JungleNut Appeals To The Government To Extend The DLP To Other Classes.

Wainaina Presenting a booklet to one of the best performers in Mugumoini Primary School.

Jungle Foundation C.E.O. Eng. Patrick Wainaina has argued that digital literacy was now crucially important to the Kenyan young learners as the modern workplace has continually become increasingly digitised.

Speaking during a tour to Thika schools on Thursday, Wainaina thanked the government for securing tablets to the standard one pupils in public schools but he said that they needed to extend this programme to other classes especially the Standards 7 and 8 learners who were on their way to the outside world of ICT.

“Considering the importance placed on digital literacy in many career roles, the government’s Digital Literacy Programme is definitely a step in the right direction – but it more needs to be done especially by extending the same to the STD 7 and 8 learners. In the world today, gaining familiarity with digital device functions and features is now just as important as learning to read and write. Digital literacy promotes higher-order thought skills and has led to great increases in information that can be conveniently and quickly accessed as it facilitates the collaboration and sharing of knowledge in the classroom environment,” said Wainaina.

He added that the gap between the learners in the public schools and those schooling in the academies was widening each day and needed to be addressed with urgency. He recognised the fact that public schools were still teaching in the same ways students were taught decades ago and there was need to change this DNA of learning to meet the needs of our learners.

Wainaina noted that learners who lacked the skills to use digital tools risked an inferior learning process at best, and being left behind at worst. He said that with the increase in IT all over the place, those capabilities that equipped an individual for living, learning and working in a digital society were one that needed to be taken seriously at all levels of learning.

“Digital literacy plays a vital role in defining a child’s ability to succeed both in school and throughout their lives. This is an inherent aspect of 21^st century education, which should be the spine of our educational pedagogy in our schools. We must focus on applying innovative teaching methods that arm our students with the skillsets they need to succeed throughout their education and as they enter the workplace. We should be focusing on the use of technology to enhance, enrich, and augment classroom learning with active and engaging learning activities across all grade levels,” he explained.

As a resident and investor in Thika, Wainaina said that he would partner with the government to ensure that he assisted the student in any way that was deemed appropriate to see to it that the performance in education of all the pupils and learners improved.

He said that his tour to all the 34 public primary schools in the sub-county was part of his mission to interact with the teachers and pupils with the aim of coming up with a masterplan of how best they could partner to improve the level of education in the region.

Collins Mwangi, a candidate at Mugumo-ini Primary School was all praises to the initiative taken by Wainaina calling on other leaders to emulate his gesture to see to it that the levels of education in Thika improved.

A student leader at St Patricks Primary School appealed to the government to extend the DLP project to the senior classes noting that the amount of luggage pupils carried in form of books was so heavy and actually contributed to their poor performance in exams.

“The books we carry for all the subject everyday are very heavy and contribute to our failure in exams. Some of us walk long distances to school and by the time we arrive in class we are so exhausted to even manage to concentrate in learning. If we were given these tablets, it will be easier for us as they are light and carry all what we are expected to learn in school. They will also help us in our revision as we can look back on previous class work with only a click of a button,” he said.

Wainaina was going round giving out revision booklets and success cards to Standard eight candidates as well as encouraging them to perform well in the forthcoming KCPE examination.