Malawi
Donor: USAID • Timeframe: Aug. 2022 – March 2027
USAID Malawi Next Generation (NextGen) Early Grade Reading Activity
The Malawi NextGen activity will solidify and build on earlier contributions to the implementation of Malawi’s National Reading Program (NRP) towards improving the delivery of high-quality early primary reading instruction in all Malawian primary schools. To achieve this goal, NextGen will support the Ministry of Education (MoE) in strengthening its national reading program. Utilizing a twin-track model, IDP will support interventions to ensure that the broader NextGen project applies an inclusion lens throughout all activities and materials to ensure that all Malawi learners benefit from its intervention while also conducting disability-targeted activities to also address this population’s diverse and unique needs. IDP’s technical work will be led by IDP’s staff person, Augustine Kanyendula, who serves as NextGen’s Senior All Children Learning Specialist.
Project Resources
- Making Early-Grade Reading Activities work for Children with Disabilities in Malawi, by Augustine Kanyendula
- Watch teachers in Malawi having fun learning--and singing!--about Universal Design for Learning in the video below! (Transcript and description below video.)
Audio content: The teachers and their trainers sing, “We are teaching using UDL, universal design for learning! We are using TLMs, Universal design for learning! We are using pair-share, Universal design for learning!”
Visual content: Three women facilitators stand in front of a classroom of adult teacher trainees. They are holding mops made out of bamboo with water bottles affixed to the top to imitate standing microphones as they sing. Some of the teachers are dancing in place as they sing.
Context: Teachers and teacher trainers in Nathenje Zone, Lilongwe, Malawi, sing about using universal design for learning (UDL), teaching and learning materials (TLMs), and pair-share in early-grade reading instruction. Pair-share is a teaching strategy in which students work in pairs to answer questions from the teacher.
Multi-Country Study on Inclusive Education (MCSIE)
In Malawi, IDP is partnering with USAID through the Long-Term Assistance and Services for Research (LASER) mechanism led by Purdue University to conduct a three-year evaluation of USAID inclusive education activities delivered by Reading for All Malawi (REFAM) and its lead implementer, Juarez and Associates. Our evaluation, the Multi-Country Study on Inclusive Education (MCSIE), is the first major effort by USAID to investigate what works to improve the quality of education for learners with disabilities. We are leveraging this unique opportunity to derive lessons learned about what works to sustainably advance teaching and learning outcomes for children with disabilities in varying contexts. USAID and its partners will use this information to inform adaptations to its activities in Malawi and to plan for new inclusive education programming globally.
Project Highlights
- Conducting literature and policy reviews around the situation of disability-inclusive education in Malawi
- Producing detailed evaluation reports identifying strengths and areas of opportunity related to REFAM’s capacity development within the Ministry, the adaptation of early grade reading assessments for students who are blind and deaf, and teacher training efforts
- Using evaluation methodologies that include key informant interviews and focus group discussions with implementing partners, disabled persons’ organizations, national and subnational government stakeholders, classroom teachers, principals, and parents; secondary source document review and rubric analysis; and training and classroom observations
- Implementing a comparative case study methodology to dig deeply on qualitative factors supporting or hindering access to and learning in inclusive instructional settings
- Mapping areas of intervention to include existing systems and actors engaged in disability inclusion in Malawi