Why Teacher Training for Primary Education Matters

Education

A long-standing top priority is building an efficient, just, and equitable primary education sector aiming for zero failure after 6-7 years

By Sada Reddi

Reforming education in the 21st century remains a major challenge for stakeholders in society, and there is no quick solution. Changing times, the emergence of new challenges, and rising expectations have all compounded the role and responsibility of educators in present-day society.

Recent interviews and articles in the press paint a chaotic and dismal picture of the education sector, and strong feelings of despondency seem to have gripped educators, especially as acute unsolved social problems have invaded school premises as never before. Short-term and immediate solutions can only plug a few gaps and are inefficiently implemented, pending the implementation of more creative and innovative strategies for an ever-changing present and uncertain future.

The various stakeholders coming together for the national conference on education organised by the Ministry of Education had pinned their hopes that some solutions could be found to meet the many challenges, and the 14 themes which will be explored indicate the ambition and determination of the minister to plan holistically to overhaul the system. While there has been some scepticism about the conference and its outcome — not necessarily unjustified given experience, but nevertheless a legitimate voice in a democratic and liberal society — one can expect at least that a few priorities can be identified which can be implemented as soon as possible.

With this view in mind, one hopes that one top priority, which has occupied the minds of many for at least half a century, is how to build a primary education sector which is efficient, just, and equitable to achieve zero failure at the end of 6 or 7 years of education. While educational reforms are expected to tackle many wide-ranging issues in an integrated manner, one major component of reform should be teacher training for the primary sector.

We may not have realized that teacher training has been a major failure for the primary sector for several decades simply because our institutions were not staffed with qualified teacher trainers for the primary sector. Even at the Teachers’ Training College, one of the primary teachers who went for training as a primary teacher recalled that most of the teacher trainers were subject specialists fresh from university, with only two expatriates — one specializing in infant education and the other teaching French. There were also two headteachers with experience at the primary level who had joined the staff to provide some practical experience to trainees. There were also woodwork and gardening classes which introduced children to manual work but also equipped teachers to prepare their own pedagogical resources for teaching.

Perhaps it is worth noting that primary education in the past was geared for a colonial agricultural economy. It was deliberately inefficient to provide for a small minority for clerical and other essential services for the colonial bureaucracy. One can remember well that the Standard IV examination was considered the hardest and served to filter out supposedly weak students from moving up to higher classes and completing their primary education. Most of the pupils dropped out after the Standard IV examination, but nevertheless, many achieved a standard of literacy and numeracy, and with their other skills, were able to earn their living.

After independence, the filtering process persists, albeit unintentionally, and the rate of failure at the end of primary school has been ascribed to many problems — particularly blaming children for their low achievement — but rarely has the training of primary teachers been identified as possibly a major factor.

With the setting up of the Mauritius Institute of Education, primary education has hardly improved for various reasons. Like the Teachers’ Training College, most lecturers at the MIE were mostly subject specialists from the secondary sector, with admittedly wide experience in secondary teaching but little knowledge and experience in primary education. Later, many were given fellowships to complete a master’s degree in various fields of education but rarely in primary education and pedagogy for the primary sector.

The situation may have worsened today, as some lecturers with postgraduate degrees in education have neither taught even in a secondary school nor trained in primary education. This situation was inevitable in a country with limited resources and which had to cope as best as it could in a situation where education expansion was growing very fast with universal primary education and free secondary education. Lecturers were jack-of-all-trades and were called upon to train educators in both the primary and secondary sectors, write curriculum materials, and prepare national examinations. The resulting education deficit may have been a major factor in the lack of concrete improvement at the primary level and the failure to break generational cycles of poverty and equip children with life skills to meet present and future challenges.

Though there is no known research on the impact of teacher training on the primary sector, it is known that many teachers are reluctant to work with children from disadvantaged backgrounds and find teaching extremely difficult and depressing. Such attitudes may suggest that among the various causes of this aversion are inadequate training, skills, support, resources, and resourcefulness, leading teachers to struggle to give their best for their pupils’ benefit.

It is not surprising that at the Ministry, primary education remains the Cinderella of the education sector. Most of the officers are also from the secondary sector. There is still only one Assistant Director for primary education — not even a Director — and efforts in the past to elevate the person to the post of Director met with a lot of bureaucratic hurdles, not to mention a bias on the part of many. So, the primary sector at the level of the Ministry has to contend with a Chief Inspector, though the primary sector is the foundation of our education system.

Given the importance of primary education, the conference must provide an opportunity to give primary educators the utmost consideration they deserve and to prioritise their professionalisation within the broader effort to professionalise all educators. Reform in primary education will entail investigating various aspects of the sector and coming up with integrated measures regarding budget allocation, resources, management, decentralisation, action research, curriculum innovation, salary structure, and teacher training. All these and other areas require attention, for they are all interlinked, but I believe that teacher training should be a crucial component of reform, and one expects that views from educators in the primary sector be given all the importance in the coming conference, and primary education should be a major theme given its specificities.

Another reason why teaching in the primary sector is flawed is revealed in the 2023 report on Primary School Achievement Certificate (PSAC). While examination papers of PSAC are marginally less difficult than CPE examination papers in English, French, Science, and Mathematics, and comparable to similar assessments and examinations in other countries, the examination results show that pupils pass the examination by doing well in questions linked with recall, rote learning, and procedural drilling, and avoid or do badly in questions which require inference, understanding, problem-solving, and reasoning.

There are many reasons to explain the gap between what the curriculum demands and what is achieved in practice. It is known that teachers are under societal pressure to deliver examination results and do not have time, resources, and support to apply their teaching skills to teach higher-order thinking skills which go beyond the recall of facts. The report also recommends equipping teachers with skills aligned with curricular objectives, ensuring continuous professional development, and fostering a shift in classroom practice.

Reforming the Education sector will require effective planning, resources, implementation, monitoring, evaluation, and above all, political commitment—not only from the Minister of Education but also from the Minister of Finance and the Prime Minister. On a practical level, any reform must begin within the Ministry itself by establishing a Director of Primary Education position, specifically tasked with enhancing the quality and effectiveness of teacher training, rather than general management. This must be followed by revisiting the training of educators at the Mauritius Institute of Education.

An evaluation of resources for training in the primary sector would reveal that there is hardly anyone with specialist training in primary education. Professionalisation of the teaching profession in the primary sector will necessarily require specialist teacher trainers. Very often, education modules are prepared not in response to the educational demands of learners but tailored according to the human resources available. This is no longer acceptable, and it will be necessary to get a few specialists from overseas to be posted at the Institute for a minimum of three years, while some fellowships must be made available for training in primary education.

Technical assistance could be sought from several countries and UNESCO once needs are identified and a request is made. Furthermore, scholarships and fellowships should prioritize primary education on the Ministry of Education’s list. The current diploma course for educators should be replaced by a full-time, three-year B.Ed program in primary education, accessible to all, to enhance their employability in both the public and private sectors.

Previously, the distinction between primary teachers and education officers was eliminated by categorizing them all as educators. Now, it is time to go further and place all educators in primary and secondary education on the same professional scale, contingent upon primary educators completing a three-year B.Ed course. This also necessitates a review of recruitment criteria for primary school educators, incorporating profiling to identify individuals genuinely interested in educating young learners; otherwise, the sector risks attracting those who primarily value teaching as employment or for the advantages of extended holidays.

It would be naive to assume that implementing the conference recommendations across various themes through holistic planning will be easy. Administration, management, and teaching will grapple with conflicting priorities. Actual implementation will be hampered by resource misallocation, and certain expenditures will be deemed unfavourable. Furthermore, as the Minister himself noted, obstructionist tactics may arise within the Ministry itself. Any government genuinely committed to improving education must invest significantly in primary education. There is no shortcut or magic solution, only sustained hard work and dedication from all stakeholders to build for the future.

Mauritius Times ePaper Friday 11 April 2025