Timeslive.co.za
By Vladimir Mzaca
22 August 2010
Primary education in Zimbabwe is to get a shot in the arm with the distribution of 13million textbooks.
The textbooks have been made available through the Basic Assistance Module (Beam) programme between the Zimbabwean government and the United National International Children’s Emergency Fund.
Funding was made available though the Education Transition Fund.
‘We have managed to print about 13million textbooks that will be distributed countrywide in September’, said Education Sports and Culture Minister David Coltart.
Beam spokesman Godfrey Mudzengerere said: “Our main focus is to reduce the textbook ratio in schools from one textbook between 15 pupils.
‘If possible, we should reduce it to at best one pupil to one textbook or, at some points, two pupils sharing one textbook.
‘Our research now is to find out how many pupils are in a class.’
Primary education in Zimbabwe is centred on four subjects: mathematics, science, Ndebele and Shona languages.
Other minority languages are taught in schools, although learning material is scarce.
‘The textbooks that were printed are for mainly mathematics, science and languages,’ said Mudzengerere.
The move to provide schools with textbooks is in line with the aims of the Education Transition Fund, which was launched by the minister in January, in conjunction with Unesco, to improve the pupil-textbook ratio and to help restore basic education for all.
Coltart said the fund was aimed at reducing the pupil-textbook ratio to reasonable levels that made learning easier.
Mlamuli Moyo, a teacher at a rural school in Matabeleland North, said: ‘We are going in the right direction in terms of learning material. Â The only stumbling block at the moment is teacher remuneration.
‘If teachers go on strike, who will teach the children?’