Vol. 16, No. 2, pp.

173 184, 1996

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Int. J. Educati~mal Development,

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EDUCATING TEACHERS FOR THE IMPROVEMENT OF THE QUALITY

O F B A S I C E D U C A T I O N IN D E V E L O P I N G
COUNTRIES
YATTA KANU
I.E.D., A g a Khan University, Karachi, Pakistan
Abstract - - In discussions about improving the quality of basic education in the developing
countries much focus has been on education functioning to improve the economic conditions
of individuals. Basic education as critical literacy which empowers people to improve their
social and personal lives by participating politically in decision-making processes relating to
equitable distribution of economic wealth appears to be missing from the discussion on basic
education. Grounding her a r g u m e n t s in observations of classroom teaching in two developing
countries, the author argues in this article that the current 'socialization' approach to education
in the developing countries needs to be replaced by innovative, critical approaches involving
"resocialization" if basic education is to play a role in improving the lives of the masses. What
some developing countries are doing in teacher education to achieve this innovation is also
discussed.

INTRODUCTION
In the 1990s improving the quality of basic education in the developing countries seems to be
at the forefront of the international education
agenda, as evidenced by several conferences
already held in various parts of the world. ~
It was the theme at the conference of the
Ministers of Education of the Commonwealth
held in Barbados in 1990 and continues to be a
focus of concern for many leading international
educationists.
What exactly constitutes a 'good quality' basic education remains an area of disagreement
because, as it has emerged in policy planning
and educational discourse and practice, the
concept is multidimensional, with a range of
definitions and interpretations based on how
the term is conceptualized by the different
stakeholders in policy planning and the educational process.
In the developing world, views of 'good
quality' basic education have ranged from
an instrumentalist conceptualization of education, which urges schools to raise the academic performance of students in their various
school subjects, to increasing the rate of school
enrollment in order to provide educational opportunity for every child, to providing children
with the skills necessary to meet their essential
learning needs for survival, security and growth
(Coombs et al., 1973).
173

Many of these views have their origin in the

modernization and human capital theories of
education, which have linked education to economic development z and influenced not only
educational policy planning in the developing
countries for the past three decades but also
the planning and lending policies of the World
Bank in relation to developing countries?
Admittedly, the World Bank, by regarding
education as 'a basic need which helps to
meet other basic needs' and education as 'an
activity sustaining and accelerating overall development' (World Bank, 1980a, p. 86), gives
legitimacy to the multidimensional contribution
of education not only to economic productivity
but also the creation of those conditions that
lead to such other factors as political development and social participation.
Despite this recognition, however, perceptions of the role of education in development
for most people, and the World Bank itself,
have seldom gone beyond an economic view
of education. Consequently, the function of
basic education as critical literacy that empowers people to improve their lives socially
and personally by participating politically in
decision-making processes in relation to issues
such as equitable distribution of economic
wealth has been largely neglected in basic
education. If basic education is to improve
the quality of life for the masses in the developing countries, its meaning and practice

YATTA KANU

174

must include a critical dimension that prepares

and enables people to participate socially,
politically and meaningfully in issues affecting their lives. This means that good quality
basic education should provide children not
only with the minimum education needed to
become a resource for production (MoralesGomez, 1991) but also, especially among the
poor and marginalized, with the skills, attitudes
and dispositions that will enable them to have a
better vision of life and strive towards positive
change in the social, political and economic
realities in which they find themselves.
In the developing countries, many ways in
which good quality basic education can be
provided have been put forward. For instance,
Bacchus (1991) has proposed that because of
the central role of the curriculum in the educaL
tional process any effort to improve the quality
of basic education in the developing countries
must begin with a change in the curriculum.
Among the many innovative approaches to
curriculum practice Bacchus has proposed are
the following:
- More active involvement of local communities
and teachers in the development of school-based
curriculum to ensure that it responds to the needs
of children in different areas of a country
- The production of more relevant instructional
materials including more detailed teacher's guides
and self-instructionalmaterials
Greater use of child-to-child learning possibilities
the development and use of distance education
delivery techniques
A more flexible supervisory relationship between
teachers and school inspectors which allows teachers to try out new ideas
The adoption of more innovative teaching strategies.
(Bacchus, 1991, pp. 21-23)
-

In this paper an attempt will be made to

develop in greater detail Bacchus's last point
in this list of proposals and argue that if basic
education is to be useful at all in improving
the lives of the masses in the developing
countries, then the preparation of teachers
in alternative and innovative approaches to
classroom practice based on critical literacy
should be of central importance in any attempt
at educational change.
The role of critical literacy and that of the
teacher in effecting such innovations needs to
be clarified here. Underlying the idea of critical
literacy is the belief that the fundamental effort
of education is to help with raising consciousness and thus liberate people by providing them

with critical knowledge that leads to desirable

changes in their circumstances. In other words,
basic literacy is insufficient if it only provides
people with opportunities to read and write or
encounter inert bodies of knowledge without
inviting them to think critically about that
knowledge, the learning process itself and their
society. It should enable those who experience
it to read the world critically and demystify it
and those distorted perceptions that hold them
in passivity.
The teacher clearly becomes the vanguard of
this effort. The crucial role of the teacher in
bringing about meaningful educational change
has been recognized in both the developed and
developing countries. For example, the Holmes
Group study (1986) on educational reform in
the U.S. gave recognition to the importance of
teachers in educational reform when it stated
clearly that:
Curriculum plans, instructional materials, elegant
classrooms and even.., intelligentadministrators cannot overcome the negative effects of weak teaching or
match the positive effects of positive teaching. . . . The
entire formal and informal curriculum of the school
is filtered through the hearts and minds of classroom
teachers, making the quality of school learning
dependent on the quality of teachers.
(Holmes Group, 1986, p. 23)

During the conference of the Ministers of

Education of the Commonwealth held in Barbados in 1990, similar recognition was given
to the role of teachers when teacher education
was identified as one of the areas that could
be taken up at both national and international levels to improve quality in education
(Commonwealth Report cited in Bacchus, 1991).
This paper will start by looking at the currently dominant approach to classroom instruction in the developing countries as exemplified
by teaching practices in social studies in two
countries - - Sierra Leone in West Africa
and Pakistan in South Asia. This approach,
which will be referred to as the 'socialization' approach to classroom teaching, will be
problematized and its educational implications
for the developing countries will be discussed.
A case will then be argued for an innovative, critical approach to teaching involving
'resocialization' in order for basic education
to achieve its long-term goal of empowering
and liberating the vast majority of the people
in the developing countries and thereby better
prepare them to play a more active role in

IMPROVING BASIC EDUCATION IN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES

175

out in the classes where the observations were

carried out.
The dominant approach to the teaching of
social studies in the schools observed can be
characterized as one involving the following
steps: teacher asking the students to read
sections of the prescribed textbook; teacher
engaging in a monologue to explain what has
THE 'SOCIALIZATION' APPROACH TO
been read to ensure that all the essentials
CLASSROOM INSTRUCTION IN THE
(usually factual details) have been covered;
SOCIAL STUDIES
and teacher testing the students to see how
The strategies of classroom teaching de- well they can recall the material contained in
scribed in this section are based on observations the reading.
In the primary school classrooms observed,
of teaching social studies in classrooms in crosstesting
was usually done by children being
cultural settings in Sierra Leone and Pakistan.
The teaching of social studies in particular has asked to fill in the blanks in the worksheets
been chosen for discussion here because it is provided. In the secondary schools students
the school subject that comprises almost all were asked to answer low-level fact-oriented
the disciplines of the social sciences - - e.g. questions prescribed at the end of a chapter.
This approach to teaching social studies
history, geography, economics, cultural studies, anthropology, political science, sociology, was reinforced by the government prescribed
etc. Even though social studies is an integrated textbooks, which were filled with an incredible
area in the school curriculum, each component amount of trivia relating to the culture, history
is usually taught as a separate discipline, thus and geography of Sierra Leone that students
giving an observer a clear insight into the way were required to remember (at least tempoeach discipline is handled in the classroom. A rarily) and that generally managed to avoid
general description of what is practised in the any topics that would generate controversy,
teaching of social studies in each country is first meaningful discussion or critical thinking in
the classroom. Any approach to assessment
provided.
and evaluation that required students to apply
what they had learned to new situations or
SIERRA LEONE
that would inquire into their own beliefs,
For three months (August-October) in 1991, experiences and behaviours as individuals were
the author carried out intense observations of markedly absent in all the lessons observed.
the teaching of social studies in four classrooms in four different schools (two primary
PAKISTAN
and two secondary) in Sierra Leone. (The
The scenario of social studies teaching in
exercise was done as part of her doctoral
research, which inquired into reflective prac- Pakistan where the author started teaching in
tice for teacher education in a post-colonial 1993 was equally dismal. For several weeks
context) (Kanu, 1993). Through research, the she, along with her students at the I.E.D.,
author had identified various approaches to observed social studies classes in seven classreflective practice, which had been classified rooms (classes 4-10) in various primary and
as the technical, the practical-interpretive and secondary schools run by the government and
the reconstructionist approaches. 4 The aim of private sectors in Karachi. The observations
these careful and extended observations was carried out by the students were part of the
to find out which of these approaches was M.Ed. teacher education programme offered
followed in the classrooms observed or if at the Institute. This requires students to carry
there were other approaches different from out sustained school visits and observations as
those identified in the research. The findings a vehicle' for reflecting on teaching and making
of that study and their implications for teacher sense of their own teaching experiences in new
education in Sierra Leone are outside the scope and enlightening ways.
The social studies lessons were conducted in
of this paper. Here discussions will be confined
to the way social studies teaching was carried Urdu (the medium of instruction), which was

shaping their own lives. The paper will end

with a description of how such innovation
is being currently embarked upon in teacher
education at the newly established Institute for
Educational Development (I.E.D.) at the A g a
Khan University in Karachi, Pakistan.

176

YATI'A KANU

foreign to this author, but it was easy to see

that they were based on the same expository
methods observed in Sierra Leone. There was
very limited student participation in the lessons
seen. In both the primary and the secondary
schools, the teacher did all the reading from
the textbook, explained what she read and
asked the students whether they understood
the explanation, to which they answered 'Ji'
(yes) in a chorus. She would then ask them a
few questions requiring very short answers or,
in the case of the primary school classes, give
them fill-in-the-blank exercises to assess the
'learning' that had occurred. On one occasion
in class 8 a student raised her hand and said
something in Urdu to the teacher who simply
said something in return and continued with the
lesson. In a conversation later with one of the
I.E.D. students it was discovered that the student had raised an issue that was very pertinent
to what the teacher was explaining and that the
point could have led to a lively class discussion,
but the teacher simply told the student that the
point she was raising was not in the textbook
and went on with the lesson. In classes 9 and
10, which were the matriculation examinations
classes, teaching involved mainly note-taking
from the blackboard with brief explanations
of points by the teacher. No discussions or
meaningful interactions between teacher and
students were observed.
An examination of the government-prescribed
books used in those classes revealed a marked
focus on cultural transmission, reverence of
historical figures and what was referred to as
'Pakistan Ideology' meant to be inculcated into
students. Again, as in the case of Sierra Leone,
there was an absence of any content inviting
controversy in the classroom or creative and
critical thinking on the part of the students.
EDUCATIONAL IMPLICATIONS
As seen from these descriptions, the approaches to the teaching of social studies in
Sierra Leone and Pakistan are remarkably similar, constituting what has been labelled in this
paper as the 'socialization' approach to education. Underlying the socialization approach
to educational practice is the basic assumption
that there is a body of fixed 'worthwhile'
knowledge, which students should master and
digest without raising questions or discussions
about it. Teaching in the socialization approach

is characterized by what the Brazilian educator,

Paulo Freire, calls a 'culture of silence', whereby knowledge is given to learners who are not
expected to discuss, question or change that
knowledge. Teaching, in such a situation, is a
monological process (engaged by the teacher),
which lacks any theory about the creative
capacity of students to interpret what they are
taught and bestow it with their own meanings.
As one educator put it over 30 years ago:
Learners experiencing this (Socialization) orientation
to education are not, as a rule, given the opportunity
to do things for themselves. They are told or made to
feel that their opinions are worthless; that they should
follow, not lead; listen and remember, not work things
out for themselves.
(Duminy, 1973, p. 27)

Because it fails to relate textbook knowledge to the needs, circumstances, experiences

and realities of the learners but, rather, emphasizes an unquestioned acceptance of and
acquiescience to the teachings and beliefs of
authority figures the socialization approach
effectively alienates learners from the educational process and has been identified as a
major factor contributing to the high student
drop-out rate from school in the developing
countries.
It is not being argued here" that schools
should not socialize students into certain cultural norms considered as valuable to their
societies or that students should not be taught
such things as their nation's history or the
values underlying their cultural and religious
practices through socialization. Every society
practises a form of socialization by trying
to induct its young people into its values,
belief systems and behaviours as a way of
holding that society together and preserving
its traditions and practices. However, I think
that as children mature into adults their education should provide them with opportunities
to examine and evaluate what they have been
socialized into in order to see its relevance to
their own lives and times. Unfortunately, this
critical and questioning dimension is missing
from the education of young people in schools.
Typically, for instance, a school subject like
history is taught as if the historical statements
reported in the textbooks are not based on
interpretations by the w(i.ters of the books,
with all the biases and vested interests that
accompany such interpretations. When history
is taught this way the teacher is socializing

IMPROVING BASIC EDUCATION IN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES

students into a body of 'truths' assumed to be

beyond questioning, criticism or modification
through reinterpretation. Many teachers practise this socialization approach to the teaching
of history in order to develop 'patriotism' in
their students. However, such an uncritical way
of teaching patriotism or nationalism denies
students the historical insights they need to
interpret and shape alternative futures that are
rooted in their historical realities. As well, it
fails to help students develop those important
critical insights that lead to an understanding
of the human condition in a world that is
increasingly becoming a highly interdependent
global community.
Similarly, basic education that indoctrinates
students into particular religious ideals does
not serve a useful purpose to improve the
quality of their lives now or in the future.
What is needed is an approach to the teaching
of religion that helps students to become aware
of the consistencies or inconsistencies between
religious ideals and the behaviours existing
in their society. This way, the critical and
reflective 'wide-awakeness' needed to bridge
lhe gap between religious ideals and reality
is created, thus better preparing students to
improve their society.
Socialization can have political implications
as well, because, in the wrong hands, it could be
easily turned into an instrument of domination.
In many developing countries socialization is
actively employed as an educational approach
to submerge the consciousness of the vast
majority of the people and thus preserve the
powerful positions that the ruling and elitist
classes, as well as other vested interest groups,
hold in these countries. And the processes
involved in this are not difficult to see. As an effective means of bringing children to fit into the
existing social order, the socialization approach
is not concerned with developing the intellect,
creative capacity or independent-mindedness
of individuals. Its goal is to encourage conformity to existing ideals and thus ensure
the continuity of the status quo. Socialization
is not reflective, for it does not encourage
individuals to think critically, analyse reality
or support views that they might hold with
reason and evidence. Children experiencing
education based on socialization often come
to accept their world as a given and are not
prone to challenging existing practices to arrive
at alternative views of the world and their

177

place in it. As an educational approach, it

diminishes the individual's potential to become
something other than what has been prescribed
or predicted.
An additional debilitating short-coming of
the socialization approach to teaching is its
outright neglect of the key role of values in
the understanding and construction of what a
student is taught. In all the social studies classes described above, the teacher's expository
methods implied one of two things: either the
topics they were teaching were value free or the
values embedded in or underlying them were
fixed beliefs to be taken on faith or authority
without being questioned by children. Values
are not fixed entities that can be handed
down intact from adults to children or from
generation to generation. How a particular
value is to be taken or applied depends on
the circumstances and times. Because times
and circumstances are not static but are constantly changing, values and traditional belief
systems should be interpreted case by case
and generation by generation. This author has
argued elsewhere (Kanu, 1993) that, indeed,
to continue to be human in a deep sense is
to possess the political will to read traditional
norms and values as open-ended texts needing
constant rereading and reinterpretation in light
of emerging situations, as opposed to reading
them as closed entities that bar alternative
possibilities even when circumstances point up
the need.
Whether we recognize it or not, the values
we hold are the key to the way we behave
to our fellow human beings and interpret and
deal with a certain given reality. A social
studies curriculum that focuses on the transmission of facts and neglects to deal with
value problems embedded in textbooks stops
far short of teaching children how to think
intelligently about the real world. Today's
children are tomorrow's adult citizens charged
with decision-making responsibilities. To carry
out these responsibilities properly such citizens
must be able to identify and clarify their own
values before they can act to solve personal
problems or influence public policy. Basic
education aimed at improving the quality of
life for citizens must provide citizens with the
skills necessary to make reflective decisions by
examining values (theirs or imposed), clarifying
them and relating them to facts they have at
hand. Indoctrinating children into "correct'

178

YATrA KANU

values by means of didactic inculcation or

treating value problems as invisible in the
classroom is not only pedagogically unsound,
but it also denies children a most effective
decision-making tool.
If basic education is to make a difference
in the lives of those experiencing it, then
classroom instructional strategies should be
reconsidered and recast in new ways based
on 'resocialization' of students within which
they are encouraged to carefully and critically
examine the 'facts' and values they encounter
and their taken-for-granted ways of looking at
the world. Students should be taught to make
sense of the world through questioning, inquiring and considering alternatives and making
decisions based on careful deliberation. In
this way basic education prepares them to
participate more actively in the shaping of
their lives. How we might educate teachers for
a new teaching role based on 'resocialization'
and what some developing countries are doing
to realize such a goal is the focus of the next
section of this paper.
EDUCATING TEACHERS FOR
'RESOCIALIZATION'
In the preceding pages it has been argued
that current instructional strategies in classrooms in many developing countries are based
on a socialization approach, and the educational/political implications of this approach to
education have been discussed. Evidence suggests that this approach to educational practice
has thus far not led to any meaningful transformation in the attitudes and dispositions of
the vast majority of the people experiencing it.
Despite this, it remains the dominant approach
to education in these countries. How can this
phenomenon be explained?
There are several reasons for this, three
of which are pertinent here. First, as was
pointed out earlier, there are powerful forces
in these countries serving to maintain such an
approach to education because it works in their
own interests. In the developing societies (as
indeed in many others) a great disparity exists
between a small group of people who are rich
and powerful and a vast majority who are
poor, powerless and down-trodden. As long as
this majority is made to continue experiencing
education as a process of socialization into the
existing ways of life and the dominant beliefs

in their society, and not as an opportunity to

question these beliefs and practices, how they
came to exist and whether they need to be
changed, the rich and powerful classes will
continue to enjoy their privileged lives.
Second, the indigenous approach to the
education of young people in many developing
societies depends heavily on the socialization
process. A major objective of indigenous education in these societies is the preservation of
the tribal or community heritage done largely
through the transmission of community values,
such as unquestioned respect for adults and
their teachings, and moral and religious beliefs, to name a few. The successful transmission of these values requires unquestioned
obedience and conformity on the part of the
educands. Although this approach to pedagogy
has sometimes helped to hold the community
together and has minimized the loss of parental
control over children in these cultures, the
approach can be inimical to children because
it transforms them into youngsters who, though
biologically equipped with the same keen interests and imagination as their counterparts
from other cultures, quickly come to lack
the spirit of initiative, creativity and critical
thinking. Such an educational process produces
what one might refer to as 'over-socialized'
individuals for the world that is changing so
rapidly around them.
Third, apart from the indigenous pedagogical
tradition described above, many developing
countries are emerging from over 200 years
of colonial rule and domination during which
they experienced educational approaches that
were based on socialization into the culture of
their colonial masters. A major goal of colonial
education was the assimilation of the colonized
people into the habits and ways of thinking of
the colonizers, and the content and teaching
methodologies employed in classrooms during
the colonial period were all aimed at achieving
this purpose. The content knowledge offered
was foreign to the colonized people, divorced
from their histories, reality and experiences and
transmitted to them in a way that discouraged
any questioning of this knowledge. The aim was
to discourage critical thinking in the colonized
people so that they would make no demands
for independence from their colonizers. Even
though these countries are now independent,
but because they were effectively socialized
into colonial ways of doing things, many of

IMPROVING BASIC EDUCATION IN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES

their practices, including those of education,

remain firmly rooted in the colonial system.
Thus, education continues to be delivered in
a transmission mode that allows little or no
questioning by those receiving it. Teachers
find the method simple and straightforward,
involving no controversy and leaving them in
complete control in the classroom. As well, its
outcomes are easier to measure and, therefore,
favoured by those who wish to see teaching not
as the flux that it is but as a straightforward job
involving no ambiguities.
Thus, firmly embedded in political interests
and pedagogical practices that are difficult to
uproot, the socialization approach to education
poses a significant challenge to any attempt to
bring about educational reform based on an
innovative, critical approach. And yet, because
of its woeful inadequacy as a liberatory tool,
there is need to move beyond this orientation to
educational practice towards alternative practices that will bring about those emancipatory
norms towards which all good quality basic
education should be oriented.
The crucial role of the teacher in the educational process puts teacher education at the
centre of this task. As teachers themselves are
the products of the socialization system, efforts
to educate them for this new teaching role need
to be guided by certain principles considered
as important to 'resocialization'. The first of
these principles involves a recognition that the
teaching/learning process should foster the habits of social criticism, independent and critical
thinking and questioning of existing realities, so
that those experiencing education can come to
realize that through their own effort they can be
instrumental in creating an alternative world.
The second principle involves a reappraisal of
what has been learned through the process
of socialization so that such knowledge is
now interpreted and understood within wider
social, political and economic configurations.
The third principle relates to understanding
the dynamics involved in the psychology of socialization within which people internalize the
ideologies embedded in certain actions, values
and traditions they encounter, sometimes to the
point where these ideologies become 'second
nature' and their origins and histories are either
forgotten or cease to be questioned. Educating
teachers to understand and unravel this type of
psychology means preparing them for instructional approaches that abandon the expository

179

modes of teaching in favour of methods that

allow students to question basic assumptions
of their society in the quest for a better life for
all. It requires teacher education that prepares
teachers in the skills that build up or restore
the confidence and dignity of their students as
human beings whose views and experiences are
recognized and honoured in the teaching/learning process. It also involves teacher education
that builds an awareness in its participants that
the resocialization approach involves difficulties and is more intellectually demanding than
the transmission approach, but that, if they
consider their teaching acts as a central issue
in the struggle for a better world, then they
should be prepared to put in the extra resources
needed to achieve this goal.
Implicit in the principles outlined above is a
teacher education programme based on critical
reflection so that teachers become reflective,
critical inquirers who, through modelling, will
eventually pass on the habits of critical reflection and inquiry to their students. Reflective
teachers are those who possess the capacity to
surpass the given, look at things as if they could
be otherwise. That teaching is not a neutral act
and that teachers, consciously or not, do help to
organize the way students perceive themselves
and the world is no longer in dispute. Teachers
who are prepared to go beyond the given and
aim for a better society are likely to influence
the thinking of their students towards similar
views. This is the vision of teacher education
and teaching that developing countries must
work towards if education is to serve to improve
the quality of life for the masses. The final
section of this paper describes what is being
done in one developing country, Pakistan, to
realize this vision.
THE I.E.D. PROJECT AT THE AGA
KHAN UNIVERSITY
The Institute for Educational Development
(I.E.D.) came into operation in July 1993 as
part of the Aga Khan University in Karachi,
Pakistan. This university was opened 11 years
~igo with the purpose of promoting the welfare
of the people of Pakistan and other developing
countries through the provision of health and
educational services. The I.E.D.'s establishment is seen by many as a timely intervention in
the attempt to address the acute and appalling
problems in the educational system of Pakistan,

180

YATFA KANU

which has been described as being 'in a state of

crisis' .5 The predicament of teacher education,
in this dismal scenario, is particularly severe,
requiring immediate attention to not only the
training and deployment of new teachers but
also the improvement and development of
those already serving in the nation's schools.
The rapidly expanding system of education
in Pakistan requires more trained teachers
than are currently being produced by the
formal teacher training system in the country.
According to recent external assessment, 6 the
government's Seventh Plan, which came into
operation in 1988, calls for 10,000 more trained
teachers each year (in addition to the current
annual throughput of 25,000) to meet current
educational needs in Pakistan. With a national
budget allocation of only 1.6% to teacher
education one can say with a fair amount of
certainty that this demand will not be met in
the immediate future.
Apart from the quantitative dimension, the
qualitative dimension is also staggering in its
proportion. A very high proportion of teachers
at primary and secondary school levels have
no professional teaching qualification, many
of them not being educated beyond secondary
school level. Except in years of formal training,
there is no observable difference in quality between trained and untrained primary teachers
and, with very low salaries paid to teachers in
Pakistan, there is no immediate desire among
unqualified teachers to improve and upgrade
themselves academically or professionally.
The crisis in education is compounded by
an approach to classroom instruction that conspires to cripple learners intellectually. It is
a teacher-dominated approach to classroom
teaching within which information is simply
transferred from the teacher's head to the heads
of the students. This approach, employed both
in the education of teachers and school pupils,
assumes that knowledge is an inherently static
and unproblematic phenomenon to be poured
into learners through the transmission mode of
teaching. Assumptions of this kind ignore the
socially constructed nature of knowledge and
the reality that learners are capable of both
interpreting knowledge and constructing their
own knowledge around their own experiences
and understandings. It also denies learners
the opportunity to process and examine in a
critical way the information delivered and raise
questions relating to its relevance, usefulness

and application to their lives. The education

received is so remote from their everyday
experiences and needs that it is simply filed
away in their heads, and in the process they
themselves are filed away as human beings
(Freire, 1990).
Further, as mentioned earlier, there is a
general low level of education among teachers
themselves. In this regard, Pakistan is similar to
many developing countries where both primary
and secondary school teachers have no further
education beyond secondary school level. In
addition to their lack of content knowledge,
many of the teachers have not received any
professional training in teaching to enhance
their quality of performance in schools. Although the recruitment and deployment of such
untrained and unqualified teachers has helped
to address the problem of teacher shortage in
the rapidly expanding educational systems in
these countries, the ability of these teachers
to become more actively involved in the successful implementation of curriculum change
or to embark upon alternative instructional
responsibilities is severely handicapped.
In the light of all these problems, the role
of the I.E.D. is to provide practising teachers
with an education that will not only meet
their needs in the enhancement of the content
knowledge of the various subjects they teach,
but will also introduce them to innovative
approaches to the teaching of these subjects
that will result in the personal and intellectual
growth of the students and, consequently, the
improvement of their lives through education.
There is ample evidence in the developing
countries that if the skills and knowledge
of teachers already practising are upgraded
constantly through in-service training, the quality of education offered in schools can be
considerably increased at relatively minimal
costs (Bacchus, 1991). In low-income countries
such as Pakistan effective intervention lies in
the development of the skills of the reflective
practitioner among already practising teachers.
The education of reflective teachers focuses not
only on the upgrading of content knowledge
and the teaching skills of teachers; focus is
equally on. the recognition that knowledge
itself is problematic because it is constructed
among a community of learners and subject
to change in the light of new evidence. As
well as emphasizing the technical dimensions
of teaching, teacher education aimed at the

IMPROVING BASIC EDUCATION IN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES

preparation of reflective teachers also portrays

teaching as involving moral, ethical dimensions
requiring constant reflection upon the way one
carries out one's responsibilities as teacher. In
particular, reflection within such a programme
should focus on the purposes of education in
developing countries and whether curriculum
content and teaching approaches lead to the
achievement of these purposes. This is of
crucial importance because in many developing countries educational goals are in constant
clash with curriculum content and teaching
methods used in classrooms. For example, one
cannot have the development of responsible
decision-makers as an educational goal and
yet employ transmission modes of teaching.
Neither can educational content be based on
an academic education when one's goal is to
prepare students for life in rural areas.
The I.E.D. is currently working towards the
development of reflective practitioners with a
group of 22 primary and secondary school
teachers from various developing countries.
These teachers come from schools that see
value and purpose in the reflective approach
to teaching and are working in partnership with
the I.E.D. in this school improvement venture. The participating countries are Tanzania,
Kenya, Bangladesh, Tajikistan and Pakistan
(the host country for the programme). The
teachers go through two academic years of
intensive in-service training and will return to
their schools and play the role of teachers and
mentors or Master Teachers. During the programme their content knowledge and teaching
methodologies are upgraded. The programme
also tries to foster in them new attitudes and
dispositions towards teaching that take into
account the active involvement of students in
their own learning as opposed to the passive
role they play in the teacher-dominated approach to teaching prevalent in developing
countries.
In implementing its reflective teacher education programme, the I.E.D. emphasizes critical
reflection in teaching. For its purpose, the
I.E.D.'s understanding of critical reflection
is guided by Smyth's (1989) articulation of
it as reflection, which involves a conscious
understanding of the material and ideological
conditions that create the problems we face as
educators. It involves not only reflection on
these conditions but also the political will to
embark upon alternatives and act to change

181

these constraining circumstances. For developing countries like Pakistan, such constraints
include the gross lack of educational resources
in many schools, the lack of equity in educational opportunities and a fatalistic disposition
towards life in the vast majority of the population, which makes them see whatever lives
they live as predestined and the will of Allah,
which cannot be changed. The teachers in the
I.E.D. programme are encouraged to channel
their critical thoughts to focus on both their
classroom teaching and the wider contexts
of teaching in which the constraining conditions occur. This is done in order to create
the awareness in them that teaching is not
a neutral act from which students emerge
unaffected and that teaching takes place in
broader social, economic, political and cultural
contexts that extend to, and have implications
for, their classrooms. For this purpose the first
three weeks of seminars at the I.E.D. include
reflective sessions during which the programme
participants reflect on their values and beliefs
about teaching (their teaching philosophies) to
find out if these are in consonance with their
teaching practices. If discrepanciesare found
to exist between beliefs about teaching and
practice, the participants are encouraged to
examine the sources of the discrepancies and
see how they can bring about change in more
desirable directions for themselves.
Critical reflection is also actively drawn upon
in the programme as a vehicle for embarking
upon alternative practices for the improvement
of education. The programme participants are
encouraged to visit different school systems in
Karachi for an extended period of time and
observe the school, paying particular attention
to the following areas: the overt curriculum
(content, teaching methodologies and assessment processes); the hidden curriculum and
the types of messages contained in it; the
relations among the commonplaces of education (the teachers, students, school subjects
and the general milieu in which the schools
operate); the administrative structure of the
schools and how these enhance or constrain
teaching; the community links that the school
has; and structures that erihance and inhibit
change. The intention guiding this exercise is
for the programme participants to reflect critically on their observations and think of viable
alternatives to those practices they find to be
in dissonance with their espoused philosophies

182

YATTA KANU

of education. In addition to their school observations, participants are also encouraged

to extend the reflective process to their own
schools and consider ways in which certain
practices could be improved to provide better
quality education for all.
Inquiry is a major vehicle for promoting critical reflection. In the I.E.D. teacher education
programme, inquiry is embarked upon at two
levels. The first level involves the development
of the programme participants as effective
professional teachers. They are encouraged
to inquire into their teaching through means
such as conducting action research into their
own teaching, journal writing, monitoring their
own teaching and reflecting on it and undertaking curriculum analyses. At the second
level they learn how to plan and implement
inquiry-related teaching in classrooms. They
learn this approach to teaching mainly from
the way in which it is modelled by faculty in the
teaching of their various disciplines. Research
by the programme participants on given topics
or topics chosen by them, class presentation
of research findings, project work, collaborative assignments, cooperative learning, analysis
of textbook and classroom knowledge and
drawing on participants' own experiences during class discussions and seminars are some
of the activities in which faculty engages to
promote inquiry in the classroom as well as
actively involving the programme participants
in their own learning. Through the inquiry
method, participants are resocialized into a
new approach to teaching, which, as opposed
to knowledge transmission, recognizes that
knowledge is not something out there, fixed
to be given to students, but that students can
construct their own knowledge and recast and
recombine knowledge in new ways. As well, the
programme participants come to understand
that as teachers they need not have all the
answers and that the teaching/learning process
is a communal venture within which they and
their students learn together through inquiry.
In order to close the gap between the theory
learned in teacher education and the real world
of practice in the classrooms, the I.E.D. has
attempted to make the programme as fieldbased as possible through a unique approach
that is worthy of emulation or consideration by
even those developed countries searching for
interventionist measures in teacher education.
The four curriculum courses of the programme

social studies, English, maths and science

are divided into modules each lasting for
six weeks. During each module, for two hours
each day, the course participants experience
seminars in the content and innovative teaching
methodologies of that course based on inquiry
and critical reflection. The seminars are followed immediately by classroom teaching at the
professional development school designated for
that purpose. This way whatever is learned
in the seminars is applied immediately to
real practice and reflected upon to see what
works, what does not, the reasons for this and
what alternatives can be considered. During
such teaching, the regular curriculum of the
professional development school is used, but
the enhanced content knowledge of the course
participants and their innovative approaches to
teaching that content give the exercise more
meaning and usefulness than is usually the case.
This approach functions as an effective means
of relating theory to classroom practice, thus
addressing the theory/practice divide that pervades teacher education in both the developed
and developing countries.
In addition to the four core courses offered,
seminars are also offered on reflective practice
in teaching and teacher education, curriculum and instruction, research in education,
issues related to education in Pakistan and
other developing countries and mentoring and
coaching. The idea behind these seminars is
to prepare the programme participants for
their future role as teacher educators and
to help them to understand that meaningful
teaching cannot be separated from reflection
and curriculum issues such as those relating
to curriculum goals and purposes, and curriculum planning and implementation. The
seminars also bring them face to face with
persistent issues such as equity in education,
especially in countries where the education of
girls is neglected or where there is a distinct
difference in quality between the education
that the rich and the poor receive. Research
on how such issues can be addressed for the
improvement of education is also encouraged
among programme participants. In short, the
programme participants are resocialized into
looking at teaching that extends beyond the
confines of the classroom.
The programme participants conduct weekly
workshops for regular teachers of the four curriculum courses so that these teachers benefit

IMPROVING BASIC EDUCATION IN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES

from what the participants have learned at

the I . E . D . Seminars are also run for the
headteachers and managers of the partner
schools in order to help them develop an
atmosphere supportive to change and m a k e
the work of the Master Teachers more effective
when they return to offer in-service teacher
education.
Examination systems anywhere influence
curriculum practices, but in Pakistan in particular, so strong is the stranglehold of the
examination system on the curricula of schools
that it completely determines the way teachers
teach in the schools. Since the examinations
usually solicit fact-oriented recall answers,
classroom teaching hardly ever goes beyond
the transmission of facts to students. Any
attempt at an innovative approach to teaching
must take this examination reality into account
if it is to succeed. The I . E . D . is, therefore,
working with the Ministry of Education and
the various public examination boards in the
country to change the focus of the examinations
*.o reflect the approaches to teaching that are
e m b a r k e d upon at the I . E . D . If it succeeds in
doing this, the I . E . D . will have also succeeded
in curbing the r a m p a n t cheating that pervades
Pakistan's examinations system, for students
will no longer be required to provide recall
answers (a practice that encourages cheating).
Rather, they will now be required to harness
their creative and critical thinking capacities to
answer examination questions.
At the end of the p r o g r a m m e at the I . E . D .
the participants will return to their schools
where they will continue to teach part-time
and work as Master Teacher Trainers at professional development centres in their countries.
In Pakistan, it is planned that 10-12 of the
graduates from the I . E . D . p r o g r a m m e will
function in this dual capacity, utilizing their
newly acquired qualification to improve teaching in their schools and training other teachers
at in-service level at the professional development centres. It is envisioned that during the
first year four different groups of 30 visiting
teachers will experience such training at the
professional development centre in Karachi for
eight weeks at a time (a total of 120 teachers in
one year). Similar centres will be opened in the
northern areas of Pakistan by 1996.
As mentioned earlier, the I . E . D . teacher
development p r o g r a m m e has just started, and
it is still in its infant stages, but already

183

the government of Pakistan is encouraging

and applauding its efforts, and a preliminary
U N E S C O review has given the p r o g r a m m e
a positive rating because the continuous inservice teacher education provided in the prog r a m m e is considered to be one of the most
effective ways of improving the quality of
education at minimal additional costs. For
developing countries hardpressed for educational financing, this is a step in the right
direction. A n u m b e r of modules have already
been completed and have been appraised as
a remarkable success by the headmistresses
and teachers at the professional development
school. As one of the teachers said after a
week-end maths workshop organized for them
by the p r o g r a m m e participants, 'Formerly, I
knew only one way of teaching fractions to
my students. Now I know three other ways
and I can use these to cater for the different
learning needs of different students in my class.'
Also, if the quality of mind that comes out in
the writings and discussion seminars with the
p r o g r a m m e participants and the constructivist
approach to mathematics teaching observed
among them during the mathematics module is
anything to go by, then these teachers are well
on their way to revolutionalizing teaching in
many schools in Pakistan; for the constructivist
approach to teaching, based as it is on students
bringing their own experiences and purposes to
the learning task in the classroom in order to
make sense of it, gives voice to students in the
teaching/learning process for the first time.
Admittedly, the i m p r o v e m e n t of teacher
education in Pakistan involves a long haul, but
the I . E . D . ' s approach represents a beginning
effort in this challenging task.
NOTES
1. Three such conferences were held in 1990 alone: the
World Conference on Education for All (WCEFA) held
in Jomtien, Thailand; the World Summit on Children
held in New York; and the Commonwealth Ministers of
Education Conference held in Barbados.
2. Both modernization and human capital theories of
development link education with economic development.
Modernization theory holds that a modern society is a
developed society and that all societies develop in a linear
manner from the traditional stage to the modernized stage
where they develop modern institutions such as schools
and factories where work stills and modern values and
positive attitudes toward work are taught. Such skills and
attitudes lead to industrialization; an industrialized state
is a modern state. Human capital theory posits that the
most efficient way for a country to achieve economic

Y A T T A KANU

184

development is by investing in its human population

through education. This approach to development has
led to many problems in the developing world (e.g.
the problem of the educated unemployed) and is now
being reconsidered by education policy planners in these
countries.
3. According to the World Bank's Education Sector
Policy Paper (1980a), the role of education in overcoming
poverty is 'increasing incomes, improving health and
nutrition, reducing family size' (p. 46). Education is
regarded as a 'basic need, an instrument to help meet
other basic needs' (p. 86). This is the rationale provided
by the Bank for its principle of 'basic education . . . for
all children and adults' (p. 86). This principle, along
with four others also rooted in economic considerations
reduction of educational inequalities, cost-effective
transfer of knowledge, provision of manpower skills,
and development of national analytic capacities in management, administration and planning (Habte, 1983) - constituted the World Bank policy framework for lending
in the 1980s (Heyneman, 1983).
4. For fuller explanations of these approaches to
reflective practice and their educational implications, see
Kanu (1993).
5. See for example, the proposal for the I.E.D., Aga
Khan University.
6. Read the recent research on education in Pakistan
by the USAID-funded project, BRIDGES.
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Reform. Commonwealth policy paper on curriculum

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Rural Children and Youths. International Council for
Educational development, Essex, U.S.A.
Duminy, P. A. (1973) African Pupils and Teaching Them.
D. L. Van Schaik, Pretoria.
Freire, P. (1990) Pedagogy of the Oppressed. Continuum
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Habte, A. (1983) Where the Bank is going in the field
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(1), 65--74.
Heyneman, S. (1983) Editor's introduction. Special issue
- - Education and the World Bank. Canadian and
International Education 12 (1), 7-10.
The Holmes Group (1986) Tomorrow's Teachers: A
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Morales-Gomez, D. (1991) Is basic education for all a
solution to the development crisis of the 1990s? Canadian Journal of Development Studies xii(i), 39-57.
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