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How to teach our children to be heirs of Zimbabwe …Understanding curriculum — Part B

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“THE first premise of any curriculum therefore is the nation’s vision, the political, economic and socio-cultural definition of a nation and the goals and purposes that derive from it, the ideological identity of a nation, the who we are, what we are, what we want to achieve and what we want to mature to be,” we said last week.
We said that ours is the vision of a society that has its foundation in a heroic liberation struggle, which came into being because thousands willingly sacrificed their lives for the sake of justice and equality under sovereign rule, for all Zimbabweans.
It is this vision which constitutes the ideological axis of the curriculum, its most critical component, the determinant of both the pedagogic and scientific axis of the curriculum
The values ensconced within the liberation struggle are that we are a people with an invaluable heritage, and we are prepared to pay the ultimate price for it.
We are proud heirs and we are own masters and therefore in charge.
The pedagogy that is consonant with this vision, with these values, is the subject of today’s article.
During the liberation struggle ComradeMutumbuka highlighted a major problem with colonial pedagogy whose purpose was to create befuddled individuals who can only parrot what the master said.
“An incredible amount of time is spent on useless rote learning. Obscurantism, jargonism, and verbosity are common. To encourage this, much of the curriculum consists of memorizing countless irrelevant material most of it utterly useless to anyone. The learning process is never related to the development of logic, or the solving of problems’ (Mutumbuka: 1987).
Certainly you do not become a master through rote learning, by regurgitating what the teachers say without your critical input, by accepting without understanding. You are trained to be a master through independent thinking, critical thinking, creative thinking, innovative thinking, knowing your own mind, and ultimately knowing your own self. That is how the mind becomes executive.
The colonial legacy that Comrade Mutumbuka lamented then is still dominant in our school curriculum. It was meant to create servants who would obey without questionit thus is not consonant with the ideological axis described above but with colonialism and capitalism.
In our school curriculum today, methods and strategies that encourage self-validation and introspection are discouraged.
This was a very potent tool for the colonialism because one’s greatest strength is within oneself, if that is disabled, one is not sure of themselves, they cannot stand their ground, they are malleable and therefore a perfect tool for the ‘colonial master.’
This is why to this day the teaching and learning objectives in our classrooms omit the ideological component, they do not spell out the moral, ethical and aesthetic attitudes values and feelings that are embodied in the curriculum thereby safeguarding the colonial statusquo.
The reason given is that they are not measurable, not time specific, but the real reason is that once they are spelt they have to be correct but if they are unsaid, then the prevailing ethos inherited from colonialism remains unchallenged.
This inebriating, alienating approach is part of the positivist philosophy which claims that only that which can be proved by the five senses is true. We highlighted earlier that this philosophy is meant to make it easier for the powers that be to control people.
When people are not allowed to feel, to dream, to imagine, to reflect, to think, it reduces them to robots and robots have no initiative or independent agenda, they obey at the touch of a button.
But to fight the liberation struggle we had a lot of feelings inside us, we refused to accept that we were inferior to whites, we refused to accept that it was just that our land was robbed from us at gun point, we felt injured by the injustice and inequality ofcolonialism and we took up arms. This heroic war would not have happened but for hearts that burned with love for their country.
We cannot prove love in the laboratory perhaps but we can prove its works, its achievements. It is ironic that we are perpetuating the factory model of education developed by British capitalism in the 17th Century which Charles Dickens satirizes in his book Hard Times.
‘NOW, what I want is, Facts. Teach these boys and girls nothing but Facts. Facts alone are wanted in life. Plant nothing else, and root out everything else. You can only form the minds of reasoning animals upon Facts: nothing else will ever be of any service to them. ‘Bitzer,’ said Thomas Gradgrind. ‘Your definition of a horse.’
‘Quadruped. Graminivorous. Forty teeth, namely twenty-four grinders,four eye-teeth, and twelve incisive. Sheds coat in the spring; in marshy countries, sheds hoofs, too. Hoofs hard, but requiring to be shod with iron.
Age known by marks in mouth.’ Thus (and much more) Bitzer.
“Now girl number twenty,” said Mr. Gradgrind. “You know what a horse is.”
The discussion does not stretch to include the colour of the horse’s coator any affection for it, there is no room for aesthetics or feelings. This factory model of education was foisted on working class children to dehumanize them so as to ensure that when they got to the factory they produced without raising any questions.
Regrettably, colonial methods and strategies that alienate one from one’s history, from one’s context still harass our children.
They do not empower learners to be masters of their own destiny because when one is anchored outside one’s self, it is not possible to be strong because power lies with those who control where you are anchored.
Using examples from everywhere else but Zimbabwe disempowers the learners, because their destiny is in Zimbabwe. Critical to controlling one’s destiny is accurately understanding phenomenon, natural or social.
The majority of Africans were denied academic education so that they would be labourers while the few who went further with education were restricted to the theoretical aspect of learning.
This is why during the liberation strugglethe concept of Education with Production was conceived and practiced and this is why the Zimbabwe Foundation for Education with Production was established to pioneer this approach to education in Zimbabwe.
Curriculum therefore has to link theory and practice, teaching and learning strategies have to link theory with productive activities.

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