Discovering sustained literacy practices through post-programme inquiry

The quantitative evidence that is currently being collected on learning does not reveal much about what happens after instruction finishes. Numerical assessments of programme performance are often used as proxy indicators for... [ view full abstract ]

The quantitative evidence that is currently being collected on learning does not reveal much about what happens after instruction finishes. Numerical assessments of programme performance are often used as proxy indicators for learning; however, while numerical indicators have their place, they do not show how practices are established and sustained after the educational intervention is finished.

For this reason, evidence regarding post-programme practices is a valuable complement to programme assessment data. Such evidence can be obtained from the learners themselves, as they describe and evaluate the changes which have resulted over a period of years from a given educational program. This approach has the further advantage of highlighting what the learner thinks is most important about these changes. This approach allows the learner’s voice to be heard, a step which reveals much about the sustainability of the learning that has taken place.

This paper reports and reflects on just such a post-programme study, carried out in 2014 and 2015 in Kenya, Ethiopia and Cameroon. The study used the Most Significant Change model of inquiry to ask people 5-20 years after they completed mother-tongue literacy instructional training what changed as a result of becoming literate in their own African language. The paper will argue that such inquiry sheds light not only on the literacy practices that followed instruction but, just as important, on what is significant for the learner to sustain these practices.