Kenya: Early Childhood Education Key to Laying Firm Foundation for Better Learning Outcomes - ECDE Campaigner

By Vanessa Kariuki

Nairobi — There is need to invest in effective early childhood education in order to enhance learning outcomes, particularly in often under-resourced government-funded schools.

According to Grace Waithera, founder and CEO of Twiga Soma Africa, lack of timely interventions in Early Childhood Development Education (ECDE) is largely to blame for literacy challenges reported among learners as they advance in post-ECDE.

Waithera's firm has worked to bring back literacy and numeracy to the highest standard when the children at an early stage something she notes contributes significantly to attaining better learning outcomes as children advance in education.

She notes early learning is the beginning of literacy for children as it is the foundation on which their education is based.

"Our desire is to make sure every child who is in school gets the quality education that they deserve, as education is the right to every child. The early years, if we get the foundation right, then the rest is set up for success," Waithera, herself an early childhood educator, said during a interview with Capital News.

She noted that often local communities are willing to aid in funding early learning once they are informed on the importance of ECD.

"The community, if you show them the importance of early childhood education being a priority in your school, they back you up," said Waithera.

"They paid the teachers out of their own pockets and now look at the fruits, there is no parent taking their children to school hoping that they will come out illiterate, the parents are supportive and when I told them to buy stationeries and books needed, they bought, initially they were worried about the money but after the change they saw in their children they continued the funding," she added.

She singled out Kiangigi Primary School, the first school she started with in her quest to enhance education, which scaled KCPE rankings from being among schools registering the worse results countrywide to one of the best schools in Muranga county.

Waithera, who first offered to support the school in 2013 when it was just an early learning education centre, noted that with clearly defined outcomes, learners can register better results.

"I was introduced to the first set of primary school children, class one, those children could not read or write or tell you sounds of the vowels, they could also not communicate in English or Swahili, they knew nothing," said Twiga Soma Africa CEO.

She developed a strategic plan which included training teachers and developing teaching guides that the teachers could follow when educating the children.

Kiangigi Primary School is now on the map after Waithera's tireless efforts in providing reading and teaching materials for the teachers and pupils.

The school produced one of the top performing pupils in Gatanga constituency registering a top mark of 384 the recent national exams for primary education, a great improvement from 180.

This article originally appeared in Capital FM

Photo: UNICEF Kenya