Cultural shock: An experience of teachers and students in the junior secondary schools.

Change is the only pathway to growth just as it is to degradation. The resolution by the education task force to have junior secondary school domicile in the primary schools was received differently by the educators across the country. At the end, the position of the government had to stand. 30,000 new teachers were employed on permanent and pensionable and intern terms. To these teachers, jumping into this new pool was a matter of necessity. The government is addressing unemployment, especially among hundreds of thousands of graduate teachers as it implements the new curriculum, CBC. A child that was born to the education system through ups and downs, but has shown strength and resilience throughout formulation to the current state of implementation had to be nurtured further. Millions of learners who sat for Grade 6 exams last year have since been kept in anticipation. The unquenched thirst for education, in a new set-up, facilitated by new teachers and desire to transition to the senior level of learning kept this young souls in anticipation of nothing but the best.

Admission of these students to the junior schools opened a chapter that has since been marred with conflicting experiences. Sweet and bitter at the same taste. What a miracle! 12 to 14 subjects, lessons taking the secondary school periods of either 40 or 80 minutes, teachers’ proficient in the lecture method learning to embrace learner centered learning with little regard to their major subject combinations. Lack of clarity on what lies ahead. All has built tales that will attract attention generations to come.

The teachers on the other hand have had their share of cultural shift. Majority had served in numerous schools under BOM terms. Schools that are rich in resources, utilized in a culture that is largely built in high school state of affairs, age of learners and diversity. A number of them had built a reputable profiles in setting, marking and teaching that brought the best out of their learners, who in most cases could resonate in relatively all aspects of academic and co-curriculum. The new working environment is unique by all measures. The scarcity of key resources and the young age of learners, always curious and cheeky. In their playful mind and energetic bodies, they take little chunks of knowledge in demonstrative and localized experiences. As pioneers of CBC at the junior secondary stage, the stakeholders are always grappling with desire to meet the clarion calls of the national goals of education with little regard to the, mental state of the teachers and students. Measures should be advanced to address the current state of cultural shock in the junior secondary schools.