articles, opinions, and research about teaching and learning
Teachers Forum
February, 2001
Voices from Tanzania:
Sedet Bulaya
This interview was conducted by Linda Helgesson,
UNICEF Education unit in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania
Question: Sedet, can you first introduce yourself?
Answer: My name is Sedet Bulaya. I am working in Kisarawe District. I completed my college education in 1996 and after that I did my A-levels in HKL, which stands for History, Kiswahili and Literature. After finishing my A-levels, I started working as a primary school teacher and I joined the COBET-programme in July 1999.
Q: What are some of the current interventions by the Ministry which you think have made a difference to your professional career and classroom teaching?
A: Well, one of the current interventions by the Ministry of Education and Culture which has made a difference for my career is the COBET Programme. I had the chance to undergo training on different occasions. The first training was one month and the second training was also for one month. In these trainings, we learn about new methodologies of how to teach the COBET learners. After finishing the first year in the COBET-cycle, there is a training in how to use the Year II materials and this training is currently going on for three weeks here in Morogoro. Here, we are sharing different ideas and experiences which we have gained during the first year and we are also preparing for year two.
Q: What do you think should be done in your school to enable teachers to meet the children with respect and ensure that they have a conducive learning environment?
A: If I refer to my experience from before, when I was working as a primary school teacher in the formal system, I can say that our primary school should have enough teachers and teaching aids so that all children can have enough help and tools to learn in their subjects.
Q: How was it in the primary school where you were working before?
A: In my primary school, we were four teachers in the whole school which is a small number and the work was so hard because we had to teach all subjects in the curriculum. Therefore, the learners had fewer subjects than they were supposed to get and the standard of education was also lower than what they were supposed to get.
Q: How relevant have you found your teacher training in your daily work as a teacher?
A: The subjects which I took in 1996 are nearly applicable in my daily work. I can apply things that I learned about such as teaching aids, psychology, history, geography, mathematics and general knowledge. For example the psychology which I learnt has helped me know how to support and care for the pupils and how to teach. It has also helped me know how to deal with the community.
Q: What are your suggestions for improving teacher training?
A: My suggestions are that the teachers should continuously be offered different kinds of training in order to improve their teaching and to keep up to date. Of great concern now is children dropping out of school and teachers need to know how to handle this. It is also important that teachers are trained in administration so that they know how to administer their schools.
Q: In the school, what changes would you make to improve children’s participation and learning at the classroom level?
A: Well, the methods used in the formal education system are more lecture-oriented than practice-oriented. If we change the methods of how to teach the children, by using, for example, dramatisation, demonstration, doing actions and participation, children will like the subjects, be motivated, be able to study without getting tired and generally like school. If we also improved the school environment with desks, enough teachers and gave the children sport-grounds and different kinds of games, such as football, netball and basketball, they would be motivated to come to school daily, without missing any class sessions.
Intro ·
Delaide Daniel ·
Delfina Lusuva ·
Rashid Chua Chua ·
Sedet Bulaya
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