The US Agency for International Development (USAID) Early Grade Reading Project (EGR) cooperated closely with the Ministry of Education and Higher Education (MOEHE) to provide each student in EGR classrooms with age- and grade-level appropriate reading materials. In March 2018 EGR formed the Materials Development Technical Working Group (TWG) comprised of 10 members from four MOEHE General Directorates: General Education – Kindergarten (KG), Supervision and Educational Qualifications; National Institute of Education and Training (NIET); and Information Technology. The TWG methodically progressed through many stages before the complementary reading materials reached the classrooms: developing a book leveling instrument, inventorying the available books in the schools and in the market, leveling the available books, identifying the gaps, and finally developing and/or purchasing needed reading materials. By project end, EGR had developed or procured over 100,000 titles of leveled readers, decodable readers, big books, and read-aloud books to provide the 104 schools that EGR supports with complementary reading materials for KG-Grade 2 classrooms.

Given the dearth of research on early numeracy interventions in low- and middle-income countries, this paper presents the instructional methodology and impact results of the Tayari program. Tayari is a preprimary intervention in Kenya (2014–2019) that prepares children aged four and five for entry into primary school by providing materials for students, training for teachers, and continuous in-classroom support. The Tayari methodology was built on the Kenyan government’s preprimary syllabus to produce instruction that was developmentally sequenced, linked to out-of-school experiences, and supportive of children’s number sense. Tayari was evaluated using a randomized controlled trial (RCT) and collection of longitudinal data from 2,957 children in treatment and control schools at three time points. Pupil assessment items were drawn from a growing body of research on preprimary numeracy in developing contexts, plus instruments and techniques from the Measuring Early Learning and Quality Outcomes (MELQO) program (UNESCO, UNICEF, Brookings Institution, & World Bank Group, 2017). The impact evaluation of the longitudinal RCT results showed statistically significant effects in the numeracy tasks of producing sets, identifying numbers, and naming shapes, while revealing no initial effects in the areas of oral and mental addition. We present recommendations for Tayari’s improvement in terms of mathematics instruction, as well as preprimary policy implications for Kenya and similar contexts.

Tangerine:Class is easy-to-use software that assists teachers to systematically collect, analyze, and use students’ results from continuous curriculum-based assessments to inform instructional decisions on grouping, pacing, and materials use. It is optimized for Android devices and offline use.

Beginning in Spring 2013, MOE, in collaboration with READ TA, began the process of developing new reading curriculum and materials for MT reading in grades 1-8 by first reviewing and validating findings for what was currently in existence. A similar process for the remaining three activity areas began in May 2013 with rapid baseline assessments for pre- and in-service teacher training and ICT in Colleges of Teacher Education and primary schools. This report is one in the series that outlines not only the findings and validation process for the baseline assessment for the respective activity area, but also presents conclusions and early recommendations to MOE for review and approval so that READ TA work under the associated activity area can begin.

With the aim of providing developing member countries (DMCs) with better guidance for using information and communication technology (ICT) effectively in education, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) funded a 21-month Regional Technical Assistance (RETA) in Bangladesh, Nepal, Mongolia, and Samoa. The RETA researched approaches to using ICT in education that succeed in improving teaching and learning and also are sustainable given the region’s development challenges. The study in Nepal focused on the use of digital video recording and laptops as tools in remote teacher training settings. Although VHS video has been around for many years, and has been common in teacher training in some countries since the 1970s, the advent of digital recording offers many new possibilities for using video in the classroom, as well as in developing-country contexts, because of the compact and easily distributed nature of this technology. This makes video a particularly suitable tool for remote areas with poor communications infrastructure, such as the mountainous regions of Nepal.