The Teachers Service Commission (TSC) Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Dr Nancy Macharia has revealed that her Commission is ready to train teachers on the Competency-Based Curriculum in the coming month.
According to the TSC CEO, the Commission and the Ministry of Education jointly working on ensuring that transition from primary to junior secondary school will be seamless for pupils to proceed to the next grades.
She revealed that more teachers are set to undergo training in April in preparation for the Competency-Based Curriculum’s (CBC) next pioneer grades.
The CBC’s pioneer class which is currently in grade Five are set to join Grade six come the 27th of April when schools shall be reopening for the new academic calendar.
The academic calendar is set to normalize by 2023 with 2022 set to have multiple national examinations due to the time lost during the closure of all learning institutions in March 2020.
Schools were closed for almost seven months after the reporting of the first case of the novel COVID-19 pandemic.
The Commission is now set to train around 60,000 more secondary school teachers in readiness for the junior secondary level.
The teachers will be taken through a congested program that is intended to equip them to teach the key subjects in junior secondary school in 2023.
Teachers who will be required to attend the program are those who shall be tasked with handling Science and Physical Education subjects under the pioneer CBC learners in Junior secondary school.
In 2023, Grade 6 learners will be joining junior secondary school level which consists of Grades 7, 8 and 9.
According to a Circular released by the TSC CEO, the aforementioned 60,000 teachers will be picked from those teaching Biology/Chemistry, Physics/Mathematics, and Physical Education.
Biology and Chemistry teachers will undergo training on how to tackle Integrated and Health Science while those teaching physics and Mathematics will be trained on handling pre-technical and pre-vocational education.
According to the circular, Physical Education (PE) teachers will be retooled on how to teach Sports and Physical Education in secondary schools.
The April training will be done in a five-day physical (face-to-face) training while subsequent continuous learning on new subject areas will then move online.
Venues for the program countrywide will be selected to ensure teachers are able to access them.
Dr Macharia had been accompanied by Chief of Treasury Eric Simiyu Wafukho who revealed that budgetary allocations had been made to include activities in the new adjusted school calendar.
“Even though there will be a strain on resources due to double intakes, the government has included it in the budgetary,” he revealed.