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Reorganizing the Primary School Staff Structure to Meet Modern Trends in Education

Feature Article Reorganizing the Primary School Staff Structure to Meet Modern Trends in Education
JAN 24, 2023 LISTEN

A typical primary school (single stream) in Ghana will have a six-unit classroom block, six teachers and a headteacher. The headteacher takes care of administrative duties in the school. Each teacher is assigned to a class as the homeroom teacher (class teacher) and in most cases, is expected to teach the students all the subjects in the curriculum. This situation that primary school teachers find themselves sometimes makes some teachers avoid teaching some topics in certain subjects and even do not give much attention to other subjects like creative arts. In cases where the supervisory role of the headteacher is weak, then class effectiveness will decline, and this will negatively affect students` balanced development and school improvement.

These problems can be dealt with by reorganizing the staff structure in the primary school. By this, there should be a shift from the tradition of assigning exactly six teachers as class teachers to a primary school. Now, add two or more extra teachers (depending on the need of the school) to the primary school staff. These can be teachers with expertise in some `difficult` and `technically` aligned subjects like math, science, creative arts among others. Maintain the normal homeroom teacher role but take some subjects from them and give it to the teachers added. These extra teachers should not be limited to teach at a specific grade. They will be floating teachers with the responsibilities of teaching some subjects. The school timetable should be designed to ensure teachers get equal number of lesson periods to teach and other school responsibilities to undertake.

Such practice will ensure efficient use of school time and resources by having all topics and subjects taught as outlined in the curriculum even if some teachers may want to avoid certain topics and subjects. Students will not be lacking in certain areas of their studies especially when teachers avoid such topics and subjects. This will also reduce the workload of teachers. It can also reduce the national unemployment rate in a way.

One may ask what the other teachers will be doing when the six are teaching since there are six classes (in a single stream school). This is one of the things that can be done. When teaching subjects like Math (depending on the preference of the school), teachers not teaching a class can be assigned to classes studying the subject at that time to assist. With such arrangement, learning subjects like Math will be less difficult for students as there is an extra teacher to assist them when working examples leading to increase in teacher-student contact during math lessons. At least there is an extra teacher to attend to the needs of about half of the class. It will reduce disruptiveness among students too. In this case too, teachers will also be able to share ideas in the class when teaching. In situations where there are extra classrooms, the class can be split into two for one teacher to handle half of the class when teaching some `difficult` subjects. A reduced class size will surely have a positive impact on the teaching and learning of Math and other subjects.

Another concern this approach will address is the teaching of creative arts. Having teachers with the training and qualification in the subject on each primary school staff will be a plus. The needed time and attention will be given to the teaching and learning of it which will lead to building the right base for the intended purpose for the teaching of the subject.

The primary school staff structure should be improved to ensure effective implementation of the curriculum.

BY Okota-Wilson Nicholas
[email protected]

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