i

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

I acknowledge my gratitude to the host organization MERU District Council for giving

me permission to pursue my study at their organization. Special thanks should go to

District Education Officer, Mr A Mbasha for his valuable assistance throughout the

course of this study.

Likewise, my profound gratitude is extended to the course Coordinator, Dr. Charity

Waichungo, and the entire Faculty of Education at the Mount Meru University, Arusha,

for her talent full teaching and instructing. The tireless efforts, by the dean of students

Mr. Malima, for preparing a very useful introduction letter to the host organizations are

really appreciated.

Lastly, I thank God for his blessings throughout the period of my study.
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Contents

Acknowledgment …………………………………………………………………………i

List of tables …………………………………………………………………………… vii

CHAPTER ONE…………………………………………………………………………. 1

1.0 Introduction …….……………………………………………………………….. 1

1.1 Background information…..

……………………………………………... 1

1.2 Definitions

………………………………………………………………. 2

1.3 Childhood education program in Tanzania ......

………………………….. 3

CHAPTER TWO .......................................................................................................….... 4

2.0 THE POLICY OF CHILDHOOD EDUCATION IN TANZANIA …………….. 4

 iii

2.1 Introduction …..

………………………………………………………….. 4

2.2 Goals and objectives of the National Childhood Education Policy

……... 4

2.3 Curriculum of Childhood Education in Tanzania .............

………………. 6

2.4 Training of Childhood Education Teachers in Tanzania

………………... 7

CHAPTER THREE.............................................................................................................8

3.0 CHILDHOOD EDUCATION IN MERU DISTRICT COUNCIL..........................8

3.1 Availability of Preschools Education in Meru District

council...................8

3.2 Number of Childhood Education units in Meru District

council ................8

3.3 Provision of Facilities and Educational

Materials.......................................8

3.4 Training of Childhood Teachers in Meru District

council ..........................8

3.5 Statistics of Children who have benefited from the Childhood

Education program in the last five

years ................................................................9
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3.6 Statistics of children who have benefitted from the Childhood

Education program in the last five

years...............................................................10

3.7 Parents’ assessment of the Childhood Education Program in

Meru ........10

3.8 Progress on 2010 UNESCO’s goals and objectives as related to

Childhood

Education..............................................................................................11

CHAPTER FOUR .............................................................................................................12

4.0 CONCLUSION AND RECOMENDATIONS .....................................................13

4.1 Conclusion ...............................................................................................

.13

4.2 Recommendations ...................................................................................

..13

LIST OF ABBRESSVISIONS .........................................................................................15

BIBLIOGRAPHY ............................................................................................................16
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LIST OF TABLES

Table 1: Number Pre – Primary schools in Meru District council from 2005 – 2009...... 9

Table 2: The number of Pupils selected to join standard I from 2005 – 2009 in Arumeru

district................................................................................................................................10
vi
 1

CHAPTER ONE

1.0 Introduction

1.1 Background information

Giving birth is something in which mankind and animals are equal, but rearing the young

and especially educating them for many years is something that is a unique gift and

responsibility of men (Nyerere, 1967)

The provision of early childhood care and education in colonial Tanzania were started by

the religious organizations and minority racial groups (Self in Kweka et al., 1998). These

included bush schools, madrassats (Quran schools), nursery schools, kindergartens and

day care centers. These were however very few due to the weak position of those

organizations during the colonial times. The colonial government on its part introduced

early childhood care and education with the establishment of the Social Welfare Division

in 1946 which dealt with “problem” cases such as probation of young offenders, social

guidance and counseling of families and individuals, child welfare (day care, orphanages

etc), destitute care (aged and poor persons), and handicapped persons and children

(Omari in Kweka et al., 1999). The government did not provide early childhood

education for normal children below the minimum age of 7 years when they were

required to start formal schooling.

After independence in 1961, there was some pressure from a few parents for pre-school

education of their children. The reasons given for pre-school education were growth of
 2

towns and disruption of communal child rearing practices, working mothers,

development of modern technologies and the appearance of nuclear families. Later on the

development of Ujamaa villages after 1967 required that women should be freed to

participate fully in economic production in the new villages. The expansion of primary

education in the country also meant that the older children would not be at home taking

care of their young brothers or sisters. At the same time some parents looked at pre-

school education as a good preparation for formal schooling. This would enable them to

do better in the primary school and secure a place in a secondary school. However, there

was no single organization that could articulate the needs of the various groups and come

up with a comprehensive national programme for early child care and education. At the

same time it was not possible to throw the whole burden of early childhood education to

the government at a time when the government had not been able to provide universal

primary education.

1.2 Definition and Concept of childhood education in Tanzania

Early Childhood Education is a term that refers to educational programs and strategies

geared toward children from birth to the age of six. This time period is widely considered

the most vulnerable and crucial stage of a person's life

(www.k6educators.about.com/od/educationglossary/g/earlychildhoode.htm)

Early childhood education often focuses on guiding children to learn through play. The

term often refers to preschool or infant/child care programs.

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1.3 Childhood education programs in Tanzania

The responsibility of child rearing and early childhood education in Tanzania has in

many places remained in the hands of individual families and communities without a

proper and competent institution to provide for their continued needs of education and

development. In some cases religions organizations, the Government of Tanzania with

the support of donors, particularly UNICEF, private initiatives in the business perspective

and some Ujamaa villages have initiated various formal programmes for the care and

education of the children. These programmes are known by different names such as Day

Care Centers, Nursery Schools and Kindergartens although in most cases their activities

do not always match with those institutions (Kweka etal, 1998)

Government Indecision on Early Childhood Education continues to date as there is no

serious program on the part of the government that shows serious strategies/actions apart

from the shallow policy statement found on the education and Training Policy. The

initiatives on the early Childhood education so far observed are:

i. Government Primary schools have provision for Early Childhood Education.

ii. Religious Centers that is Christian nursery schools, Christian Sunday schools and

Muslims Madrasats.

iii. Social Welfare Centers such as orphanage centers

iv. Political Party’s wings such as CCW- UWT child centers

v. Organization Child care centers

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CHAPTER TWO

2.0 THE POLICY OF CHILD HOOD EDUCATION IN TANZANIA

2.1 Introduction

A good system of education in any country must be effective and in two fronts: on the

qualitative level, to ensure access to education and equity in the distribution and

allocation of resources to various segments of the society and on the qualitative level, to

ensure that the country produces the skills needed for rapid social and economic

development (MECT, 1995). The policy statement for the childhood education is

contained on the national Childhood education policy stating that “the Government shall

promote pre-school education for children aged 0-6 years. This education shall ensure

maintenance of our cultural values”.

2.2 Goals and objectives of the National Childhood Education Policy

The Goals and Objectives of the National Childhood Education Policy are contained in

the National Education and Training Policy as mentioned below:

The Specific goals is that “Infants and Young children (aged 0-6 yrs) are cared for and

receive initial education both at home and in the few existing day care centres,

kindergartens, nursery and other pre- schools located mostly at urban areas” The specific

objectives are:

i. Government shall issue rights of occupancy and land titles to both Government

and Non Government education and training institutions.

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ii. Education and Training Boards (ETB’s) shall be established for every region,

district, town, District council and city councils and shall be responsible for the

management of all levels of formal education and training in their areas of

jurisdiction.

iii. All education and training institutions shall have school or college

committees/boards.

iv. Boards and committees of education and training institutions shall be responsible

for management, development, planning, discipline and finance of institutions

under their jurisdiction.

v. All education managers at national, regional, districts and post- primary formal

education and training institutions shall have a university degree, professional

training in education and management

vi. To encourage and promote the overall personality development of the child, that

is his or her physical, mental, moral and social characteristics.

vii. To identify children with abnormal patterns of development or education

potentials and device special programmes for them.

viii. To mould the character of the child and enable him/her to acquire acceptable

norms of social conduct and behaviour.

ix. To help the child acquire, appreciate, respect and develop pride in the family, his

or her cultural background, moral values, customs and traditions, as well as

national ethic and identity.

x. To provide the child with opportunities to acquire and develop communication,

numerical and manipulative skills.

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xi. To prepare the child for primary school education.

2.3 Curriculum of Childhood Education in Tanzania

Tanzania Institute of education (TIE) is responsible for pre – primary education

curriculum design, development, dissemination, monitoring and evaluation. The

curriculum contains the following statements:

i. The teaching of Kiswahili, English and other foreign languages shall be promoted

in the whole education and training system.

ii. Kiswahili and English shall be compulsory subjects for all students from pre-

primary to Ordinary level secondary education. Training in communication skills

through English and Kiswahili shall permeate the whole education and training

system.

iii. Science and Technology shall be essential components of education and training

in the whole education and training system.

iv. The teaching of humanities shall be promoted in the whole education and training

system.

v. The teaching of civic and social studies shall be compulsory from pre-primary

schools to ordinary level secondary education and their components shall

permeate the whole education and training system.

vi. The curriculum at all levels of education and training shall emphasize and

promote the meager of theory and practice and the general applications of

knowledge.
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2.3 Training of Childhood Education Teachers in Tanzania

There is no clear policy on training of pre-primary education teachers. This has resulted

on having untrained, partially trained and trained teachers at pre –primary schools. Few

of the trained teachers have grades C, D or certificates, while the majority has three to six

months training in centers run by non – Governmental organizations.

Efficient delivery of this education will require qualified and competent teachers to

ensure quality. The supply of these teachers will be have to be matched appropriately

with the elements necessitated by liberalization and expansion measure of pre-primary

enrollments to this extent.

The Government is supposed to facilitate proper training and develop competent cadre of

teachers for pre primary schools.

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CHAPTER THREE

3.0 CHILDHOOD EDUCATION IN MERU DISTRICT COUNCIL

Geographcal over view ;meru is among seven districtsin Arusha region .Meru
region district covers the area of 1278.2sq km with a population of 225611 of
whom112807( 50.1%) are male while 112804 (49.9%) are female according to
census.
Administration

3.1 Availability of Preschools Education in Meru District council

This includes the whole plan of research that is research design, data collection, data

analysis and interpretation. Each item had been explored and planned as explained below.

3.2 Number of Childhood Education units in Meru District council

In year 2009, the Government Pre-primary schools comprised of a total of 12336 pupils

out of which 6162 are boys and 6174 are girls.

Non – Governmental Pre- Primary schools comprised a total number of 1498 pupils out

of which 755 pupils are boys and 740 are girls.

3.3 Provision of Facilities and Educational materials

A number of facilities are being offered by district council to Governmental and Non

Governmental pre-primary schools in facilitating provision of this important education.

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Construction of school buildings such as classrooms, recreational grounds, offices, staff

quarters, provisional of school furniture and funds for other charges related to schools

operation is being provided to Governmental Pre –primary schools.

3.4 Training of Childhood Education Teachers in Meru District council

Capacity building programmes such as teacher on job training, updates on curriculum etc

are being provided to both Governmental and Non Governmental teachers, but as stated

above lack of clear policy for pre-primary education is a big hindrance to the training of

pre-primary teachers.

3.5 Statistics of Pre-Primary schools at Arumeru district for the last five years

Table 1: Number Pre – Primary schools in Meru District council from 2005 - 2009

YEAR NO. OF PRE-PRIMARY % INCREASE

SCHOOLS
2005 57 88
2006 60 95
2007 75 80
2008 103 73

2009 111 93

Source: Department of Education, Meru District Council (2010).

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3.6 Statistics of children who have benefitted from the Childhood Education

program in the last five years

Table 2: The number of Pupils selected to join standard I from 2005 – 2009 in Arumeru

district

YEAR NUMBER OF CHILDREN NUMBER OF STUDENTS % OF

REGISTERED JOINED STD I CHILDREN

JOINED STD I

BOYS GIRLS TOTAL BOYS GIRLS TOTAL

2005 6,271 6,195 12,466 6,021 5,948 11,696 96
2006 6,186 6,257 12,443 6,063 6,133 12,196 98
2007 5,807 5,763 11,570 5,693 5,650 11,343 98
2008 4,446 4,349 8,795 4,402 4,306 8,708 99
2009 9,920 6,914 13,834 6,851 6,845 13,696 99
GRAND 29,630 29,480 59,108 29,03 28,882 57,912 98

TOTAL 0
Source: Department of Education, Meru District Council (2010).

3.7 Parents’ assessment of the Childhood Education Program in Meru

Large proportion of parents are convinced that, pre-primary education crucial to prepare

children physically and mentally to start primary education. The kind of preparation at
 11

the pre – primary education (the quality of education offered) will play an important role

on the delivery, quality, effectiveness and efficient of subsequent education levels.

Parents do favour and support pre-primary education, examples of supports offered

includes school uniforms, tea and lunch for the children, educational materials, transport,

health services, construction of school buildings as well as furniture.

Parents are not happy with the efficiency of the current arrangement of having pre-

primary classes included in the primary education classes. It seemed that the same

teachers who taught primary education are the ones teaching pre-primary pupils aw well,

this is a problem since the training of pre – primary education is supposed to be different

with that of primary education.

Parents believes that issues related to the pre –primary education are not very well

captures and explained in the Education and training policy, there lacks as well

regulations for the same. This poses problems on the interpretation and implementation

of the pre-primary education in Meru district and Tanzania as a whole.

3.8 Progress on 2010 UNESCO’s goals and objectives as related to Childhood

Education.

The goals of Education for All (EFA) are centrally concerned with equality. If children

are excluded from access to education, they are denied their human rights and prevented

from developing their talents and interests in the most basic of ways.
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The World Education Forum held in Dakar, Senegal, in April 2000 adopted six major

goals for education, two of which also became Millennium Development Goals later in

the same year. The goals covered the attainment of Universal Primary Education (UPE)

and gender equality, improving literacy and educational quality, and increasing life-skills

and early childhood education programmes, and were to be achieved within 15 years.

However, the gender goal was judged to be particularly urgent – requiring the

achievement of parity in throughout education by 2015.

Specifically the goal on early childhood education programmes stated that, “Expanding

and improving comprehensive early childhood care and education, especially for the most

vulnerable and disadvantaged children”

The progress made as far as Tanzania and Meru district is concerned is not encouraging,

because the few reached are urban and the vulnerable and disadvantaged ones have not

been covered satisfactorily. Basically the main reasons for that are:

i. Early childhood education is perceived as education for the children of the rich,

this is caused by poor sensitization on its importance.

ii. The efforts by the Central and Local Government on Education for all (EFA) had

been much focused on the Universal Primary education, thus leaving behind the

early childhood education and care.

iii. There are no open and serious strategies on reaching children in general in the

perspective of early childhood care and education, this is primarily caused by lack

of comprehensive policy specifically on this category.

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iv. The costs associated with this education are very high, in some cases the annual

expenses on the private early childhood education schools are almost equal to

university expenses, and this again is a result of lack of regulations on this

education category.

CHAPTER FOUR

4.0 CONCLUSION AND RECOMENDATIONS

4.1 Conclusion

Education is a torch which can help to guide and illuminate children’s lives. It is the

acknowledged responsibility of all governments, including Tanzania to ensure that

everyone is given the chance to benefit from it in these ways, from early childhood. It is

also in the fundamental interests of society to see that this happens as progress with

economic and social development depends upon it.

Nevertheless, millions of children in Tanzania still fail to gain access to early childhood

education, and even larger numbers among those who do enroll leave prematurely in

kindergarten, primary schools, secondary schools etc, implying dropping out before the

skills of literacy and numeracy have been properly gained. A majority of such children

are girls. As discussed above, this is a result of lack of comprehensive policy on early

childhood education, lack of seriousness on implementation of the shallow policy

statements on the early childhood education on the Government side and little knowledge

of the parents on the importance of early childhood education.

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4.2 Reccomendations

Following the above conclution, it is reccomended that:

1. Comprehensive policy on early childhood education is prepared and properly

implemented.

2. Tanzania Government through Local Governments launch sensitization campains

to the society especially the rural ones on the importance of early childhood

education.

3. Local government enacts bylaws to regulate the conduct of private schools that

are running a bussiness of early childhood education especially on the teachers

education levels, school fees and curricullum.

4. The Government establish and /or facilitate establishment of Teacher’s training

colledges on early childhood education.

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LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

MECT Ministry of Education and Culture in Tanzania

TIE Tanzania Institute of Education

UNESCO United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural

Organization
 16

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Binagi et al., (1998).The situation of early childhood education in Tanzania: Draft Report

Prepared for UNESCO in Dar es Salaam.

Department of Education of Meru District Council (2009). Annual District Progress

report. Arusha.

Ministry of Education and Culture (1955). Education and Training Policy.

Kingo et al., (2004). Paper on Promoting integrated early childhood development for

Deaf children in Morogoro, Tanzania.

Retrieved February14, 2010, from www.idcs.info

UNESCO Country programming document for the United Republic of Tanzania (2007).

First version.

Retrieved from

www.k6educators.about.com/od/educationglossary/g/earlychildhoode.htm