new information into their own realm of thinking. Therefore, it is crucial for students to not be closed minded as in doing so they fail to acquire new skills and information necessary for them to grow academically and professionally.
Third, students must be willing to engage in the discussions and work together with the teacher and other students to challenge their pre-conceived notions and expand their knowledge base. It is imperative for students to be able to share their experiences among themselves and with the teacher during group discussions. This will not only foster a sense of belonging in the class but will also help the students to integrate the new skills into their own frame of reference and therefore building a deeper meaning of what they are learning.
Thus, learning in one hand is a collaborative process in which students and educators have unique roles to play. The educator must be well informed about the subject matter and the pedagogy that drives the instruction. In addition, the educator must be able to create a conducive and respectful environment for-all-in-the classroom and should foster students’ learning using a variety of learning and teaching strategies. On the other hand, students should be willing to critically examine their own altitude and be open to new ideas and ways of viewing the world around them. For example, students should be willing to engage in the discussions and work together with each other and the teacher to challenge their pre-conceived notions and expand their knowledge base.
Lecture hall instruction needs to be derived from learning theories. But, in reality this is not happening. Educators either do not have the time to use theory to drive instruction or have no basic understanding of the learning theories. In this essay I will discuss and critique the article titled “Behaviorism, Cognitivism, Conctructivism: Comparing Critical Features from an Instructional Design Perspective by Peggy Ertmer and Timothy Newby and chapter 11of the book entitled “Traditional Learning Theories” from the book entitled “Learning in Adulthood” by Sharan Merrian, Rosemary Caffarella and Lisa Baumgartner. In my discussion I will provide the relevant information gleaned from both readings and offer my own analysis of the learning theories as they relate to my own learning and teaching experiences. I will include examples from my own experiences to tie together the different learning theories to what is really happening in lecture halls across America in the days of data driven instruction.
The authors’ of the article point out the need of finding a bridge to connect learning theories to educational practices (Ertmer and Newby, 1993). They suggest that instructional designers could use this bridge to create good instructional activities based on the relevant learning theories. It is therefore paramount for instructional designers to understand the situations under which the developed instructional materials and/or activities will be used in order to facilitate optimal learning. Without such an understanding, it would be difficult for instructional designers to create learning materials and activities that would be useful to practitioners and learners (Ertmer and Newby, 1993).
According to Ertmer and Newby, the matching of instructional learning materials and activities to the varying situational and contextual needs of the learners and practitioners is not happening in the majority of colleges today. A study by Johnson (1992) supports this view by stating that “less than two percent of the courses offered in University curricula in the general area of educational technology emphasize theory as one of their key components.” This shows that instructional designers who create college courses either do not have a firm understanding of the learning theories or ignore using them all together when designing and creating the course curriculum and materials.
In order to design optimal instructional materials and/or learning activities the authors of the “Learning in Adulthood” book argue that an instructional designer needs to have a basic understanding of learning theories and being able to incorporate relevant information from a variety of learning theories in the designing process. The learning theories discussed in the article and chapter 11 of the book are cognitivism, behaviorism, humanism, social cognitism, and constructivism. In addition, the authors caution that using only a single theory will not suffice the needs of all learners and practitioners. The authors recommend a careful selection of the concepts and principals from the learning theories that meet the need of instructional situation (Ertmer & Newby, 1993).
As illustrated in the text, each theory plays a fundamental role in developing beneficial learning materials. Behaviorists believes that learning occurs when a response is produce from a given environmental stimulus (ertmer & Newby, 1993). For example, a teacher asks a question (an environmental stimulus) and a student answer the question (demonstrable response). Behaviorists are more concerned with the stimulus and the response. They put little emphasis on how the brain processes information. Consequently, the learner is presumed to not take an active role in learning their environment. They are merely reactive to conditions in the environment (Winn, 1990).
The second learning theory is humanism. In humanism the theorists believe that humans can control their own destiny (Rogers, 1983). The emphasis in humanism is that human can be whatever they want to be. There are no external forces that control your destiny but yourself. The third theory is cognitivism. In cognitivism, prior knowledge and the memory system plays important part in learning (Gredler, 1997, p.144).Therefore, cognitive theorists describe learning as involving the re-arrangement of our memory system to make sense of the external stimuli. The fourth theory is social cognitivism. In social cognitivism, the agreement is that people learn from observing others. According to founding theorist Shunck, people acquire knowledge through observing other. Social cognitive theorists believe that attention, retention, behavior rehearsal and motivation are the most important aspect in observational learning (Shunk, 1993). The fifth theory is constructivism. Constructive theorists believe that “individual creates meaning from his or her own experience” (Jonassen, 1991b). According to Jonassen “humans creates meaning as opposed to acquiring it”. This means our minds have the ability to filter environmental stimulus to create our own unique understanding or reality.
Taking the theorists into consideration, the following are real life or classroom implications. Educators focus on text and behavior management. This leaves little time for learning or studying the learning theories and applying them in their classrooms or lecture halls. In my experience as an educator I have never had the opportunity to learn in depth the learning theories that were in the reading assignment for this week. It was an eye opening experience to read the different learning theories and understanding what their tenets were. I can describe this experience this way—I had some ideas on how to create learning materials and learning activities, but I never had an idea that there were actual theories governing the process of learning. It was as if I was wearing unclean prescription glasses before I read these theories and now I feel like wearing clean prescription glasses. I can see clearly the different learning experience I have seen in the past and being able to place them in the context of the five learning theories.
Since I started teaching I feel like the school systems I have worked under are all based on the behaviorism theory. There is more emphasis on “outcome” rather than cognitive understanding of learning materials and activities. This is evident in the No Child Left Behind Act and in the Race To The Top ideas where the emphasis is on measurable outcomes. Little or no emphasis is put on making sure that student can create their own experiences and realities through social interaction and learning from others.
Even the new teacher assessment system (Teacher Keys) relies heavily on students’ assessment (an outcome measure) regardless of the composition of the students in the teacher’s class. It is like apples and oranges when you compare the scores of a teacher that teaches gifted and advanced placement only classes with those of a teacher teaching general only classes. How are you going to normalize the teacher keys to accommodate the multitude of teachers with completely different teaching assignments and projected outcomes? It is an unfair system in my view that uses the one-fits-all tenet. These behaviorists’ approaches are applied in a situation without regard to the situational needs of each educator and student.
In conclusion behavior based theory is a common place in our education system. It starts with how the learning materials (the questions, practice and answers model) are developed to how students are assessed. In my view an approach that uses a combination of all or most of the learning theories will be desirable in producing learning materials and learning activities that will lead to optimal learning experiences for the students. In addition, teacher keys that are situational cognizant need to be developed to meet the varying working environmental of the different instructors. Therefore, it is imperative to design both learning materials and assessment tools that are derived from the best practices from the various learning and teaching theories.
We try to get out every week end and do something outdoors. This week end was nothing short of fantastic. Starting with the vintage car show in our neighborhood and ending with a trip to the top of Stone Mountain Park. The temperatures are currently dipping and it’s nice to be out to enjoy nature. We started our week end with a lazy Sunday morning just lounging in the game room. Thereafter, we decided to get out and go see what is happening at the famous Stone Mountain Park. Pollinating I don’t know what?
Stone Mountain is the largest granite rock in the world (if you can believe that!). It is located on highway 78 just outside the city of Atlanta. There are tons of things to do around the park: from nature hikes, fishing, train rides, sky-rides, and numerous boats rides on the waterways surrounding this ginormous granite rock.
Face Painting
We used to take the kid here every week ends when she was little. She is no longer enthused by the swings and the nature walks in in the park. She thinks she too BIG now.
Looking at the Carvings
This Sunday we decided to back mainly for two things: 1) the pumpkins festival and 2) the sky ride—because it was a perfect day for it. We arrived at the park around 12 noon. It was almost impossible to find a parking spot on the main parking area. We circled the park a few times, but luck enough we were able to get a parking spot.
The biggest stone carving in the Universe
We spent almost 2.30 hours just doing the pumpkin festival. The kid was having so much fun with the dress-up activities, the face paintings and a scavenger hunt. It was just beautiful all around.
Stone Mountain
At around 4pm we decided to buy our tickets to get on the sky-ride. It looked as though people were having so much fun with it. The sky was clear and you could see all the way to downtown Atlanta. We got in the sky ride and went up to the top. The journey was not eventful but amazing in its own way. We got to the top and spent some time just taking pictures and taking in the views from way up.
Pumpkin reprenting the ATLPumpkins Festival Stone Mountain, GA
By: Shaaban Fundi White Teeth by Zadie SmithThe book White Teeth by Zadie Smith is about a mixed-race couple and an immigrant family life in London. Many of the controversy in the book deal with issues of identity and social class in a post racial society. Smith shows many provocative themes related to science, technology, history and religion. The book starts with Archibald Jones fighting alongside a Bengali Muslim, Samad Iqbal in the English army during WWII, and the two developing an unlikely bond. The bond intensified when Samad relocated to Archie’s native London. Smith tries to recapture their friendship through marriage, parenthood and the shared disappointments of poverty and dreams deferred.
Later in the novel Archie weds a Jamaican bride Clara. In the midst of their marriage, along came their “very interesting” daughter Irie. Achie’s friend Samad also get married, around the same time—to a wife named Alsana. Alsana and Samad were blessed with twin sons, Millat and Magid. After struggling to raise the two sons together, the parents decided to send Magid back to their homeland Bangladesh simply because living in a new country has pressures: 1) new country ways, and 2) the old religious traditions of his homeland was in disagreement with the new country ways. But, they kept Millat in England. However, Millat fell into delinquency and then adopted the ways of the new country which caused severe conflicts in the household.
Since the move, Magid becomes interested in genetic engineering, a science that Samad and Alsana rejected. Within the novel, Smith contrasts Samad’s faith in providence with Magid’s desire to seize control of the future. She involves all of her characters in a debate concerning past, present, determinism, and accidental life. The tooth, half root, half protrusion makes a perfect climax in this novel. She makes a remarkable examination of the immigrant’s experience in a postcolonial world. Dealing with the woes of adaption of a new land, and the principles of what was instilled within them in their home countries and culture.
The first theme I encountered was the marriage of Archie Jones to a black immigrant from Jamaica. This is significant because I considered her to be an immigrant just like Samad, Millat and their kids within the story. This opened up a fascinating tale. Dealing with something very new, verses something that has been instilled within them. The same holds true for their kids–Ire, Magid and Millat were all born in England. However, they are all not acknowledged in their own country because of their skin tone.
Another significant theme I saw in the book was how Magid lost his sense of “Heritage.” He was sent back to Bangladesh to grow up with the culture of his parents’ native land. He wound up more English than the English themselves. His twin brother Millat who stayed in England, was caught up in an ultra-Moslem activist group (with the acronym “KEVIN”). This showed how “brain-washed” he had gotten, even though his parents were just trying to create the best life for their son.
The last significant theme that I thought made the book wonderful was the parallels between the cross-pollination of plants and the random mixing of human genes and cultures. Despite the evident prejudice within London depicted in the book regarding heritage, culture, and ethnic background– the diversity leads to a healthy and strong society in the end. Take home–we all have white teeth despite the color tones on our skins.
Nkurumah Hall (Picture by Professor Mbele)University education is at the top of the root education (pre-K, K-7 and secondary education) in Tanzania. Whenever there is a missing link (a gap) at the bottom, the gap gets magnified as you move up the education ladder. This is analogous to the bioaccumulation concept in environmental science. The most toxic fish happens to be those at the top of the food chain. Following this logic, the degreed graduate who never had the proper training at the lower level ends up being the most unskilled. This is because majority of students in Tanzania lack skills to be autonomous learners and thinkers at the lower levels of education. Once they reach the University level it becomes really difficult for them to gain those skills. In other words it is too late for them.
The gaps in science, math and reading literacy (Uwezo East Africa Report 2012) at the root- schools can’t be fixed within the 3-4 years. Most people graduate from colleges in Tanzania with worthless degrees (No offence). They end up not gaining essential and/or transferable skills during their university careers and consequently missing the boat. There is also the gap between degree programs at the Universities and necessary market skills needed at the work place. This gap actually leads to people getting hired and working in capacities where they have no job related skills resulting to poor productivity in the entire work force.
The current trend of changing just the degree program names at the university level to match the degrees needed by the market will not fix this problem. Teaching in these degree programs need to focus more into skills building, “creating an environment in which learner become increasing adept at learning from each other and at helping each other learn in problem solving groups” (Mezirow, 1997) rather than rote memorization of theories, facts and principles. Degree programs need to develop skill sets that are needed to be successful in their gratuates working environment. These key competencies for work place includes “ acquiring and using information, identifying and organizing resources, working with others, interpreting information, and understanding complex interrelationships”(Gonzi et al, 1995). The most important factor for me is teaching learners to become autonomous, this is not the norm in most if not all colleges in Tanzania.
To sum this all up, real fixes need to start from the bottom of the education chain. That is from pre-schools, kindergartens, primary and secondary schools–all the way up to universities and graduate schools. We always seem to look at a college degree holder and dismantle him/her for lack of skills at the work place. Questions such as “where did he/her go to college?” become the norm in our conversation. We often forget this is the same person that came from schools that did not prepare her/him well in becoming an autonomous learner in science, math and writing. If we have to fix this image, the fixing process need to happen throughout the entire education system. Just putting a Band-Aid in convenient places will add up to the problem and will not in any way help to solve it.
Education can change people’s lives. And for many, it has done just that. The trans-formative power of education especially for poor rural children is surreal. Numerous examples exists of people climbing the economic ladder due to education in a single generation. The examples are too many for the poor in rural areas not to notice.
But, is this still the reality of today’s education system in Tanzania?
Discussing education opportunities for their childrenIn Tanzania and much of the developing countries, children are looked at as investments. The more education one acquires, the better the chance to land a lucrative job afterwards. This in turn, guarantees a good living wage, retirement (plan) for themselves, and their parents.
Unfortunately in the past decade, this line of reasoning has turned into a trap for many families in Tanzania.
Many rural families spend a lot of capital to send their sons and daughters to schools following this fallacy. In other words many parents are hoping for a good return on their investments–that is not actually there. They hope to create a “safety net” for themselves because none exist through the government. This is especially true for peasant families that don’t receive any type of retirement income after many years of hard work.
walking to school
For most of the rural kids attending ward secondary schools, the prospect of ending up with a division zero and/or four “if they are luck” is hanging at 85% according to statistics from the Tanzanian Ministry of Education’s data on form IV pass rates for the past 3 years. All of these failing kids are a retirement investment plan that has gone sour for themselves and their parents. If this was a bank doing this kind of business(education utapeli)–many people will be heading to jail for selling a fake product. The parents are losing money twice in this scheme: (1) a shot at a decent life for their kids and (2) a retirement investment for themselves.
Pupils sweeping the ground in the morning
The pathetic state of the schools and the schooling conditions is killing the dream that many Tanzanian families have for their children. And the sad thing is–this was not the case from independence all the way to the nineties. Most of the people you see occupying the high-rise offices in Dar came up from poor families through education. Education then, was a much flatter playing field than it is today.
This debate come and go every year when the dismal pass rates of our secondary and primary school students are announced. This year, this same debate came with a twist. The guardian newspaper reported recently that the Deputy Minister for Education and Vocational Training Philipo Mulugo and the government of Tanzania are in the process of drafting a new policy to make Kiswahili the language of instruction in both primary and secondary schools in Tanzania.
It is indeed true that the current system is not working. Everyone agrees with this premise. To make this situation worse, there is no ideal solution to the problem. This problem is so complex and multi-faceted.
While I see the value of a Kiswahili only model in improving students’ scores and comprehension for all the subjects matter, I fear that this new system will only perpetuate the already existing stratified education system in Tanzania between the very few “ the haves” and the majority of the “have-nots”. The “haves” will continue to send their children to English Medium Schools while the poor will be stuck with the Swahili only schools, creating a country of masters and slaves in the not too far future. If we are not already there?
Is this what we really want?
the path to improving the system relies on a strengthened bilingual education system model. A strengthened bilingual education system model will put enough resources to colleges to be able to teach teachers the current research based teaching methods which will not only benefit educators but, students as well. To provide professional development opportunities for teachers by improving their working conditions, to pay them a livable wage, and to attract more people to become teachers. Furthermore, to encintivise the good teachers to stay in the profession for a long enough time for them to become competent and efficient educators. Without those kinds of incentives, the change of language of instruction alone will not yield anything worthwhile.
The argument that changing just the language of instruction will yield the desired results is flawed. Don’t we already have English teachers in these schools? Why then are the students not learning English proficiently?The problem impacting the education system in Tanzania is not largely due to the language of instruction. If that was the case, we would see a huge pass rate in primary schools where mostly everything is taught in Kiswahili. The TWAWEZA report on this matter last year point to the contrary. Kids are not learning anything worthwhile in primary school either.
Resources needs to be improved, from teacher quality, the teaching environment, and to teaching tools.
I realize that there is a huge difference between learning English and being taught in English. Switching just the language of instruction will not be the solution to the massive failure rates in both primary and secondary schools. The problem is deeper than that. Huge systematic and policy changes need to happen before we see a real and meaningful uptick in the pass rates. Maybe pairing our existing teachers with teachers from abroad over a long time “ten years” could be something to be explored. The East Asian countries used this model and they are doing very well. Maybe we can learn from them this time around.
Once again, it is that time of the year when the Form IV results from the Tanzania National Examination Council comes out. To be specific, the 2011 Form Results were officially announced yesterday. This is the time when I post the snippets of what has happened with the numbers. My prediction looking to the future last year was that, the pass rates percentages will remain largely low in the foreseeable future.
The major factors contributing to the low performance are many. I will list just a few: 1) The Ward school’s lack of well qualified staffs and resources and 2) The social promotion of those who failed Form II Examination is catching up with the ill-advised policy, 3) Lack of English proficiency for the language of instruction for both students and teachers, 4) Lack of content knowledge and pedagogical skills for the teachers (quality instructional practices).
Here is the breakdown (Tanzania Form Four, Pass Rates 2011a) of the number for the 2011 just announced results. Out of 459,324 students who registered to take the examination, 426,314 students took the exams and 53.37% of them passed it. There was a 2.63% uptick in pass rates for this year comparing to last year’s results of 50.74%. The 2011 results are still approximately 20% drop from the 2009 pass rate of 72.51%.
Just looking at the numbers on the attached Excel graph, there is no significant performance improvement graphically speaking. Failure rate stabilization is the correct term to use in this year’s characterization of the Form IV results.
The results provided by NECTA did not provide a meaningful disaggregation of the 53.37 pass rate for this year. Meaningful numbers of the 53.37% who passed the exams; how many got division Ones, twos, threes and fours? Those numbers would offer a better picture than the pass rate comparison that is currently used. Here is graphical representation of the(Kwiro Center Form IV Results 2011 ) in Mahenge-Ulanga, Morogoro.
Maybe the failure rates have hit the bottom, but I would not say that there was a performance improvement in exams results this year. The numbers will largely stay at this level for years to come until the four factors I mentioned earlier have been addressed.
I will be teaching a 90 minutes Swahili lesson for beginners in Atlanta on July 11th, 2012 from 6:00 to 7:30 pm. Come join me and other international language LOVERS from across this lovely city of Atlanta. This lecture is part of the CASIE Atlanta Language Meet-Up. The Speakeasy is a monthly meeting showcasing a model language lesson taught entirely in the target language.
A Swahili Child Picking Up Crabs During a Low Tide, Zanzibar
It scares me a little to be speaking and teaching Swahili for 90 minutes to a group of 23 people who have never heard a word of Swahili before other than Simba, Pumba, Rafiki and/or Hakuna Matata while watching the Lion King.
I know it is going to be a challenge. Engaging a huge number of grown-ups for that length of time and building interest in them to learn Swahili beyond the basic greetings is going to be hard to say the least. I do love the challenge though and I will make sure that my first impression will last long enough to make them want to come back and learn Swahili to conversational level of proficiency and beyond.
This is a quote from the CASIE Atlanta website: “There are many organizations who promote languages, but no organizations who offer face to face instruction with a focus on communicative approaches for learning language”. For this and other reasons, I feel it is very important for me to get involved in Atlanta to put Kiswahili language on the map. I know there are many African and other world languages that are spoken in Atlanta, but Swahili is left behind due to lack of promotion on our part and the fact that there was no a real platform before for that to happen.
Sailing Party in Nungwi, Zanzibar
Therefore, the Speak-Easy Meet-Ups are a great opportunity for Swahili to get the attention it deserves. There are many people who would love to learn Swahili, but the lack of organized classes for them to take and practice with a native speaker sometimes is getting on the way. I believe with this opportunity; we can change all that.
I need help to do this correctly though. If you know anyone who teaches Swahili to beginners let me know. I will be happy to have a phone conversation with them so that I will be better prepared to deliver a good session. Let’s Put Swahili in the ranks with other major international languages here in Atlanta.
An Evening Full of Life in a Swahili Street, Dar Es Salaam
According to credible reports, “MV Spice Islander” had a maximum human loading capacity of 600 passengers. However, at the time of its sinking, it was carrying 2470 passengers. That is four times the maximum allowed. Further reports says, 941 passengers survived, 203 passengers lost their lives and 1326 passengers are still missing. I’m saddened by the magnitude of human loss.
The report further states, the cause of the accident was “severe levels of negligence.” Nine (9) people have been arraigned in connection to the accident. The dead and survivors of this accident will be compensated at a rate of Tshs 125,000 for 80 months which is equivalent to Tshs 10,000,000 per person.
The suggested figure is what I have issues with. I feel like the figures are too low and will not work as a deterrent for future man-made accidents. My understanding is that human life is priceless. To save it, stiffer penalties must be imposed as a deterrent.
My questions are:
Why payments are based on the basic salary levels?
What made the commission to assume that all these people were going to die in the next 6 years and a half (80 months)?
Why not use established income earning potentials for each of the passengers and life expectancy figures to figure out the payment?
This was an opportunity to severely punish those involved so that it will be a lesson to them and for others currently benefiting from this kind of behavior. Don’t let this incident be another missed opportunity like MV Bukoba. This should be a wake up call to shipowners, bus owners, and everyone involved in the transportation business. They needs to understand that “if you cause an accident due to negligence” leading to a loss or loss of lives; severe consequences will follow. The “kazi ya mungu” excuse should not be be the norm.
Once a person purchase a ticket, it’s a contractual agreement between the two parties and that the latter will transport the former safely from point A to point B. These contracts need to be honored. Maybe in the future (“that means now”) the government could implement a system that forces bus, ship and any kind of transportation business owners to declare the insurance value of a passenger and luggage on the back of the ticket in case an accident happens.
My belief is that if the owners are subjected to stiff penalties whenever accidents happens and are starting to see that their profits are being eroded; they will make sure that accidents due to negligence will not be a daily occurrences in Tanzania. To make them change their minds and put safety measures before profit, you have to hit them where it matters most—profits.
In addition to a deterrence on the part of the ship, buses, and any-other type of transportation owners. Citizen awareness campaign regarding overcrowding in public transportation needs to be carried out. It seems people are not learning from these incidence. More campaigns on road safety and problems associated with overcrowding are severely needed.
I will end you with this, “the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over while expecting a different outcome.”
How can a student cheat under these conditions?. Leaking exams–maybe the culprit.
There is a Swahili saying that goes like “when elephants fight, it’s the grass that suffers”. This saying came to my mind today as I was reading articles and comments related to the release of the 2011 Standard Seven Examination results in Tanzania. A total of 983,545 students sat for Standard Seven Examination in 2011. It is true that some gains have been made on the pass rate of standard seven graduates from 2010 to 2011. There has been a 4.76% jump over the one year period from 53.52% in 2010 to 58.28% in 2011. That in itself is commendable.
On the flip-side, cheating incidents have increased 78.5 times over the same period. From 124 cancelled student’s results in 2010 to 9,736 cancelled student’s results in 2011. Student cheating during examination in the Tanzanian education system is not a new phenomenon. Leaking of examination papers goes way back since the time I was in primary school.
The question is “who is leaking exams at the Ministry, the regional, and the school levels?.” There is no need to be complacent. Leaked examination papers always shows up each year close to the testing period. It is a huge business and almost everyone in the education field in Tanzania knows this. At times, three to five exam papers maybe circulating all over the country. Do we also blame the pupils for that? I also find the mass punishment of the pupils and parents caught up in this mess is excessive. Adults need to be held accountable here and not children. However, I do agree with the suggestions to establish a “Form One” entrance exam to all incoming Form One students to assess their abilities in reading, writing, and mathematics.
This was an incredible year. I finally had the opportunity to visit Soweto. It was an incredible moment for me to see the houses of both my favorite South African leaders, Desmond Tutu and Nelson Mandela.
I also had the opportunity to work with my co-workers to organize an event to raise funds for the Mutombo Dikembe Foundation. I have always thought that I was of a decent height, until Dikembe Mutombo towered over me at the event. The whole experience resulted into a sore neck at the end. Is this how short people feel standing next to me?
I just had to take this photo. The girls were such a beauty along the side of the beach in Nungwi Village, Zanzibar. Aren’t they cute?
This is the view over a window at the Zanzibar Museum in Stone Town, Zanzibar. It was too beautiful. I had to grab my camera and shoot this amazing scenary.
I had an amazing walk in those sweaty and humid narrow streets in Mji Mkongwe (Stone Town), Zanzibar. The shops are everywhere and the shop keepers are eager for you to unzip your wallet.
I took the three shots below in the Rock City (Mwanza), Tanzania. I fell in love with Mwanza. The temperature was just right and the price was also right. The city was very gentle to my wallet. I will be here again in the near future.
I just could not resist remembering this small restaurant just on the outside of the main bus stop in Shinyanga. The menu tells it all. I had to test the “LOST KUKU” and amazingly it was really good for the price. I will indeed eat there next time. Hopefully, I will find myself in this party of the country soon.
These three shots were taken in Meatu, Shinyanga, Tanzania. This is the only superstore in Town. Despite the lack of necessities in Meatu, I met the friendliest people on earth.
Kibogoji, what else can I say about it. This is the village that I humbly borrowed the name for my blog. The village is located somewhere between madongo poromoka in Morogoro, Tanzania.
The three shots above shows some of the residents of Kibogoji. The next two pics below shows the mountains surrounding the village of Kibogoji.
Back in Dar Es Salaam. It was such a joy to meet and take photos of the people I love and remember as the year comes to an end. Merry Xmass, hear!!.
Enough with Tanzania and now back to reality-my reality that is.
This woman wanted to take a picture of me at the DICOTA convention in Washington D.C. and I was like ooh no babe! I have to take yours as well. I have no idea who she was, but her image is still fresh in my memory.
Tanzania turned 50 years old yesterday. I should correctly say—Tanganyika as there was no Tanzania during the 1961 Independence Day. Tanzania is just a union between two independent states—Tanganyika and Zanzibar (Pemba and Unguja) in 1964.
Tanzania turns 50
Enough said. Progress is engulfing my mother land. If car ownership is an indication of how we’re progressing as the country’s president said a year ago, then there are no need for those grim statistics by the world-bank ranking Tanzania as one of the poorest nations in the world—just close to and/or next to Mozambique. The roads are filled with them. Puffing and smoking in their rears. At most times, in a city like Dar Es Salaam—the roads turn into parking lots.
The Tanzania @ 50 UHURU celebrations was nothing short of a short-lived distraction from REALITY. F**ckreality man—let show them how we party despite our poverty, lack of infrastructure, a deteriorating educational system, the lack of proper health care system and the list goes on and on.
Anyhow–who cares if our pregnant women give birth on filthy floors, no stationary at most police posts, operations are suspended in Muhimbili hospital due to lack of oxygen, kids are seating on the floor in roofless buildings in an attempt to learn something worthwhile in their tiny lives. Who the f**ck cares!!!
In addition, we continue to borrow without knowledge of when and how we are going to pay for the debt. The next generation is already in debt up to their eye brow. But, despite all this, let’s go on and spend billions we don’t have to throw a party of the “Kings and Queens” of Zwangendaba –just because we can.
Who cares—-next week we will send our leaders all over the world’s capitals to beg again from countries that are themselves struggling economically. Countries that are themselves cutting wasteful spending through various austerity measures. Any-who, let celebrate.
Who is stupid? It’s the wanainchi stupid!
How do you look to other world leaders in the face asking for money to implement your country’s developmental projects under these circumstances. These other countries collect taxes like you do. It’s the tax money from gays, lesbian, transgendered and straight people who support your budget. You also want to have big balls when you are asked to uphold the rights of gays, lesbians and transgendered people in your society? You can take the cash from gays, but, giving gays protections under your laws is against African culture? What hypocrite?
I would be very embarrassed to wear your shoes, however nice or Italian personally designed they may be.
Today, I am taking time to reflect on what is happening to the new order of leadership in Tanzania. I remember when I was little. I mean, when I was very little. Back in the day. The days in the early 1980s.
In those days. A young energetic prime minister tragically died on a terrible car accident close to Morogoro. He died on the-then-newly opened paved/tarmac road from Dar Es Salaam to Dodoma.
I was just a child, thus, my recollection of the events surrounding the accident may not be entirely correct.
However, I have a vivid memory of it all.
Picha kwa Hisani ya Bongo Pixs
Mr. Sokoine passed away from injury sustained after the car he was traveling-in collided with Dumisan Dube’s at Dumila, Morogoro. Dumisan was a young South African freedom fighter living in Tanzania at the time. In the 70s and the early 80s, many South African freedom fighters lived in camps in Tanzania where they learned general life and military skills aimed at equipping them with necessary life and military skills to fight apartheid once they returned back to their home country.
I have no idea what the court rulings for case were. I do not know whether Dube was found guilty or not.
I sometimes ask myself whom was at fault?
or whom was found guilty for causing the accident?
The accident that caused the eventual death of the Prime Minister.
I have no answers to my own questions.
The whole investigation and court ruling was kept secret.
What I know is this–there is still a huge cloud of suspicion onto the manner in which the accident happened.
The accident happened at the heat of the war against economic saboteurs.
Vita dhidi ya walanguzi.
Was the war against economic saboteur the reason for his death?
or was it just a coincident?
I don’t know.
The one thing I vividly remember to date is this:
When Sokoine died.
The whole country was in tears.
Real tears.
Not crocodile tears we often see now-days.
Everyone was mourning the death of a great promising young leader.
At the time.
It was information overload in a sense. Talking about information overload back then–it was kind of weird.
There was only one radio station on the dial.
Radio Tanzania Dar Es Salaam (RTD) and in some occasions the Kenyan Broadcasting Corporation (KBC).
You had no choice but listen to the never-ending four weeks of the Nation in Mourning.
I mean this in a good way.
I could still remember man’s burial ceremony on the radio.
It was like the biggest super-ball game.
The event is imprinted forever on my mind.
The song “kila mtu atauchukua mzigo wake mwenyewe” was in our 277 Panasonic radio (Radio Mkulima).
The only radio we had in the house.
The burial ceremony was broadcasted live on the radio.
It felt like I was in Monduli that day.
Watching his casket lowered to the ground.
It was surreal.
I was young.
A child.
Like many young minds. I was wondering what happened to dead people.
Do they go to hell (motoni)?
or do they go to heaven (peponi)?
The dichotomy that religion teaches us.
Are there no middle grounds for the dead?
Like.
Half hell.
Half heaven.
The gray area so to speak.
What is it with young people’s mind and death?
Death is sometimes scary to the young mind.
The thought of laying in the grave and being eaten by termites.
I had those thoughts.
The undeveloped thought.
Lack of maturity.
And death is sometimes fascinating to the young mind.
The “goods” of not knowing “too much” of and about what is happening around you.
Of not entirely comprehending the laws of nature.
The laws that suggests the natural cycling of matter in the universe.
That matter is neither created nor destroyed.
That matter has to return back to the ground.
To release the essential elements of life.
Through decomposition.
With maggots
Worms
Bacteria.
Fungi.
So now I wonder.
I wonder what would happen if a leader on the same stature as Edward Moringe Sokoine was ever died on an accident today.
Would the Tanzanians of today.
Full of udaku.
Would they cry?
Laugh?
Celebrate?
Or will they just be consumed with indifference?
I know the current leaders are smart people.
At least that is what they believe.
The Tanzania contemporary leaders.
They have great solutions for everything.
I wonder.
And ask myself.
Would those in power today parade people on the street to show emotion that isn’t there?
How would they do it?
Think of how they buy votes.
Perhaps, they could buy people to cry.
on the street.
For the dead.
Like they do in Ghana.
The crier for hire.
Or will they do what happened in Ethiopia a few years ago when the not so beloved Prime Minister passed away.
Shame.
I feel ashamed.
of myself.
of the people who are being corned.
With the crookedness of the human nature.
corruption.
All for me attitude.
The capitalists attitude.
Materialism.
Wanting more for self.
Nothing else matters.
What happened to human descence
Is it all gone?
I wonder.
And.
I feel like the connection between leaders and their subjects has disappeared.
That connection has completely evaporated.
Disappeared and never to be seen again.
Is it because most of the new leaders have lost touch?
Touch with the people they pretend to lead.
Leadership
In the old day.
In the Ntemi days.
Was being with the people.
Listening to the people.
Working on the people’s ideas.
Finding solutions.
Together.
Nowadays.
Leadership.
Is.
Imposition of external solution.
Solution with no real meaning to the intended communities.
Not organic solution.
Imposing.
Forcing.
Coercing.
And.
The contemporary leaders.
Chose to serve themselves.
Rather than the people who entrusted them with the office in the first place.
Again.
Just me wondering.
Of.
What.
Has.
Gone.
Wrong.
My mind sometimes goes in circles.
Thinking.
Analyzing.
Troubleshooting.
However.
I do not wish for any of you leaders in Tanzania to die.
Of course not.
I am just interested in seeing what will the reaction be?
I have been to several American Civil War Battlefields. I have no idea to why and where I acquired the interest to visit them. I have been to the one in Maryland named Gettysburg Civil War Battlefields, the one in Virgiani named Manassas National Battlefields, and just this early foggy morning I went to see the one in Georgia named Kennesaw Battlefields. These are some of the many interesting battle fields accross the United States depicting what happened during that nasty and bloody American Civil War.
It is amazing to go back to that time and see how those soldiers fought. Nasty and bloody combats. Sometimes losing 1000 and more soldiers in a few hours of a day. I just wonder what these soldiers would think of the Americans of today? Was the ultimate sacrifice they died for worth all that blood?
As we are waiting for thursday to come and give our thanks(with turkey ofcourse) for the brave people who fought for the freedom we are enjoy today, let not forget the injustices suffered by many americans in the past. Here is a crip from the documentary “trail of tears” depicting the forceful removal of the cherokee indian tribe from Georgia just because their land happened to have “gold” in it.
Here are some of the pictures from the Kennesaw Battlefield. Click on the picture to see an enlarged image. Should I say enjoy the pictures??
Garrison middle school is a title 1 school in the Baltimore city public school system. 99.3 % of the students were African American according to the school systems website. The rest (0.7 %) were Hispanic, Asian and Whites. 93 % of the students received free lunch and breakfast. The student enrollment for the 2004/2005, 2005/2006 school years were 808 and 876 respectively. The school had a total of 56 teachers.
Garrison middle school was performing poorly in reading and mathematics. The school had failed to meet the states’ Adequately Yearly Progress for three years (2004 to 2006). The data on the table shows the performance levels in reading for the six and seventh graders at Garrison middle school for two years (2004 and 2005).
I believe strongly that the performance levels at Garrison is Influenced largely by the lack of commitment by parents and teachers towards students success. Conducive learning environment where the learning process is uninterrupted by students misbehavior is an essential component for students to demonstrate the highest levels of understanding. When this is lucking, the result more often appear in the students’ mediocre performance in standardized tests at all levels.
The chaotic nature in the classroom is directly linked to how the parents value education. Whenever children are constantly told the strong value of education by the parents…..most often they come to school well prepared and hence allowing the process of learning to take its course. This has been lacking at Garrison Middle school for the past few years and is reflected of the students’ performance on the Maryland State Assessment report-card.
The other factor affecting reading performance at Garrison is student mobility. The Baltimore city school system students are highly mobile and that affects their learning process. They move from school to school with teachers of varying levels of teaching ability. This interferes with their progress in learning.
Furthermore, Garrison middle school is a revolving door for teachers. Most teachers spend one to two years and then move on to do other things or to teach at less stressful schools. This leaves Garrison with less qualified teachers and veteran teachers who are “burned out” and could careless with what is happening to their students in terms of learning.
Garrison had only 45 % of highly qualified teachers for the three years (2004 to 2006). Most classes were taught by unqualified teachers working on conditional certification. This had negative consequences in terms of student performance levels as reflected by the Maryland State report card.
Here are some great resources and opportunities for African-American individuals to go to undergraduate and graduate school for free to some of the top American Universities. Have fun with it!
1. Wake Forest University has an opportunity for minority students to attend its MBA program for FREE, and so far, the response has been very poor. Please pass along this opportunity to your friends, families. This is a great school and a tremendous opportunity to attend a top graduate school. See the details below, the contact person is: Derrick S. Boone, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Marketing, Rm. 3139 Worrell Professional Center, Babcock Graduate School of Management – Wake Forest University_ WINSTON_SALEM N.C 27109-8738 email:derrick.boone@mba.wfu.edu or visit http://www.wfu.edu phone# toll free (866) 925-3622
2. Black Male Teachers needed. Do you know any Black Males who are seniors in high school who want to go to college out of state for FREE? The CALL ME MISTER program offered by 4 historically black colleges in South Carolina, Benedict College, Chaflin University, Morris College, and South Carolina State University – visit the www.callmemister.clemson.edu/index.htl details online application or call 1.800.640.2657
3. Harvard University is offering free tuition to families of HONOR STUDENTS whose income is less than $125,000 per year. Visit www.fao.fas.harvard.edc or call 617.495.1581.
4. Syracuse University School of Architecture is desperately seeking young women and men of color interested in pursuing a 5 yr. professional degree in Architecture. Contact: Mark Robbins, Dean School of Architecture, 201 Slocum Hall, Syracuse , NY 13244-1250 (315) 443-256 www.soa.syr.edu/indes.php
5. A free pair of eyeglasses from Target for any child ages 12 and under brings a valid prescription for glasses from their doctor. You can find stores with optical departments at www.target.com
6. APPLY NOW – If you have/know young adults between the ages of 18-31 with a High School Diploma. Can earn up to $100,000 and earn benefits. The Federal Aviation Association is taking application for Air Traffic Controller School visit the website www.faa.gov/jobs_opportunities/airtrafficcontroller/
pharmaceuticals in drinking waterLast week I attended Advanced Placement Environmental Science Educators Training at Kennesaw State University. Kennesaw University is located in the north-western part of the massive metropolis called Atlanta. During the training I learned different inquiry (lab) based methods of teaching advanced placement environmental science to students. It was a great week filled with fun experiences.
As a part of the experiential learning for the training, the training participants visited the Membrane Bioreactor (MBR) sewage treatment plant. While there, we discussed the advantages of an MBR over traditional sewage treatment plants. In the middle of this discussion, a person asked a question about pharmaceuticals. I vividly remember the question: Do MBR sewage treatment process remove pharmaceuticals in the treated water?
That question actually made me think twice about where the medications (such as pills, injections, topical creams, etc) that millions and millions of people take everyday ends-up. In fact, it is a known fact that what goes in must come out. Which conforms with the law of conservation of mass. Only a small portion of the medication that we ingest is actually metabolized. The rest is released to the environment through our urine, fecal matters, through perspiration, and many other means. The questions I asked myself while reflecting on this issue was: where do the by-products go to after we flush the toilets and/or when dumped in landfills after they expire? Are there microbes or natural phenomenon that break these pharmaceuticals down?
Pharmaceuticals are the biggest incoming environmental and health challenge of our time. There are millions and millions of people taking a variety of medication each single day. All these pharmaceuticals finally end up in our waterways. In addition, most of the pharmaceuticals have long half-lives (Brausch et al.2012). Furthermore, there are few natural microbes capable of metabolizing these toxic chemicals. Thus, they stay in the environment longer increasing the likelihood that their concentrations in our waterways will continue to increase each passing year and possibly reaching toxic levels in a not so distant future.
The effect of pharmaceuticals to human and other animals is not very well documented as of yet. However, several studies done on fish have shown negative effect to fish population exposed to elevated levels of pharmaceuticals in rivers, streams, and lakes (Daughton & Temes, 1999; Boxall et al. 2003a; 2004a; Floate et al. 2005). Furthermore, some studies have confirmed that in some species male fish have actually turned into female when their habitats were exposed to high levels of pharmaceuticals for long durations(Brodin et al. 2014).
What the low concentrations of pharmaceuticals found currently in drinking water doing to the human body is currently a mystery.
Admittedly, the pharmaceuticals are in minute concentrations right now. However, since none of the water treatment plants can remove them off of our water supply–we are running the risk of their concentration increasing over the next few years to toxic levels and harming us if they are not doing so already.
No Government Plans to Eliminate Pharmaceutical in Our Drinking Water
Right now in America there are no legislation to deal with pharmaceuticals in drinking water or the water that goes into the streams, rivers, and lakes. At the same time, trace amount of pharmaceuticals have already been recorded in many urban and suburban water supply systems.
What is America going to do with this impending health and environmental problem?
I do not know about you, but I would rather not drink unprescribed pills in the water I drink. That’s just me.
With all the hormones, antidepressants, and other different types of medications in the drinking water supplies; no wonder–people can no-longer stand each- other.
And you are wrong even if you drink bottled water–you are still taking in pills!
I have summarized the three most effective teaching ideals that I find useful in my daily duty as an educator.
1.People learn to do well only what they practice by doing.
With regard to the above mentioned effective teaching idea, I have always tried to incorporate some hands on activities in my lesson plans and delivery. For instance, last week when my students were learning about the menstrual cycle, I used data from the internet that shows how luteinizing hormone (LH) levels changes before and after ovulation.
This helped my students to not only learn how to draw line graphs but also to interpret what is represented by the data. It was not the perfect way of showing them the hormonal changes associated with the menstrual cycle, but it just help them to visually comprehend the abstract idea I was presenting to them.
2.Expectations affect performance.
I always expect high performance in whatever my students are engaged in. This is not only for my students, I strive to be a better educator for them and I will not accept less than what I am confidence they are capable of.
This should not be translated as lamping all students in the same category but to recognize their individual potentials as well. I do realize that students learn and perform differently, but they all have to conform to the same standards regardless of their individual capabilities in learning. Therefore, whenever opportunity arises I do try to help each and every student to realize their full potentials without demanding for something that they might not be able to achieve otherwise.
3. Use of team approach.
Regardless of my struggle with teaching and learning, I have always tried to involve my students in group work especially during interactive lessons. I believe that it is paramount for students to gain experience for sharing responsibility for learning with each other. I do use name cards for each students with their specialties for that particular lesson in order to reduce confusions and increase efficiency in the flow of the lesson or experiment.
I know the strategy does limit the students to a particular function each day and there is no room for them to explore other functions, but at least the classroom environment becomes less confusing. I will try to rotate the students’ functions as much as possible to be in line with the best learning environment I am developing for my students.
I was reading a few peer reviewed articles in my educational research class and found some interesting information that I would like to share with you all. If you are interested in how students learn and the strategies that research has proven to help all students learn, you will more than likely be informed by reading through the annotated bibliography I painstakingly created below.
And, if you are not interested in the process of educating the minds, you will also learn something about yourself through reading these articles as well. All in all, happy reading and I hope you discover something new from the research.
Shaaban K. Fundi
Annotated Biblography
10/26/11
1.Young, Y.Y., Wright, J.V., and Laster, J. (2005). Instructing African American Students. Journal of Education and Urban Society 125(3): 516-524.
This peer reviewed paper identifies and examine research based findings on effective instructional practices in the context of their applicability for classroom teaching-learning situations. The research paper has identified two types of learners, the global learner and the analytical learner. A global learner (right brain) is visual, tactile and kinesthetic. She/He visualizes what has to be learned, touches what has to be learned and also moves a lot during the learning process.
Most, if not all African American students are global learners and tend to be uncomfortable in an academic setting because their learning styles are not met.
Analytical learners (left brain) recall facts and dates with relative easy as well as process information linearly. They can process information that is written or orally. Most analytical learners are American students with European descent. Based on the aforementioned information, this style of learner tends to be comfortable in an academic setting (Angro-American Centered Classroom) because their learning style is most often addressed.
In order to teach African American students successfully, instructional variability is a key. Instructional strategies need to incorporate movement, visual and touching to address the learning style needs of African American students.
2.Castle, S., Deniz, C.B., and Tortola, M. (2005). Flexible Grouping and Students Leanring in a High-Needs School. Journal of Education and Urban Society 37(2): 139-150.
This peer reviewed paper studied the impact of flexible grouping on students learning during a period of 5 years in a high-needs school. The researchers tracked non-transient, below goal elementary students on multiple literacy assessments using flexible grouping strategies. Results from the study showed that the percentage of students attaining mastery increased in 16 of 19 over-time comparisons.
Flexible grouping is a classroom organizational strategy that is designed to address a broad range of students needs within a single classroom. To meet the need of contemporary classrooms that are characterized by widely diverse student population with varying academic, language, social, and cultural needs, need based instruction strategies are paramount. Additionally, grouping students according to their needs is more effective instructional strategy than ability grouping.
3.Westhuizen, V.P., Mosoge, M.J., Swanepoel, L.H., and Coetsee, L.D. (2005). Organizational Culture and Academic Achievement in Secondary Schools. Journal of Education and Urban Society, 38(1): 89-109.
This peer reviewed paper looks at factors affecting performance negatively in lower achieving schools and positively in high achieving schools. The researchers have identified several factors that affect academic achievement of learners. These factors include organizational culture and school culture. Organizational culture seems to be a key factor for under-achievement in schools.
The findings in this research indicate that a healthy and positive organizational culture exists in high achieving schools whereas the same cannot be said for low achieving schools. A positive organizational culture seems to exercise an exceptionally positive influence on the members of a school and is instrumental in directing their behavior in achieving the stated goal of the school.
4.Shulman, V., and Armitage, D. (2005). Project Discovery: An Urban Middle School Reform Effort. Journal of Education and Urban Society, 37(4): 371-397.
This peer reviewed study reports on a 5- year project to improve urban, middle level student achievement through the implementation of two initiatives. (1) Teachers at participating New York middle school were engaged in weekly curriculum planning workshops to reformulate classroom curricula into interdisciplinary, discovery learning oriented activities. (2) Undergraduate college students from urban public colleges were recruited to work as teaching scholars in the middle school.
The results showed a gain in student achievement which was demonstrated by a significant increase in the number of students meeting state standards on standardized test score in mathematics and English.
5.Heystek, H., (2003). Parents as Governors and Partners in Schools. Journal of Education and Urban Society, 37(4): 371-397.
This peer reviewed study looks at parental involvement as a factor for academic achievement of students. Parents and schools are partners in the education of children because schools are a formalized extension of the family. Schools can not function properly void of parental involvement.
In spite of this demand on parental involvement in schools, this research in black schools indicates that parental involvement in school activities is limited. This in turn, leads to low achievement in most of these schools.
A Review of the Effectiveness of Lead Abatement Strategies in Reducing Lead Exposure Among Children.
By Shaaban Kitindi Fundi,
Executive Summary
Despite the growing recognition of lead abatement as an intervention for reducing the risk of lead exposure to children, very few scientists have attempted to review data on its effectiveness. This study reviews the current information on residential lead abatement procedures in order to determine whether these abatement strategies are an effective method to prevent lead exposure in children, as measured by blood lead levels.
A standardized protocol for searching, acquiring, and extracting study data and synthesizing results across studies was used. The criteria for studies to be included in the review were: (1) includes children under the age of 6 years, (2) conducted in the United States, (3) published between January 1990 and March 2004, and (4) have a pre/post or multi arm study design. Nineteen studies were found that met the inclusion criteria.
Three of the nineteen identified studies looked at soil abatement, four looked at paint abatement, ten looked at dust abatement, and two studies used a mixture of soil and dust abatement. No studies looking at the effect of monitoring tap water for lead on children’s lead exposure were identified in this review. The studies varied greatly in terms of their sample size, study design, and methods of data collection.
A review of studies looking at the effectiveness of residential lead abatement strategies at reducing blood lead levels in children found mixed results. Soil abatement strategies appear to be most effective when the soil concentration is quite high (>1000ppm) and when children’s exposure to lead is primarily through contaminated soil and not household dust.
The studies regarding lead paint abatement also show mixed results. Amitai, et al. found that doing abatement while children were living in the home actually caused a short term increase in mean blood lead levels. For this reason, it may be more effective to do primary prevention by abating homes before occupancy than to wait to do abatement after the children have already been exposed. There is also evidence that lead paint abatement may be most effective for children with very high lead blood levels (>25μg/dL) suggesting that this strategy may make more sense as a targeted intervention.
Finally, the data suggest that residential dust abatement strategies are most effective when done multiple times as household dust tends to re-accumulate after short periods of time. In addition, carpets and upholstery remain important reservoirs for lead exposure and new techniques need to be developed to better clean these potential sources of lead exposure.
Once again, fall is upon us-the temperature is dipping
by the day. I saw a weatherman today, predicting the temperature will continue to fall and by next week’s end we might be in the 20’s. It is amazing how temperature changes here, without notice we will be back in the 20F’s again and walking to our mail boxes in the after-work hours to pick up those astronomical winter gas (electricity) bills. It seems like there is no end.
The summers are extremely hot in the Hotlanta, and the winters are mildly colder. Hence, there is no break from Georgia Power. I was just thinking (wishful thinking here) maybe fall should stay for awhile. That will indeed give us a break from these back to back gas (electrical) bills.
On the other hand I feel like we put ourselves in this situation. What happened to just owning homes that are relative to our family sizes? Less space equals to lesser space to warm up during the winter and less space to cool down during the summer months. What I am trying to say is that, Atlanta has a median of 3 people per family. Surprisingly, the average house in Atlanta suburbs has a median of 4 rooms and 3.5 bathrooms. Why do we need all this space? OR Just filing-up our egos I presume.!!!
I guess it is a choice people have to make, but in this one I truly didn’t have a choice. I just had to swallow it, as there are no in betweens. I am one of those people who think dollars and cents before doing anything. I am among the people who would criticize people who drive huge SUVs (bad for the environmental, taking up two parking spaces and all the other tree huggers’ cries) but I have fallen with the masses in this one. Why? Even if I chose to buy a small house where would I find it? Everything is big here-cars, motorcycles, bicycles, human and even cats and dogs are all big.
Am I complaining? Not even close. I do really love my house except for them “summer and winter” electrical bills. Thinking of it, TANESCO would be a welcome break here. But, Georgia Power is always on and so are their bills, always on time.
I read with interest the article by Charles Krauthammer on the www.nydailynews.com today about the discovery of neutrino particles that travels faster than the speed of light.
If this experiment and the discovery happen to be correct, then most–if not all of the Einsteinian theories in physics will be absolute. It will set a precedence to the dawn of new physics laws and theories.
It is hard to imagine that what we have been made to believe for almost 100 years was (or might be) fundamentally incorect. What is next for physics? Are there other flaws to other sciences that we’re unaware of?
It is the waiting game now for more scientists to replicate the experiment and come up with same or different results.
At the end, we will always love you Einstein (in Whitney Houston’s Voice).
After the DICOTA convention on last sunday, myself and a Tanzanian couple with their 1 year old son, decided to take a tour of Washington D.C’s attractions.
This week has been such an interesting and uplifting week. The work in Boston went really well and the 50 years of Tanzania’s independence (DICOTA) convention was really informative and well planned. It really showed a detailed plan by all the committees involved despite the one hour fifty minutes we had to wait for the president to show up for his speech. Overall, it was a
great and informative convention.
Another maritime tragedy in TanzaniaIt is with sorrow I write this as my countrymen and women are grieving the loss of another too many lives wasted. My deepest condolence are to those who lost their loved ones.
A word of mouth from the survivors ……..” many of the people who died in the accident are children and women.” Thus, many of the died are going to an early grave.
I write with the realization that it is hard to supervise and monitor all marine and fresh water means of transportation in Tanzania. But, the facts still remain — we should at least have learned our lesson from the MV. Bukoba accident that killed over 1000 people in 1996.
While all this is happening, and after the fact–we hear that the Tanzania government is thinking about creating a “National Emergency Preparedness Task Force”. Don’t we have one already??? This should have been created and/done with — in 1997 after the MV. Bukoba catastrophic accident. Did we learn anything from accident?
In my views I do not see the need for another bureaucratic organ. It is indeed not needed considering the amount of resources available. We do have a traffic police force and road accidents are happening in a daily basis. The issue here is not lack of an organ to rescue people but lack of enforcement of the preventive steps to insure accidents do not happen in the first place. That is what is lacking!
What needs to be done is concentrate more on the prevention side of the preparedness and enforcement of the already established prevention measures such that accidents rarely happens. Having routine ship engine checks, ship body checks, life boat checks, making sure that ships owners adhere to loading capacities of their vessels etc, etc should be the first priority.
Always–prevention is better than a cure and it is cheaper at the same time. Most of the accidents that are happening in Tanzania are avoidable. It’s just common sense. Why do they allow un-maintained, over-loaded-ships to operate on our waterways?
How many accidents will it take for the “senses” to be “common” again?
Maybe ship-owners need to carry high premium insurance for the cargo and human life they waste every now and then. That would put them on notice and on the right path thinking-wise. They need to be taken to court and if found guilty–spend time in jail and pay both the dead and the injured handsomely.
I believe their bottom-line (profits) is merely affected when these types of accidents happens—because when people die due to negligence the people who profit from these types of negligence are not taken to account. This in turn creates no incentive to change what they are currently doing–that is killing indiscriminately in the name of accidents.
It is not Allah or Jesus that kills in most of these accidents, it is just negligence and negligence needs to be seriously confronted.
This accident has happened in the Zanzibar route which is a much safer route than the Mtwara –Dar Es Salaam route. It is quite common for ships in this route to stall (engine actually lose power in high seas) sometimes two times in a one way journey from either Mtwara –Dar or vice versa. Ill-maintained ships, over-loaded passengers and excess cargo are a norm in this route as well.
It is just a matter of time an accident like the one in Zanzibar will happen in this route as well if necessary preventive steps like the ones mentioned above are not going to be taken sooner.
In Pictures: The Zanzibar Ferry Disaster–Source BBC News.
Note: I use the word accident very lightly here as most of these so-called accidents are avoidable.
1.In an outrageous cable reported by Wikileaks, the former US Ambassador to Tanzania, Michael Retzer is reported to have said in his cable reports that President Jakaya Mrisho Kikwete has accepted gifts from the owner of the Kempinski Hotel chain, who is a citizen of the United Emirates.
2.This is, according to Ambassador Retzer, from a conversation he had with the Manager and Publicity Director of the former Dar es Salaam-based Kilimanjaro-Kempinski Hotel, Miss Lisa Pile.
3.This cable is as untruthful as it is outrageous. It is full of lies and innuendoes seeking to tarnish the good image and name of the President. It is unfortunate and highly disappointing that an ambassador worth his name could engage in this kind of lazy gossip.
4.The Directorate of the Presidential Communications would like to deny these lies in the strongest terms possible as follows:
5.We would like to state categorically that there has never been a time when the President received gifts from Ali Albwardy. This is definitely an outrageous claim and if there is evidence to the contrary, we would like to challenge Mr. Ambassador Retzer to produce it for the public to satisfy itself that what he is claiming are mere lies.
6.That there has never been a time, ever, when His Excellency Jakaya Mrisho Kikwete, during his time as Foreign Minister or currently as President of the United Republic of Tanzania, was flown by anybody to London on a subsidized shopping expedition to buy five suits. All his travels to London or any other places in the world have been duty assignments paid for by the Government of Tanzania. The matter of him being flown to London for subsidised shopping of five suites is outrageous.
7.That during his entire life, as Foreign Minister or as President, the President has never met in London nor travelled with Ali Albwardy to London on a shopping expedition. In any case as Foreign Minister he is given adequate clothing allowance. And, now as President his clothing is the responsibility of the state. He does not therefore need to be flown by anybody for subsidized shopping of suits.
8.That the President was not responsible for raising nor receiving campaign funds for CCM Party during the 2005 General Elections. He was simply the flag bearer of the Party. However, he is privy to information that Kempinski Kilimanjaro Hotel was never asked nor contributed a single cent towards CCM campaign. Therefore the allegations that Kempinski Kilimanjaro Hotel contributed one million (USD 1,000,000) toward CCM campaign are baseless and unfounded.
9.That the Government permission for possessing of the Kilimanjaro Hotel by Kempinski Hotels and the subsequent permission to Kempinski to build two new hotels – one on the edge of the Ngorongoro Crater and another on the Serengeti plains overlooking the main animal migration routes were issued by the Third Phase Tanzania Government and not by Mr. Kikwete’s Administration.
10.However, President Kikwete declined to grant permission to Kempinski Hotels permission to build on the right of the Ngorongoro Crater on the strength of environmental concerns. How come then that the President who had been offered so many favors such as suits and election money, took this principled position? This therefore testifies to the fact that, claims that the President has received favours are a concoction with malicious intentions from the authors.
11.That it is a lie that Mr Kikwete has frequented Kilimanjaro Kempinski Hotel in his personal capacity. The records are very clear; the President has never, ever on his own visited that Hotel except on official duties or when he has escorted official state guests or attended meetings.
12.It is unfortunate that the distinguished Ambassador would believe and transmit such baseless lies and hear-says from a single source. The Office of the President takes strong exception to such behaviour which seeks to tarnish the name and person of the President.
Going through the articles regarding creationism vs evolution has made me aware of the existence of the great debate that is boiling between the creationists and the evidence based supporters of the evolution process. I understand the fear that is held by the creationists about evolution and the significant challenge it possess to the creation only idea. As a science instructor representing the larger scientific community in a classroom, I feel that curriculum decisions based on the belief of creationism have no place in determining science standards.
To me, science is a particular way of knowing about the world. In science, explanations are limited to those based on observations and experiments that can be substantiated by other scientists. Explanations that cannot be based on empirical evidence are not a part of science. Thus, creationism, that provides explanations based on faith and not on empirical evidence has no part in science and no part in the science classroom.
Moreover, progress in science consists of the development of better explanations for the causes of natural phenomena. Scientists never can be sure that a given explanation is complete and final. Some of the hypotheses advanced by scientists turn out to be incorrect when tested by further observations or experiments. Yet many scientific explanations have been so thoroughly tested and confirmed that they are held with great confidence. The theory of evolution is one of these well-established explanations. An enormous amount of scientific investigation since the mid-19th century has converted early ideas about evolution proposed by Darwin and others into a strong and well-supported theory. Today the theory of evolution has become the bedrock of modern biology and is universally accepted by scientists as the engine for speciation.
However, creationists in their bid to get equal time in the science classroom, deliberately mislead the public by trying to present evolution as a controversial theory. I simply don’t understand why it is that today, more than 150 years after Charles Darwin published On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, we are still fighting over evolution. The Catholic Church has endorsed evolution; every competent biologist relies on its theoretical framework; and its mechanism and its consequences have been thoroughly documented. The theory of evolution has become the central unifying concept of biology and is a critical component of many related scientific disciplines. In contrast, the claims of creation science lack empirical support and cannot be meaningfully tested. These observations lead to two fundamental conclusions: the teaching of evolution should be an integral part of science instruction, and creation science is in fact not science and should not be presented as such in science classes.
The claim that equity demands balanced treatment of evolutionary theory and special creation in science classrooms reflects a misunderstanding of what science is and how it is conducted. Scientific investigators seek to understand natural phenomena by observation and experimentation. Scientific interpretations of facts and the explanations that account for them therefore must be testable by observation and experimentation.
Creationism, intelligent design, and other claims of supernatural intervention in the origin of life or of species are not science because they are not testable by the methods of science. These claims subordinate observed data to statements based on authority, revelation, or religious belief. Documentation offered in support of these claims is typically limited to the special publications of their advocates. These publications do not offer hypotheses subject to change in light of new data, new interpretations, or demonstration of error. This contrasts with science, where any hypothesis or theory always remains subject to the possibility of rejection or modification in the light of new knowledge.
No body of beliefs that has its origin in doctrinal material rather than scientific observation, interpretation, and experimentation should be admissible as science in any science course. Incorporating the teaching of such doctrines into a science curriculum compromises the objectives of public education. Science has been greatly successful at explaining natural processes, and this has led not only to an increased understanding of the universe but also to major improvements in technology and public health and welfare. The growing role that science plays in modern life requires that science, and not religion, be taught in science classes.
I am not advocating that students not have the right to believe in creationism. I am simply arguing that in the science classroom students be allowed to explore the truth about their own origin and the origin of their universe based on scientifically collected and proven evidence. In the science classroom, we teach students that all good science is based on the scientific method. Based on this method, we form hypothesis that we later test with experimentation. The evolutionary theory has undergone much experimentation over the past 150 years since Darwin first outlined his theory and for the most part this experimentation has upheld his ideas. Creationism, however, by its very nature, resists attempts to explore its validity using the scientific method. It is impossible to test this theory using experimentation. Thus, I believe that it has no place in the science classroom. I have no problems with it being taught as part of religious instruction or even in a philosophy class. However, I do not think it belongs in a science classroom simply because we cannot use scientific tools to understand and explore the idea.
I strongly reject the Creationists’ claim that if one believes that the theory of evolution is true then one necessarily must believe that there is no God, no meaning or purpose to life, and thus no moral accountability. This statement is completely wrong due to the fact that believing in evolution and believing in God are not mutually exclusive beliefs. The dilemma creationists have for themselves of being unable to reconcile science and religion should not be imposed upon the rest of world populous, and particularly not on educational systems. The courts have consistently ruled that “creation science” is actually a religious view. Because public education must be religiously neutral under the U.S. Constitution, the courts have held that it is unconstitutional to present creation science as legitimate scholarship. I believe that these court rulings should be upheld and creation science kept out of science instruction in the public education system.
Over the past 50 years, our world has become increasingly more technological and the need for students to understand scientific principles has become increasingly more important. If we want our public school students to compete on a global level it is essential that we teach them sound scientific principles and keep creationism out of the science classroom.
Last week I conducted several interviews with Swahili speaking students at a local community college in Atlanta. Amongst the interviewees: three were from the Democratic Republic of Congo, one from the United Republic of Tanzania and four were from the republic of Burundi. The eight students spoke Swahili with different dialects.
By definition, Swahili or Kiswahili is a “Bantu language spoken by various ethnic groups inhabiting a large Indian Ocean Coastal stretch from Mozambique to Somalia”. The countries include: Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda, Comoro, Burundi, Malawi, Zambia, and Congo DRC.
I learned from the interviews that Standard Swahili has 5 vowels phonemes. The vowels are: a, e, I, o, u. And that the vowels are never reduced, regardless of stress. The vowels are pronounced as follows:
“a” is pronounced like the “a” in pasta
‘e’ is pronounced like the “e” in bed
‘i’ is pronounced like the “i” in ski
‘o’ is pronounced like the “o” in “or”
‘u’ is pronounced like the “oo” in “bassoon”.”
I also learned that like in numerous Bantu languages, Swahili arranges nouns into a number of classes. The ancestral system had 22 classes. Counting singular and plural as distinct according to the Meinhof System. Most Bantu languages share at least ten of these noun classes. Swahili employs sixteen nouns classes: six classes usually indicate singular nouns, five classes usually indicate plural nouns, one class for abstract nouns, one class for verbal infinitives used as nouns, and three classes to indicate location.
Some examples of the nouns classes are presented below:
“class semantics prefix singular translation plural translation
1, 2 persons m-/mu-, wa- mtu person watu persons
3, 4 trees, natural forces m-/mu-, mi- mti tree miti trees”
As seen above, Swahili is a very complex language and differs significantly from the English language. The vowels are pronounced the way they are written while in the English language the vowels carry different sounds from the written expression. This difference in particular causes a huge challenge to students who are learning English as a second language from the Swahili speaking cultures. Students from Swahili speaking countries struggle with intonation and word sound relationships in English because this is a very different system from that of Swahili or Kiswahili.
Implication in the classroom instruction
It is very important for educators to understand the linguistic similarities and differences between Swahili and English to have an opportunity to help students like the ones I interviewed. In addition, Swahili has a different system for singular and plural to that used in the English language. The addition of vowels to words does not exist in the Swahili language. Thus, making it harder for Swahili speakers to learn the English language.
Opportunity in classroom instruction:
It would be helpful to educators who teach content specific course to understand the linguistic similarities and differences between Swahili and English. This understanding will help them to anticipate when and where Swahili speaking students will have challenges learning the English language. This understanding will provides educators with an opportunity to help students for Swahili speaking nations to be engaged in their own learning and also in using the new language for other content specific courses.
Educators need to develop lessons that will focus more in helping students new to the English language understand the differences and similarities between the two languages and use the opportunity to highlight how to overcome those differences. For example, educators can start by teaching the students the English alphabet, vowels and word sounds. This will help the students to understand where the two languages are similar and where they differ.
After students have mastered word sounds, educators can go further into reading, writing and comprehension of the English language. The step by step instruction will help many ESOL students to become fluent English speakers and writers and in turn this will have a significant impact on how the ESOL students excel in the content classrooms.
References:
1.Prins, A.H.J. 1961. “The Swahili-Speaking Peoples of Zanzibar and the East African Coast (Arabs, Shirazi and Swahili)”. Ethnographic Survey of Africa, edited by Daryll Forde. London: International African Institute.
2.Prins, A.H.J. 1970. A Swahili Nautical Dictionary. Preliminary Studies in Swahili Lexicon – 1. Dar es Salaam.
3.Whiteley, Wilfred. 1969. Swahili: the rise of a national language. London: Methuen. Series: Studies in African History.
4.Brock-Utne, Birgit (2001). “Education for all — in whose language?” Oxford Review of Education 27 (1): 115–134.
I have heard of the DICOTA conferences in the past two years, but I was too occupied with other important things and never had the WILL to attend. This year-2011 is different though, I will definitely be in Washington D.C. to attend this important meeting for all Tanzanians living in the Americas.
The reasons for attending this year’s convention are simple: 1) to celebrate 50 years on Tanzania’s independence, 2) to just mingle with like-minded folks from that great east African country.
I believe that for Tanzania to achieve the type of development we all want to see, it is imperative for all to participate in the process. That means people in the diaspora need to have a role in what is happening in Tanzania. I am taking that necessary step– this time around.
As I seat here planning my trip to the U.S capital for this convention to be held on September 23th-25th, 2011, I am completely preparing myself for all-things positive that will happen during the entire length of this conference.
My decision to attend the convention was somewhat made easier this year after hearing our Ambassador to Washington Ms. Maajar speak eloquently the needs for Tanzanians and everyone with origin from Tanzania to support Tanzania’s development. To quote ambassador Maajar‘s words of wisdom “if not us Tanzanians, who else will push for the development of Tanzania?” I am with you on that Balozi Maajar.
It will definitely be really nice for me to be in the capital city again after 2 years away. I lived in Baltimore City, 25 miles outside of the Washington D.C. beltway for almost 8 years and spent so many beautiful moments in the capital during the week ends and attended many social events there. It will indeed be like a home coming event.
For all Tanzanians in America, please attend if you can. I know it is a recession time and there is little money to go around, but if you have the time and money, please show up to celebrate this important event for Tanzania.
Finally, If you want to cut expenses by sharing a room at the Dulles Marriott Hotel in Washington D.C. leave your name, phone number or e mail as a comment so that other people who would like to do the same can contact you privately through this blog. I would be happy to do the same especially if we book the two bedrooms offer that they have.
The first thing I heard from the Head Teacher when I went to register to start my primary school education was— “raise your right hand over your head and touch your ear on the other side.” It was a heart breaker for many children those days. If your right or left hand couldn’t touch the tips of your ear on the opposite side, it meant you was not old enough to start a primary education.
It actually happened to me twice before I was formally registered. Two years in a roll, going to that long line, with my peers and being rejected at the end of the line—just because my fingers could not touch the tips of my ear. I guess the first time I was a little younger, but the second time I was really 7 years old. It was humiliating in both cases.
My mother was and continues to be a law abiding citizen. Most parents whose kids were rejected due to the hand over head to ear rule, would go to the district office and just buy a birth certificate for their kids. My mother kept me home for two years so that I could start primary school at the right age.
I knew all my A, B, Cs for gods sake! I could count to a hundred in Ones and in tens in Swahili, but, that was not enough. I had to touch the ear, because that was the rule of the land. For most of us who did not have a birth certificate to prove that we were indeed 7 years old, we had to wait for the next round–which was next year. The lack of birth certificate was very rampant during those days. Even though I was delivered in a regional Hospital “Kitete Regional Hospital” I still lacked one.
It is still a mystery to me to why we had to do that? I have not been able to find any logical explanations to collaborate the relationship between age and hand over head touching your ear on the other side preposition. If you know anything as to the origin of this rule—please share!!
While holidaying in Tanzania I had to take the bus from Mwanza to Shinyanga. The bus was going all the way to Dar Es Salaam. We left Mwanza before sunrise and we had to travel for about an hour for the sun to start coming up. It was a beautiful morning, there were No clouds on the horizon. You could see the sun rising from the ground-up, first pinkish-yellow in color, then slowly turning into that warm red African hot sun. It was simply beautiful!
The bus was traveling at a very high speed. Everyone had a seat and some of the seats on the back of the bus remained empty. We continued to stop here and there picking up passengers going to Dodoma, or further ahead to Dar Es Salaam. I was in a bus, comfortably seated, the passengers spoke loudly and I could hardly understand the language. It was mostly Sukuma mixed with some Swahili words. I could see the pride in them, these people were very proud to be Sukumas.
Before we arrived at Old Shinyanga, we stopped for all the passengers to go out and relieve themselves. Everyone jumped out of the bus and off into the side of the road’s bushes. Some went further afield; I guess some were “taking a dump” and some were just going out to pee. I was just wondering what you would do if you really had to go poop in the bushes while you had forgotten to pack your toiletry?
I remember when I was a kid; we used to use tree leaves or corn cobs to wipe our asses with after we went pooping into the bush. I remember in those times, you would go into the bush and hold on a small bush trunk to let it out. Grab some tree leaves “soft ones off-course” and wipe your butt with. I am not exactly sure how clean you would get while doing this, but it was how things were done back then.
No digging holes to poop in, just on top of the dirt. The hole in the ground type was a way to advanced sanitation system. The hole on the ground toilets were 5-10KM away sometimes. I just had to do what I had to do! answering mother nature’s call.
This post is inspired by the little girl taking a dump at the side of the road on my way to Shinyanga from Mwanza. The father (seen on the picture) did exactly what I described above. He picked some young tree leaves and used them to wipe the kid’s bummy after she was done pooping. It was hilorious to see that done on the side of the road.
Over the week end I was curious to know which country owned America’s debt the most. I thought China would be at the top of the list. I was wrong, not even close. America owes America the most of its debt.
According to Business Insider, America owes foreigners about $4.5 trillion in debt. But America owes America $9.8 trillion. The break down is listed below:
I did not follow closely the conversation and debate between the democrats and the republicans over the issue of raising the debt limit in the United States. There were fears of a default and economic Armageddon if the debt limit was not raised by August 2rd, 2011.
Looking at how the market “wall street” has performed since the passage of the debt limit bill, one could easily conclude that the America economy is slowly walking to a train wreck. It was running towards it before the bill passage as some have suggested. The bill has just put some temporary brakes on the inevitability.
The American deficit or the difference between what the U.S government collects and what it actually spends is approximately 1 trillion dollars. That is, the U.S government is spending approximately 15 trillion dollars a year and collecting only 14 trillion dollars in the same time span.
In my little understanding about economics, what the raising of the debt limit is doing is analogous to raising the blood alcohol limit when you’re trying to curb a drunken driving epidemic. That is to say, you can still drink and be drunk before you breach the legal limit and/or before the cops can legally stop you. In the same token, the government now can continue to over spend without taking serious measures on the actual debt that the U.S government is currently carrying. http://www.hulu.com/aol/http%3A%2F%2Fwww.hulu.com%2Fwatch%2F258670%2Fthe-daily-show-with-jon-stewart-men-of-a-certain-rage/embed/pJyx3bpXUie3QSCLCnXQ0w
This is what life is for most of the Dar Es Salaam residents. Lack of water, electricity, healthcare, educational opportunities and jobs are a reality. Watch the video to see the real life of the majority of Dar Es Salaam residents.
This is what I wrote two years ago about Somalia. Is it still relevant?? Is this a continuation of the indecisive political capitals in East Africa? Is Dar Es Salaam prepared for the incoming terrorist act?
By Shaaban Fundi,
I deeply regret the loss of lives and the senseless injuries caused by the bombings in Kampala. I wish the injured a speedy recovery and the dead mercy from the creator. And to the relatives of the victims, time will heal the wounds and sorrows. The killing of innocent people should be forcefully condemned.
What should Uganda do now? The issue of dealing with al Shabaab should not be left to Uganda alone. If they can bomb Kampala, then they are indeed capable of bombing Nairobi, Dar es Salaam or Kigali at any time in the future. It should be a collective gesture by the East African Community to show al Shabaab that East Africa is fed up with this barbaric and nonsense killings of innocents.
Somalis terrorists have now become a regional nuisance that needs to be dealt with decisively. Forces should be combined (Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda etc) to uproot them from their bases in Mogadishu and wherever they might be hiding in the countryside. Their acts and existence are destabilising the region and hindering further investment in East Africa from outside investors.
As East Africans are trying to build an integrated East Africa, we can’t lose sight of the problem of piracy, terrorism and refugees streaming from Somaliland. It is in the interest of East African nations to deal with this problem now, once and for all. These resolutions after resolutions by the AU of sending peacekeepers to keep nonexistent peace in Somalia should end.
We East Africans actually need to go into Somali, create peace by disarming all the fighting factions and then keep the peace until Somalis are ready to lead their own county.
We have been watching Somalis kill each other for far too long, over 20 years in fact. The fact of the matter is they seem incapable of figuring out solutions to their problems. It is now time for neighbours to intervene. We are not going to intervene just because it is morally right, but because we will also be preventing future attacks.
If Tanzania, with the support of Ugandans, was able to uprooted the ruthless regime of Idi Amin Dada, three countries or more in the East African bloc should be able to do the same in Somalia with the help of moderate Somalis.
This is our problem and we need to deal with it as East Africans. America and the West will not be fully engaged in this as their interventions around the world usually involve the presence of oil or minerals resource in the country in question, and Somalia has neither.
As the AU head of states gather in Kampala from July 25, this issue needs to be at the top of the summit’s agenda. The Somalia problem cannot be left to take its own cause any longer and needs to be dealt with forcefully and conclusively.
It has been all over the news channels for the most part of last and this week. It is a huge scandal involving 178 teachers and administrators in 44 different schools. Some of the accused have already confessed to changing student’s test answers and doing special arrangements to raise students’ achievement in their schools.
In following this issue, I came across an article on the internationalguy’s blog that talks in detail about what happened (an inconvenience truth in his views). I do not agree entirely with the author but there is some truth on what he is saying (despite some racist vernom in his writings). Read the article here and arrive at your own conclusion.
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