In 2012, a humble pilot education project kicked off at the Diepsloot Community Centre, part of a non-governmental initiative whereby – Daily Maverick reported at the time – locals could learn anything from welding to computer literacy. A key part of this hub was the maths programme, which, with the help of the Khan maths tool, was already at the time having a major positive impact on participating learners.

Today, those same pupils have dramatically outperformed their peers in their matric results, not just in maths but overall, with 80% of them achieving a bachelor’s pass. The maths class is no longer working with Khan – the Americanisms became confusing for learners, necessitating a South African version inspired by a similar concept – but the pupils are still being supported at the centre in Diepsloot, and the tutoring programme next expanded to Heideveld in the Western Cape, with learners from approximately 10 schools now participating in Cape Town.

Photo: Portia Gqoli

The students are now using the new local OLICO online maths programme, developed by former Wits academic Dr Lynn Bowie, which was built in collaboration with and peer-reviewed by a large academic and teacher network. The programme is aimed at Grade 7, 8 and 9 learners and contains over 20,000 unique interactive maths questions and about 330 tutorial videos. The content, which is aligned to the South African CAPS curriculum and rooted in the local context, is available online and free to use for anyone who wishes to access it.

“In Grades 7 to 9 learners need to make the crucial transition from working with number and shape to laying the foundations of algebra and geometry,” Bowie says. “For many learners, the time and support available in school hours will simply not be sufficient to do this, so OLICO’s online offering is one way in which we can supplement the work of the teacher.”

But, she cautions, it is crucial to realise that, as popular as e-learning has become, it is a tool. It is not a silver bullet and it is no substitute for interaction and classroom time. The learners at the Diepsloot Community Centre, for example, see their tutors a minimum of twice a week and there is a maximum of 30 students to one or two tutors. There is a large classroom and a big computer lab.

“Purely working online is not enough,” says Bowie. “We have to take them offline and do class discussion and offline work. That is one of the things we have learnt over the past few years. Technology is great for getting the kids motivated – they will sit and do the exercises because it is less boring than a piece of paper. But it isn’t a magic bullet. You need a good tutor and good guidance. Technology doesn’t produce magic.”

Photo: Katlego Malogadihlare

So, inasmuch as the Diepsloot centre and the OLICO maths programme are a good news story, this is also a sobering tale of just what it takes to turn poor results around.

“We are now starting with kids in Grade 7, putting them through very intensively, twice a week or more,” says Bowie. “Our experience has been that leaving the catch-up to matric until Grade 10, 11 or 12 is too late. In the schools where we are working, there is so much deficit over time that we need to really start earlier. That’s what we saw with our first class, who only came in Grade 8, with an average of less than 20%. It really took all those years to get them to the point where they could pass matric maths.”

Maths, as Nicky Roberts pointed out this week, has traditionally been South Africa’s canary in the mine for education.

Some statistics to ponder: Of 33,511 matriculants who scored more than 60% for maths in 2016, 1,700 were black African students. Performance in maths and science for the last batch of matrics – despite the Department of Education’s satisfaction with results overall – was underwhelming. And a little further back, of all the learners who wrote the 2014 Grade 9 Maths Annual National Assessment (ANA), only 3%-4% passed with 50% or more.

“Given this reality, the need for a tailored and responsive tool designed for this age group is vitally important and urgent,” OLICO programme Co-ordinator Andrew Barrett says.

Photo: Tsekani Mokoko

But it’s a slow climb. Although the first batch of matriculants from the Diepsloot centre’s pilot programme all passed, the class average was somewhere in the 50s: high enough to get into tertiary education, which was a big plus, but also, possibly, not as high as they could have achieved had they had a better foundation from the start.

“We had hoped that we would get them higher than that, but if you look at the number of kids getting higher than that [for pure maths], it is only about 20%,” Bowie points out.

A further complication is that poor mathematics marks do not occur in a vacuum. Although maths is the main focus at Diepsloot, the centre also runs an optional basic literacy programme, because the tutors realised that poor language and literacy skills were impacting on students’ ability to learn overall. The programme is informal, but teaches basic skills like writing paragraphs and other extended passages, how to conduct research, and introduces learners to reading for pleasure.

Additionally, says Bowie, an important part of improving results is offering students encouragement.

“Expanding the programme relies on getting good tutors that can run it,” she says. “There’s a lot of work just in terms of encouraging students – speaking to the kids, getting them back on track, giving that kind of emotional support that is equally important.”

While Minister Angie Motshekga has appeared pleased with the most recent set of matric results, critics have been unconvinced. Prior to the official release, a controversy kicked off around the adjustment of marks by Umalusi. Earlier in January, analyst Nic Spaull commented that the “real” matric pass rate was significantly lower than the reported rate, taking into account the high dropout rate between Grade 2 and Grade 12. According to Spaull’s argument, fewer than half the original students in the original class of 2016 actually finished and passed, and the “root issue is the weak foundations students get in primary schooling”. The evidence, he added, could clearly be seen in poor maths and literacy skills.

“[A]bout 60% of South African youth leave the schooling system without any proof of their educational status,” he said.

Archbishop Emeritus Njongonkulu Ndungane, meanwhile, described the reported increase in matric passes as “actually quite poor”, pointing out that the passing of progressed learners meant there was a realistic increase of less than 2%.

The DA’s Gavin Davis speculated that weaker pupils may have been “culled” to make for a better pass rate. The Department of Education described his allegation as “mischievous”.

Nonetheless, the department did acknowledge a high dropout rate among school pupils, which it said it was attempting to counteract through a variety of measures. If the Diepsloot case study is anything to go by, though, there will be a lot of catching up to do. DM

Read more at Olico.org

Main photo: Khotso Matlou (tutor volunteer, left) and Pontsho Mathuma.