C Dugmore: Launch of WCED Literacy and Numeracy Strategy

24 July 2006

Acting Head of Education, Mr Brian Schreuder,
WCED senior officials,
Members of the Standing Committee,
Educators,
Members of the Publishers' Association of South Africa,
Representatives of teacher unions, school governing bodies,
Representative council of learners, tertiary institutions, service
providers,
Representatives of the media and of civil society,
Learners,
Ladies and gentlemen,
Boys and girls:

This launch today marks a personal high point for me; I have declared that
addressing low literacy and numeracy performance levels is my number one
priority. The public launch of the strategy is another step in our serious
effort to turn the situation around.

It is not the beginning nor is it the end of the battle. It represents a
stage where we have added new impetus, focus and co-ordination to our work. We
do not promise quick-fix solutions but a strategy which, over time, will yield
results.

I want to make three points about the context into which this strategy is
born.

1. Testing is showing slight improvements already

Our learners are already showing improved scores in our system-wide
provincial testing. Grade 6 of 2005 has a seven percent improvement in literacy
scores and two percent in numeracy since the previous tests in 2003. However,
with only 42 percent of learners scoring at the required level for literacy and
17 percent for numeracy we still have a long way to go. Today we are announcing
our plan of action.

2. The strategy we launch today is the first-ever Western Cape Education
Department (WCED) combined literacy and numeracy strategy

It builds on the work which has been done already but also directs the full
energies of the officials of this department onto a programme to turn things
around so that our children are not prisoners of their inability to read, write
and calculate but are empowered to direct their own affairs and realise their
full potential as the actors have just depicted for us.

3. Human capital development, skills and employment - the broader
context

The WCED has been mandated by the Premier and the provincial government to
define and then to lead the provincial human capital development strategy
launched earlier this year.

There is no shortage of information about the demands of the skills'
challenge. The national programmes of Accelerated and Shared Growth Initiative
for South Africa (AsgiSA) and the Joint Initiative for Priority Skills
Acquisition (JIPSA) outline the parameters and identify the array of approaches
crisply.

The WCED needs to ensure that every learner can lay claim to a solid general
education and training foundation. Statistics tell us that it is our young
people aged 15 to 24 who are unemployed, over 50 percent of them, and also that
employment prospects are directly linked to levels of qualification.

The national systemic research and other studies point to the direct links
between deprived socio-economic status and poor scholastic performance. The
research exposes the poor scores in remote rural areas as well. Poverty and the
need to earn money are contributors to the high drop out rate where in the
Western Cape, as in other provinces, we experience a 50 percent dropout
rate.

Half of the learners who start grade 10 do not complete grade 12. We have to
reverse this tendency. If our learners at grade 6 level are so far behind their
age norms then it stands to reason that that skills gap will grow. Our dropout
figures might well be linked to the reality that those young people simply
can't cope with the academic demands at the grade 10 level.

Our focus on equity and redress through the further extension of no-fee
schools over the next two years, our efforts to deal with infrastructure
backlogs and school safety must complement our strategy.

The strategy itself

We launch this strategy confidently, ladies and gentlemen. It contains not
only a plain exposition of the key theoretical underpinnings and an indication
of the three critical leverage points of the strategy but also a detailed
analysis of six critical success factors and the practical steps to be taken to
turn the situation around.

We feel that we have done our homework. The design is there now we need to
put all the building blocks in place: all the cement, the scaffolding and the
roof. We must keep the light shining into all the corners and ensure that we
have an optimistic and skilled team of builders.

1. The strategy provides a theoretical framework

The first thing our new strategy does is spell out a theoretical framework
for teachers and teaching. The new curriculum, the National Curriculum
Statement (NCS) for the first time stipulates the specific assessment standards
for each grade.

This means that teachers now have a good map for the skills needed and the
required pace of development. In other words, the curriculum itself is the
first part of the useful framing for a practising teacher.

The strategy we are launching today has three helpful theoretical pointers
for teachers:

* It provides a careful rationale for a constructivist approach in the
classroom, one where the best learning takes place when active learners have
constructed meaning in a well-designed learning environment.

* For literacy teaching the strategy spells out the provincial approach to
learning how to read (with phonics explicitly taught but embedded in the whole
language method).

* For numeracy teaching the strategy stresses that drill is a notable
feature of the automation required, once concepts are clear, to help with
fluency in numeracy.

2. The strategy offers three key solutions to the literacy and numeracy
backlogs:

Solution one: Develop and support teachers

The kind of learning turnaround that this province needs has to be driven by
teachers who are also "driven".

The world our learners are in is a new one. There's less reading and more
television. There's less talking and more television. Our teachers were not
trained to deal with children quite like these. Our teachers weren't trained to
teach in multilingual classrooms but there's been a huge migration of learners
and that's what we are faced with.

Our teachers were trained in another curriculum with another approach
altogether. We have a new curriculum with a fundamentally different approach to
teaching and learning. Worldwide there are discrepancies between the intended
curriculum and that which is actually taught in the classrooms.

This is particularly the case during curriculum changeovers. I believe that
the implementation of the NCS is beginning to reach completion. Our grade 8, 9
and 11 teachers received orientation in July this year.

Next year it will be the turn of our grade 12 educators. By 2008 our grade
12s across the country will write matric in terms of the new curriculum. With
curriculum bedded down it is critical that our focus shifts firmly to content,
classroom practice and support.

Our teachers have to have "time out" so they can stock up on new skills. And
they need more than a quick workshop at the end of a long hard day. The
training that we envisage for teachers will be very carefully designed.
Predominantly we are looking at certificated courses offered through tertiary
institutions.

This is an expensive option and not one to be achieved overnight. However we
know that we must undertake it. Our Cape Teaching Institute (CTI) residential
courses will play a pivotal role as well. In this regard our teacher unions are
key partners. Consultation with teacher unions on all aspects of teacher
development will take place.

Solution two: Work at a systems level to attend to the problems surrounding
the questions of mother tongue and learning:

* Fact: research tells us quite clearly that our children have better
chances of educational success if they learn through their mother tongue for as
long as possible.

* Fact: the system (the WCED) must then make it its business to tell parents
this.

* Fact: the WCED must then help schools to manage this properly.

The first target of the language in education transformation plan is that
wherever possible learners should have mother-tongue instruction until the end
of grade 6 at the earliest. We have many careful plans to make this happen
properly and in stages. It can never just happen overnight; we know that.

We are making our children turn their backs on their own languages; parents
are currently opting for what can be called "subtractive bilingualism" where
people "give up" their own languages for the perceived benefits of another one.
We must remember that our country has a policy of additive bilingualism or even
multilingualism.

This brings me to target number two, the other part of our transformation
plan, at least three years of trilingualism for all our learners before the end
of the General Education and Training (GET) band. We plan to make sure that all
three of the languages of the province are given status.

Apart from encouraging nation building and enhancing the economic viability
of our young citizens we want to grow language pride, "if others are learning
my language then it helps me know that my language is also valued".

I firmly believe that paying proper attention to supporting learning through
the mother-tongue and helping teachers to manage both this and making sure that
their learners get excellent teaching of English as a second language will help
make a major difference in the schools where learners are really struggling to
meet the performance demands.

Solution three: Advocacy/community/family literacy

Why so much emphasis today on each one, teach one: together building a
learning home for all / elkeen leer iemand - saam bou ons 'n leertuiste vir
almal / omnye ufundisa omnye - sakha kunye ikhaya kokufunda lomntu wonke?

My challenge to all of us on this third solution is simple, we must network.
I have huge respect for all that our teachers are trying to do. I know about
their long hours and all the time spent planning, assessing and recording. I
know about the work teachers do as social workers and caregivers.

My firm belief is that those of us inside the school system must be upfront
about it and admit that we don't have to or we cannot provide all the solutions
in our classrooms. We must ask what the literacy levels in our learners’ homes
are.

Do their parents read? Can their parents read? Is there anything to read? Do
family members talk to one another? Do they tell stories? Does the child belong
to a library? Read for pleasure? Do our parents know exactly how to help their
children? Have we tried training them to offer good support at home?

While the classroom itself remains the key because of the skills of the
teacher and the resources of the school, I am calling today for the start of a
provincial campaign which goes far beyond the classroom walls and which gathers
momentum in families, communities and workplaces. I hope that the rallying call
of "each one, teach one" will be taken up in the media in the homes and in the
streets of our province.

I heard last week that 80 percent of the parents at one of our leading
ex-Department of Education and Training (DET) primary schools, a school a few
kilometres away, are illiterate. In that smoothly operating school only 7.5
percent of the grade 6s has the expected literacy levels for that grade and 0
percent for numeracy.

When we asked the principal how she would feel about getting literacy help
for her parents she opened her arms wide and said "I would say come! I would
say welcome!".

The WCED plans to do all it can to mobilise and train people to work in
communities on issues of family literacy. Our teaching assistant project with
510 people employed to provide extra support in classrooms might grow next year
for example, so we add into their contracts that they need to get out and visit
the families of their classes and help the adults learn to read perhaps.

The question is ‘how big is our provincial literacy family? How can we grow
it?’ "Families," are loving and they give to one another, we need to work out
how to surround our learners with loving and knowledgeable "family
members".

We have community development workers (CDWs), we have health clinics, social
workers and student mentors from the tertiary institutions there are
learnerships and internships. We have volunteer readers who are ready to get
out helping schools. We have retired teachers and other professionals. We've
got local librarians.

I believe we just need to find creative ways to invite these people into our
lives. We are currently re-looking at the delivery of Adult Basic Education and
Training (ABET) in the province to meet the human capital targets of
dramatically expanding the provision of ABET in the Western Cape.

Ladies and gentlemen, we need to mobilise. We've got enough people who are
literate to assist in this campaign.

From today and until the end of August our call centre will be taking calls
for volunteers to help with our literacy and numeracy campaign. Call 0800 45 46
47 to hand in your details. We will process the offers and be in touch with you
in October to set up the operation. We know that there are many projects
already under way. These need to be identified, assessed and integrated into
our strategy.

The programmes inside the strategy

Apart from the three solutions just listed (teacher development and support,
the language in education transformation plan and the family literacy model)
the strategy has, as a core, a further comprehensive set of six steps. I will
just touch on them very briefly and urge you to study the detail in the
strategy document.

1. A pre-school programme
One cannot overstate the need to have a powerful and comprehensive pre-school
strategy. To this end we have an Early Childhood Development (ECD) task team to
ensure that all of the development and growth needed in this sector are
properly handled.

This task team is working with our sister departments of social development,
health and also local government. We have already dramatically increased our
resourcing to grade R provisioning and the development of the skills of care-
givers and pre-school educators is the combined focus.

With ECD on the one hand, ABET on the other and a strong school system in
between we must be poised to make a huge impact on the literacy and numeracy
results in this province.

2. Changes to classroom practice

Our classrooms must be at the centre of our support. The strategy aims to
provide support and mentoring to teachers in terms of lesson planning, the use
of resources to enhance teaching and learning, management of diversity in the
classroom and assessment practices and support for learners with special
needs.

3. Learning and teaching support material

A reader needs books to read and learners need resources in their mother
tongue and at an appropriate linguistic level to work from. We already have 100
reading books in each classroom in the province in grades 1 - 6, our reading
half hour is in place.

We also have flipcharts for the daily ten minutes of mental mathematics.
Schools also have mathematics, science and technology kits of manipulative and
equipment for developing these skills.

I'm pleased that the publishers are here in some numbers today as I believe
that their role in providing reading materials and texts to support or guide
classroom work is critical. I look forward to engaging with them as we roll out
our language in education transformation plan.

4. Research

We must undertake and benefit from research. The testing I have alluded to
helps us to diagnose and intervene. Our partners, the non-governmental
organisations (NGOs) and the tertiary institutions have spent years working in
our schools; we need to tap into that wisdom. We will also need to research the
impact of this very strategy that we are launching here today.

5. Monitoring and support

We must combine forces to fix things that are broken and celebrate things
that work. The WCED is dedicating a team of 100 to the task of turning around
the poor literacy and numeracy results in our schools. School themselves need
to monitor their own proposed interventions. Progress and challenges will
feature consistently on the agenda of TOPCO and Broad management.

6. Co-ordination and sustainability

Unless our interventions are sustainable we are wasting people's time and
spoiling their life chances. Who is it who would dare to do that?
Getting down to basics

I want to focus finally on two aspects on target setting and on making this
all happen.

Firstly, let's think about "target setting". Anything in life which
represents a shift from the norm needs target-setting. Think of a weight-loss
campaign or a fitness programme for example; we need to set precise targets
(getting advice from experts about what is realistic about pacing and about all
the sub-skills we will need, we have to learn "what it takes" to meet the
targets in other words we must "walk the walk" ourselves, we make our mistakes,
we take corrective measures, we get professional help if we need it, we work on
motivation, we remain confident, we get more help or different kinds of
help.

We announce our targets to our friends and family once we are sure what they
are, we know we're going to need moral and practical support, we need to
record/track and graph our progress, we announce our success or our winning
results.

And finally, what about "making this all happen"?

Our various tests particularly the provincial ones which are written by all
of our schools, give us good diagnostic information. In the next few months,
each of our targeted schools in other words those registering the poorest
performance levels will be helped to set realistic targets.

They will be required to define the targets, announce them and put all
reasonable measures in place to meet them. The school governing body (SGB) must
be part of setting this target at school level. As we begin 2007 the targets at
school and district level will be in place.

On the side of the WCED we will commit to putting all the weight of our
expertise and time at the disposal of our targeted schools so that together we
can make a difference. We will monitor. We will support.

Our team of 100 officials will be dedicated to the service of the schools
and will maintain strong and supportive links with them. The strategic
intervention is led by Mr Brian Schreuder himself; the fact that we have
assigned this role to a Deputy Director-General is indication of the level of
commitment.

On the school side schools will be asked to sign up for a literacy and
numeracy turnaround plan. There are clear steps laid out for compliance and for
all the layers of planning, management and monitoring.

In the classrooms the teachers will manage their planning, their application
of the theoretical underpinnings, their resources and their teaching under the
guidance of the trained specialists.

Concluding words

Today, we are calling for a renewed commitment from every WCED official,
every teacher, the leadership of our teacher unions and governing bodies and
from our learners and parents.

I am convinced that if we place literacy and numeracy at the centre of our
personal priorities, we can win this battle. Ongoing partnerships with NGOs,
community-based organisations (CBOs), Higher Education (HE), sister departments
in the provincial government and local government itself are critical to this
initiative. All of us must be part of this strategy. We call on you to pledge
your support.

The pledge

I appeal to all of you and your constituencies to make a commitment to work
towards making a difference. We have circulated copies of our pledge document.
In a moment Freda Brock of the ECD sector is going to hand me the first few
signed pledge documents. If you took one and want to hand it over, signed,
today then that would be wonderful.

If you want to sign one now and pass it along the row to the end we will
collect it from you to put in the pledge registry. We want to grow the numbers
of signatories. Once we have a number of signatories I will hand the set to the
Premier. It will include my own pledge and those of my cabinet colleagues.

Together, saam, sibanye, we can make the difference and we will ensure that
the Western Cape is indeed a learning home for all.

Thank you!

Issued by: Department of Education, Western Cape Provincial Government
24 July 2006
Source: Western Cape Provincial Government (http://www.capegateway.gov.za/)