Teaching methods blamed for poor Gr 10 and 12 results

Teachers and schools were urged on Friday to change their teaching methods to uplift the performance of Grade 10 and 12’s. This came from the Erongo Regional Director of Education, Mr John /Awaseb who expressed concern over the poor results these grades achieved during last year’s external exams. Mr /Awaseb made these remarks at the annual address of school leaders in Swakopmund.
/Awaseb said the poor performance of the grade 10 and 12 learners is a reflection of the overall per-formance of learners in grade 1 – 9 and 11. “We are not fit with quality learners to groom for grade 10 and 12 so the problem is not just at secondary but at primary level also,” said /Awaseb.
According to /Awaseb, learners are transferred at all levels because the fundament or basics are not laid down, “we are not doing our best at that level and only sending them up for the secondary teachers to deal with them and then we blame the se-condary teachers but all blame lies some-where at the primary level” said /Awaseb. He urged teachers to change their way of teaching and to try new innovations. He also said teachers should find ways of effectively teaching learners so they can pass with great results. “Our concern is that if teachers do not pre-pare their lessons and if they are not followed up to the classrooms to see what they are doing then we will never know what is happening in the classrooms, therefore it is important that as managers make sure that teachers are teaching” said /Awaseb. Another matter that /Awaseb touched on was the discipline of learners. He said that learning cannot take place if learners are ill-discipline and disruptive of what the teacher is presenting. “I want my principals to work on ill-discipline learners, bring them to book, if they are not discipline at their homes we should discipline them at our schools” /Awaseb emphasized. /Awaseb said he will support the teachers and principal in every step they take to discipline learners, he said in the past he would say “take back the learner”, without thinking of what harm that learner is causing to the rest of the other learners. /Awaseb stressed out that only if learners are discipline will there be teaching and learning taking place in classrooms.
Caption: The Erongo Regional Director of Education, Mr John /Awaseb