HOMEWORK AND THEN SOME

Whenever I indulge in my childhood memories, all I think of are the countless times I got into trouble for mischief.

Shout out to all those of us who grew up in the 80s and 90s in small towns! We had a real childhood. I spent my formative years Highland Primary School in Kericho town. It was smack right in the middle of town and was as cosmopolitan as it gets. All 800 of us walked to school, except my classmate Julia who took a matatu and we all envied the fact that her mom allowed her that much responsibility. School buses were unheard of.

As pupils, we knew our classmates really well: who their siblings were, where their parents worked, where they lived and who had the enviable position of owning a dog. School started at 8.15am and was out at 3.45pm. 99% of us walked home for lunch and came back in time for 2.00pm class.

The most memorable time was the after-school hours. We would walk to the local library; yes, the public library had wonderful books that transported pre-teen kids to a wonderland that developed a strong imagination in us. Thank you Enid Blyton and co. I remember amassing all my siblings’ library cards so I could borrow several books as I was only allowed two cards. The librarian knew me by name because I was back every second or third day to replace the seven books I had borrowed. She once told me that I would finish reading all the books in the kids section before I was grown enough to go to the teen section. All I know is that when my siblings all went to high school, the only reason I stayed sane was because I read books from that library.

When not at the library, we perfected the art of climbing trees, riding bikes (only one child owned a bike at any one time as if the parents had agreed on a rotational time table to buy the bike), hiding in strange places and running away from dogs and the domesticated baboon that was owned by the local police station for years!

Religious festivals were the best times! Ramadhan was synonymous with pilau! The Muslim population may have been the smallest in town but had the biggest hearts. We left school and headed straight to the Muslim homes every evening of the fast, to partake of Iftar; and on Idd-ul-Fitr, we marched around town with them, celebrating with our tummies. The Hindus were not to be outdone. Diwali was all about chevra and fireworks from the top of the buildings. The tallest building in town was only four floors high but we caused a racket the whole month as if we were headed into space. It therefore follows that all Christians were obligated to give back during the Christmas season just as graciously.

Amid all these amazing memories, I am yet to find the space for homework. I clearly remember my first homework on standard six. I remember because I completely forgot about it and did not do it! I have never done an assignment that fast in my whole life. My book was a mess and my teacher was appalled at the handwriting! I had to confess my sins.

Today, I believe that my peers and I turned out just fine! We have managed to make something of our lives with a healthy dose of childhood memories to look back to. I have faith that my peers are seasoned professionals in their field, highly skilled and experienced.

So pray tell, how did we wake up one morning to find our three year olds coming from kindergarten with homework on a week-day evening? Just how do ten-year olds sleep at midnight ploughing through heaps of assignments? How does it help for an eleven-year old to describe the process of digestion at the level I did in the third year of high school?

Who is this curriculum designed for? I am not an education specialist but I am a product of the 8-4-4 system. So, was it a bad system or has it been mutilated over the years to the point where we can no longer define who the beneficiary of this system is?

I wept when I heard that art subjects were no longer in the curriculum. This is because I went to high school with girls who went on to become amazing achievers in the field of art and music after their talent was discovered, nurtured and exposed in those four years. Now they are international household names. Wilful adolescent girls were tamed and redirected in more productive pathways because the system recognized their inner fire.

Today, our system has been directed towards raising robotic nerds with no social skills who, courtesy of crazy traffic jams and, spend three hours in school buses every morning attempting to complete their assignments, spend an intense six hours learning things beyond their scope and get home after dark to continue with more assignments.

Society is complaining about parents who are not paying due attention to their children and spend more time in the office instead. How does a parent squeeze in some down time with their child if the child is terrified of not completing their assignments, ready for the next day?

Teachers are robbing families of bonding time by sending all that work home. Dear teachers, doing homework with our kids is not equal to bonding time. We are marionettes and you are pulling our strings to your bidding from the classroom. Teachers have the unenviable position of giving informed feedback to policy makers. How they still believe this slavery children are wallowing in, in the name of education is appropriate, I still do not fathom.

There has to be a way around this. Children must learn but not at the expense of their childhood. We must not compromise psychosocial development in the name of intellectual gain. We have very many years dedicated to education for our children, we must spread out content appropriately to allow for other aspects of growth to also thrive. Technology is meant to assist us in this, not make things worse.

Let us not lose focus, education is a major aspect of our lives, but IT IS NOT EVERYTHING!