The government is carrying out a pilot study on the Kenya Junior Secondary Education Assessment exam in order to come up with a replica of the same, so as to help teachers to prepare the children on how they will be assessed.
Speaking during the ongoing 96th Kenya Music Festivals at Moi Girls High School, Eldoret, Uasin Gishu County, Basic Education Principal Secretary (PS), Dr. Belio Kipsang, pointed out that the assessment is key in terms of getting the learner’s progress and being able to appreciate how much the learner is able to utilize the knowledge that they have received.
Dr. Kipsang pointed out that they are trying to run away from just memorizing into using what they know to do something, adding that the pilot assessment exam for grade 9 to be done November, will be used to extrapolate how placement should be done.
“This will be an assessment, appreciating how much you can be able to apply the knowledge that you have received and what you can be able to do with it. We did one two weeks ago between 15 and 19 July, we used grade 8 to do a pilot, which we are now using to appreciate the data,” he noted.
The PS hinted that they shall carry out a real one now in November this year, a replica of the grade 9 exam, which will be done in November next year 2025 to assist them in moderating, setting and development of the tests in a way that it will be enable them, using the same pilot to see how they shall place the learners into the pathways.
He further noted that the main focus of placement in grade 10 is not in the school the way it is today because learners struggle to say they want to go to certain best performing high schools in the country, but will rather be according to pathways.
“The placement that we shall have in grade 10, the focus will be seeing the child saying where can I get the stem pathway, where can I get sports and creative arts, where will I get social sciences. So, you first look at your pathway before you look at the school because the pathway will lead you to where you will get what you want,” said Dr. Belio.
The PS assured the country that the government had started construction of grade 9 classes, 2 weeks ago with phase one for 3500 classrooms ongoing and disbursement of funds on course to do another 7500 which will make it 11000 classrooms.
He added that they are already engaging with the National Treasury on a conditional grant that was given to NG-CDF of Sh3.4 billion to do another 3400 classrooms, where the MPs committed to give another shilling for every shilling committed, which will bring the number of the additional classrooms to 6800.
Dr. Kipsang clarified that grade 9 pupils will not be domiciled in secondary schools, noting that Kenyans were very clear through the presidential working party on education reforms, which reported that 93 percent of Kenyans wanted their children to be retained in primary schools because parents felt that they needed to engage more with them.
“I want to bring clarity that, by January 2025 we should be having enough classrooms to take care of our grade 9 learners, in this way the parents can only engage more with children because most of our primary schools are day schools, so children will go home and their parents will be able to mentor them and guide them, that is why 93 percent of Kenyans wanted junior schools to be domiciled in primary schools,” explained the PS.
Dr. Belio affirmed that they had conducted training for junior school principals and are currently also training teachers for senior schools preparing them for the kids from the Junior Secondary School (JSS).
He emphasized that capacity building and retooling of the teachers will continue to ensure effective implementation of the new curriculum, noting that teachers are trained to teach and that what has changed in CBC is purely pedagogy, the way one delivers content saying the focus is now more on the child.
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