Publishers of books have stressed the significance of parents’ involvement to ensure the success of the new curriculum, despite widespread unhappiness with how teachers managed learners’ homework, equipment, and roles they allocated parents when using the Competence-Based Curriculum (CBC).
Publishers, led by Kiarie Kamau, CEO of East African Educational Publishers (EAEP) and Chairman of the Kenya Publishers Association (KPA), claimed that parental involvement would enable them to recognize and understand their children’s academic and technical strengths in addition to any prevailing weaknesses.
He continued by saying that it is nothing new for parents and other adult caregivers to assist kids with their schoolwork or other necessary things.
However, under CBC, there has been a rise in dissatisfaction nationwide over the sometimes-overwhelming demands caused by the abundance of homework and the high cost of instructional materials.
Apart from demands for what they deemed to be expensive and occasionally unavailable materials for practical sessions, the parents’ biggest beef is what they perceive to be their over-involvement in their children’s homework.
Concerns have also been raised about the accessibility of essential information technology (IT) tools like photo-capable smartphones and printers, particularly in rural areas.
To ensure that they ceased requesting expensive learning materials from students and instead created their own materials from readily available, inexpensive resources in their communities, Kiarie noted that teachers needed to be more trained in the fundamentals of the CBC.
According to Mr. Kiarie, “There is a need for more structured and intense teacher training to enable them to employ locally accessible resources in teaching.”
