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According to the Tanzania educational policy, formal education should be useful and applicable to learners’ real-life settings. In this sense, classroom instructional approaches should have the power to enhance the acquisition of real-life related skills and knowledge. It is for this reason Tanzania reformed its secondary school curriculum in 2005 from the one that focused on the mastery of subject contents to the one that enhances acquisition of competences among students. For this change to materialise, the new Tanzanian secondary school curriculum emphasizes the use of inquiry and student-centred pedagogies such as problem-based, demonstrations, hands-on activities and conducting real-life related projects. This study assessed the extent to which teachers employed these methods in their classrooms.
Data were collected using semi-structured one-on-one interview involving sixty Agricultural Sciences, Biology and Civics teachers, and ten academic teachers. Besides, focused group discussion was conducted with teachers to discern the linkage between classroom instructional approaches to learners’ real-life settings.
The study shows the disjunction between the policy and practice due to resources scarcity. The inadequacy of both human and physical resources appeared to be the main setbacks for teachers to practice instructional methods that could enable learners to acquire real-life knowledge and skills. The scarcity of human resources appeared to be a big issue because teachers were also incompetent in both content and pedagogical knowledge. The study recommends the concerned stakeholders allocate adequate and necessary instructional resources for teachers to practice teaching methods that could inculcate skills applicable to students’ life. |
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