By Daily Nation
This coming week, our children will sit their primary school exit examinations, the Kenya Certificate of Primary Education (KCPE) examination.
Results in this examination determine which secondary schools the children will be admitted to, with the top scorers having a pick of schools considered to be the best, while those at the bottom of the pyramid are sent to whatever is left afterwards.
Our education system, 8-4-4, has been roundly condemned as being too examination-focused and neglecting important aspects of child development that education is supposed to be responsible for.
The initial conceptualization, according to public pronouncements over the past 30 years, was to create a system that gave young people the opportunity to learn practical life skills that would be useful to them even if they dropped out of school.
Over time, and due to the huge investments required for this, the practical components were gradually eliminated from the curriculum and what was left was lots of rote learning. Read more>>
