Support Teachers to Educate 200 Children Monthly

Dear friend and project partner,

2017 has been a year of growth and development for our teaching staff. Our aim with this project has been to ensure the students get quality teaching and learning from our teachers. You have ensured that this has happened throughout the year. As our project partners, you have ensured all the teachers have been motivated to come to school every month without having to worry about whether the paycheck will come in time, because faithfully and sacrificially you have ensured that happened. Thank you.

We invested time in coaching the teachers and mentoring them to ensure high quality teaching. In 2017, we focused on training the staff on Brain Based Teaching, Inquiry Based and other effective Instructional Strategies, Classroom Management Strategies, Competency Based Curriculum, and Growth Mindset.

The school had a teacher to pupil ration of 1:13. This is an average score. The class sizes ranged from 24 to 10. The school teacher population was at a constant 13 teaching staff. The support to these teachers yielded impact in the learning and achievement of students as could be seen in the Average Class and Subject Value-Added Scores and Attendance Score.

By the end of the year compared to October 2016, Average Value-Added Scores for 2017 for the entire school grew by 28%. The score shows how much a subject or class grew in achievement from the last assessment taken at the same time in the previous year. It assumes the efforts being put in by the teacher, parents, and students, and administration yielded the growth in achievement. The average school attendance score was at 84%, which can be roughly translated to mean that at any given time the school had 112 students attending class any given day, with the main reason for non-attendance being parents not taking responsibility to contribute their portion of tuition fees.

We found that the Value Add Score is a better motivator to teachers than the mean grade as it measures how much improvement students are making. This has helped teachers focus more on strategies to improve individual student achievement rather than improving class mean scores. It also achieved a key strategy that focuses on using data and assessments to improve teaching instruction and classroom interventions which will yield quality teaching.

At the end of the year, the teachers shared their best memories from 2017. Here are some of them.

“One of my best memories was when we went for a team building session accompanied by our students.” Grade 4 Class Teacher

“Guiding Learners in the dangers associated with pre-marital sex.” Counselling Teacher

“Improvement in Grade 4 Mathematics Achievement.” Grade 4 Math Teacher

“Participating with the students in the music festivals.” Grade 5 Teacher

“Seeing the learners develop interest and positive attitude toward mathematics.” Grade 8 Teacher

“Teaching students about road safety with toy cars and sound effects from a sound app. The boys enjoyed it. The girls loved it.” Grade 6 English Teacher

“Being given the opportunity to be Head of Academics. I was able to develop my skill in administration.” Head of Academics Teacher.

“My best memories were seeing children slowly by slowly take initiative in their learning and forge ahead without fear.” English Language Teacher

All this was made possible by your consistent investments in the teachers. We celebrate your successes in 2017. You both have made the year a success. One of lasting impact. Thank you.

On behalf of the teachers, the children and the Acres of Mercy Board, I wish you a great year 2018, one of success in all your endeavors and look forward to your continued support for much more impact in this year.

Dear friends and partners,

Since July our teacher coaching focus has been how to make learning more accessible to all students in our classes, and how to in ways make teaching more ambitious so our learning outcomes can begin to improve in the short term and most definitely in the long term.

We had a week of workshops and trainings by an expert teacher from the U.S. who was sharing different instructional methods on how to close student achievement gaps and reach all the students in our classrooms.  Teachers had a great time learning about “High order questioning skills”, “Lesson Planning and Lesson delivery”. There were sessions on “habits of mind” and “Classroom management”.

The sessions had a positive impact on the professional stance of the teachers. These are reflections from a section of the teaching staff after taking an exit ticket.

“My most valuable take away from the training is the stations and group activities. That’s what I want to utilize with my students since I have realized that it is inclusive and the learners’ participation in the lesson is high”.

This kind of feedback is encouraging as implementation will mean that student engagement would be improving.

Another teacher remarked,” I am very much ready to implement the strategies that I have been exposed to- Progressive monitoring, using formative assessments.”

Yet another teacher declared,” Yes, I do feel prepared to try out looking for the positive in every child each day.”

With this kind of professional growth and development, we know we will begin to see improvement in the achievement of the school. And indeed, we are beginning to see this in improved students’ attitudes towards subjects like Math where students are testifying just how much they have been enjoying Math classes. Together we are restoring the joy of learning in the hearts and minds of the children.

Through our partnering we are seeing the restoration of the joy of learning back to school.

With 138 students we have a No Corporal Punishment Policy in strict enforcement yet discipline levels are unlike the public school systems. Acres of Mercy students are able to listen to instructions without external threat. The teachers are fairly motivated as they continue to receive their monthly pay on time. And weekly staff meetings are more about how to have a more enabling learning environment and how to design learning to reach the “jagged” learning profiles in  class.

Thank you for making educational change happen.