Early Childhood Literacy at GHEI

Visiting an ECL classroom is an exciting and inspiring experience. The students have boundless energy, and three days a week, their teachers, Saga and Felicity, match them. On these days, Early Childhood Literacy classes can be clearly heard throughout the GHEI compound.

Students often arrive one or two hours early to run in circles, play well-strategized games of Connect Four, and build with play dough and blocks while they wait for class to begin. Lessons start with Daily Routines. Our two ECL teachers enthusiastically lead their classes through a recitation stating the day of the week, the date, current weather, and each student’s emotion. The students use rhythm and repetition to learn patterns and anticipate their teachers’ questions; shouting their answers in unison. The teachers are animated: acting everything out as they express it and in turn, the students are engaged. They are focused, but smiling and laughing the whole time. When one of their teachers steps back, the students take turns happily leading the class and clapping for each other when they get the right answer.

They speak loudly and build confidence working in English. The walls are covered with a mix of printed and hand-drawn posters that illustrate a large portion of the ECL curriculum. Students reference the posters throughout class as they work to increase their vocabularies and fluency.

The typical Early Childhood Literacy student is a younger sibling who either has not shown much promise in school, has some learning disability or is simply hyperactive. Most ECL students are seven, eight, or nine years old and at a critical stage where children develop at vastly different rates and all need to be nurtured and given the opportunity to grow. The students chosen for ECL have often already been labeled as poor investments; beginning a pattern of neglect from parents and teachers that compounds and becomes increasingly detrimental over time.

When GHEI tried to hold a meeting for parents of new students at the beginning of the year, only one parent bothered to show up.

ECL classes give students individualized attention, positive encouragement and allow them to actively participate in class while building their creativity and critical thinking skills. As part of GHEI’s female education and empowerment initiative, 60% girls and 40% boys are recruited for the program.

Using a culturally-adapted version of the Wilson Fundations phonics-based curriculum, classes focus on building literacy skills and incorporate purposeful play, songs, poems and time for individual reading and writing. The students thrive in a small classroom setting with ample books and school supplies.

To help monitor the program, GHEI measures students’ performance by organizing end of term exams and conducts baseline, midterm and final Early Grade Reading Assessments. Students’ exam scores improve and in the course of a year, many go from learning the alphabet to reading narrative passages and answering basic comprehension questions.

The program has been commended by local school teachers. They have written GHEI to report that students who were once falling behind are now shining as leaders in the classroom. With the help of ECL, initially poorly performing students have the opportunity to catch up with their peers and gain the attention and encouragement they deserve.

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