MY EXPERIENCE DURING THE SHORT TIME I TAUGHT MATHEMATICS AT NAMUTAMBA SECONDARY SCHOOL.

MY EXPERIENCE DURING THE SHORT TIME I TAUGHT MATHEMATICS AT NAMUTAMBA SECONDARY SCHOOL.
As a pioneer ‘Head teacher’ at Namutamba Secondary School; early 1984, I was focused on seeing the school start on a firm foundation. I remember teaching mathematics to my senior one students then (this was the only class we had then). These were the type of students one would categorize as weak given their Primary Leaving Examination passes. I was surprised at the rate they were grasping the work. I had started off with revising the equivalent of Primary Seven Mathematics. These students were doing well. What came to my mind was that teachers greatly contributed to their weak passes at Primary Seven. My students were lively, they loved the work and the atmosphere was inducing learning.
My stay with those pioneer students was so short, but it gave a good start, the basic initial push. I am sure teachers are to blame in many instances of poor child academic performance with the exception of children with specific learning problems.
As a strategy to improve Namutamba Demonstration School, the teachers MUST exhibit competence in what they teach; they must feel that they have mastery of the discipline. I have had chance to see teachers give pupils wrong information. I remember one Head teacher of a certain primary school who was equally a Mathematics teacher for Primary Seven pupils. I was surprised when I saw him illustrate the solving of a number involving average speed. This number had time where the motorist rested, but when it came to computing the average speed, the time taken during the rest was added on and divided by the distance. This is one of the many ways the children are slowly but steadily made to fail examinations. Secondly, some teachers don’t want to bother to show the children how formulae for solving problems are derived and when a small twist is made in the question, the child end up failing!