WELCOME

1. WELCOME A study on Primary and Secondary Education of Bangladesh Presented by A.N.S. HabiburRahman Date : March 10, 2014

2. The objectives of the study • Review Documents • Education policy, • Teachers' training curricula, • Teachers' training materials, • Teachers' training system and methodology; • Identify the relevance of documents to ultimately meet the diverse needs of learners; • Identification of teacher’s qualification, skills , gaps and constraints in practicing right based teaching. • Assessment • Gender equity • Human rights • Multilingual education • Flexibility in the teachers training curriculum

3. Facts & Figures • Primary school children (6-10): 17 million • Net Enrollment: 91% • Dropout rate : 40% • Government Primary School (GPS): 37,672 • Enrollment in GPS: 10 million • Teacher :about 185000 • Registered Non-govt. Primary School (RNGPS): 20083 • Teacher: 77,000 • Enrollment: 3.5 million • Ebtadayi Madrasa (equivalent to Primary): 6726 • Enrollment : 0.9million Teacher: 29,000

4. Facts & Figures (contd.) • Kindergarten School: about 3,000 • NGO-run non-formal learning centres (7-14): 50,000 (Approx)( Mostly One teacher centres) • Enrollment in NGO-run non-formal learning centres: 1.5 million • Government Secondary School: 317 • Enrollment : 2,25,000 (Approx) • Teacher: 5,500 • Non-government Secondary School:18200 (Approx) • Enrollment 72,00000 (approx) • Teacher:226,009 (Approx)

5. Primary Teachers’ Training Management • Teachers’ training for the mainstream primary education • Course name- Certificate-in-Education (C-in-Ed). • Duration- 1 year • Under-graduate certificate by Primary Training Institutes (PTIs). • 55 government PTIs working throughout the country • A non-government PTI offers training to indigenous teachers • An NGO (CRP) runs C-in-Ed course on Special Education in a very small scale

6. Organizational capacity • Two shifts simultaneously. • Each PTI is supposed to have 12 instructors • A Superintendent responsible for overall team • Many of the posts are vacant. • (NAPE) National Academy for Primary Education • Trains the PTI Instructors, officials • Conducts PTI examinations and research • No effective control to implement the curriculum. • PTIs are not informed about the changes in the national primary curriculum and PTI teaching are not updated accordingly. • Lack of coordination among Directorate of Primary Education (DPE), NCTB, PTIs and NAPE.

7. C-in-Ed Course • Theoretical aspects constitute the major part of C-in-Ed Course • C-in-Ed is yet to put more importance on ICT. • Gender equity is inadequately covered in the curriculum. • In practice teaching, too many trainees are engaged in same school which hinders to obtain adequate skills • Instructors experienced in one-way communication ,trainees groomed up accordingly • Space, contact time and number of learners are not favorable for using teaching aids . • No refresher or follow-up after one year course

8. PTI Instructors • Instructors are recruited with a background of B-Ed and M-Ed. Experience in primary education is not prerequisite. • A number of instructors are promoted from experimental schools. • Severe shortage of instructors to run one shift, though PTIs run two shifts. • Sometimes instructors are assigned to visit few schools for monitoring in the attachments area • Instructors have very little scope to visit the trainees during the practice training.

9. Recommendations • Coordination among DPE, NCTB, PTI and NAPE should be strengthened • Trainees should be allowed to take the textbooks after the training is over. • Technical support has to be extended for developing materials and preparing and using teaching learning aids. • Practice teaching should be half of the total course period for sustainable achievement . • Tanning Monitoring should be introduced • C-in-Ed Courses on Special Education should be expanded. • One year C-in-Ed Course should be reviewed and updated . • Mental growth of children should given more emphasize to ensure joyful creative learning.

10. Recommendations • Materials on music, fine arts and physical education should be available • ICT with appropriate facilities should be incorporated within a short time. • Best use of of learners’ time requires proper consideration • Instructors should receive primary education related induction as a prerequisite of their service. • Pre-service training should be introduce under NAPE. • Instructors should have firsthand experience on classroom activities before they are supervising practice teaching. • Vacant positions instructors in PTIs have to be filled • After completion of the course instructors should meet trainees once a year

11. Secondary Teachers’ Training • B.Ed is the mainstream training course for the secondary school teachers • Course : 1 year- Bachelor of Education (B.Ed) • Run by the Teachers’ Training Colleges (TTCs) under the National University. • Bangladesh Open University runs B.Ed Course with less contact hours • There are 14 govt. TTCs, one for female. • The govt TTCs have a good number of teachers, well trained both in home and abroad. They also conduct short-term training • The management structure of TTCs is akin to that of the degree colleges.

12. Secondary Teachers’ Training • Private TTCs established in affiliation with the National University, having quality below standard. • Private TTCs address the increased need of the huge number of teachers in the country. • Private TTCs have less teachers, most of them work on part-time basis and run B.Ed class once in a week • A large number of teachers expecting B.Ed training from private TTCs only for payment and scale change • Most of the out-campuses of private universities conduct training of very low quality

13. The Course - B.Ed • Present B.Ed curriculum was developed in 1996 • Designed with 1200 contact hours • Gender issues are addressed to some extent • Four discussion sessions on inclusive education • The issue of human rights is not properly addressed in the curriculum. • Questions are different of the private universities and BOU though, curriculum is the same. • Most of the private universities do not have teaching practice, for the trainees; instead they adopt simulation .

14. Secondary School Teacher • Trainees with 1200 contact hours can use their skills more. • Bachelor in Physical Education (B P. Ed) is offered to game teachers. But they are engaged in teaching other subjects. • Music, fine arts and crafts subjects are neglected. • Most of the secondary schools face shortage of teachers . • Inadequate messages on indigenous issues in B-Ed, squeezes ability of teachers to deal with indigenous groups . • Low salary and benefits attract teachers to take additional work • In many cases, subject-teachers are not recruited .. • Presently non govt teachers are recruited by Non-govt. Teacher Registration and Certification Authority (NTRCA)

15. Recommendations • For one shift, all TTCs should strictly follow the B.Ed curriculum and 1200 contact hours . • Public and Private TTCs should be of similar standard. • Strong regulatory framework is needed for Out-campus of private universities. • A supportive follow-up of B-Ed Course should be introduced. • TTCs should review the B.Ed curriculum .

16. Recommendations –B.Ed • Right-Based Approach should be the focus of B.Ed Course . • Teaching Quality Improvement of Secondary Education Project can be mainstreamed for sustainability of achievement. • 'Human Rights‘ should be included in Teachers’ training course • Universal Human Declaration be available to the instructors and teachers.

17. Recommendations • Sports, music, fine arts , crafts should get proper emphasis • Student teacher ratio should be reduced for enabling trained teachers to use skills in converting classroom into learner-centred. • Ethnicity, disability and gender issue should be addressed with due importance • Allocation is needed for teaching learning aids . • Subject-based teachers should be recruited.

18. Other trainings forSecondary Teachers • Many teachers participate in some round year trainings offered by different projects, which get lost after phase out • The short term trainings include • Teaching Quality Improvement (TQI) for 14 days, • Continuous Professional Development for 20 days, • Subject-based training for 6 days, and • Workshops on different issues. • These include inadequate gender, inclusive education and other important topics. • The present short-term trainings use participatory method and thereby interactive to some extant. • TOT is not adequate for Master trainers to disseminate content in large scale training .

19. Recommendations • Short-term teachers’ trainings should be reviewed to supplement B-ED training. • Weeklong refresher training should be introduced to develop skills of teachers with modern concepts of teaching learning. • For professional development of teachers visit to schools by trainers at a reasonable intervals. • To acquire knowledge on social development issues and pedagogy study need to be commissioned.

20. Other FindingsInclusive Education • PTI training focuses mainly on meeting the needs of normal students, not the disable children. • The concept of inclusiveness is a workshop topic to orient the instructors of PTIs • Bangladesh Health and Physiotherapy Institute initiated an equivalent C-in-Ed Course with focus on special education on a small scale . • No follow up and support provided to the teachers for solutions to the problem of teaching learning process

21. Recommendations- Inclusive • School management committee and other stakeholders including teachers and parents should work to create scope and support inclusive education at school level. • Comprehensive approach should be undertaken from policy to practice to make the mainstream primary education inclusive. • 'Inclusive Education' topic should be included in curriculum • Special Education materials should be free of cost or at a low price.

22. Special education institution should work as resource centres for inclusive education. • Negative concepts, text and images in curriculum regarding disabilities ,be replaced by positive messages and information. • Subject related to special needs should be included in the curriculum of PTI & TTC.

23. Gender • Gender parity has been achieved in primary and secondary education, but but teacher training lack gender aspects. • Gender equity is not adequately mentioned in training course, materials and methodologies. • Materials produced by some NGOs highlighted gender and equity issues. • The number of female teachers increased, but attitude of male teachers is not congenial.

24. Recommendations- Gender • Gender equity should be taken into account during the policy and course development. • Topic on 'gender equity' should be included in the Teachers' Training curriculum. • All gender biased or insensitive concepts, text and images prevailing in the education • curriculum of schools should be replaced with gender sensitive messages and information. • Materials produced by some NGOS should be adapted.

25. Multilingual Education • There is no official arrangement to use ethnic minorities’ mother tongues as instruction of education • Education materials are not available in the languages of the minority groups other than in Bangla. • Number of teachers coming from minority groups in the mainstream employment process is too small . • Some NGOs working in ethnic minority areas introduced multilingual education.

26. Recommendations- Multilingual • More number of teachers from minority language should be trained and posted. • In case of unavailability , recruitment should carefully be made from the sensitive citizens. • Materials should be developed in minority languages to help teachers and learners • Information on culture and livelihood of the minority groups should be in the curriculum and textbooks.