USAID Vamos Ler! / Let’s Read!

FY 20 QUARTERLY PROGRESS REPORT 1 OCTOBER 2019 – DECEMBER 2019

Contract Number AID-656-TO-000003

January 2020

This report was produced for review by the United States Agency for International Development. It was prepared by Creative Associates International, Inc. This report was made possible by the support of the American People through the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). The contents of this report are the sole responsibility of Creative Associates International and do not necessarily reflect the views of USAID or the United States Government.

TABLE OF CONTENTS ACRONYMS ...... 3 SUBMISSION REQUIREMENTS ...... 4 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY ...... 5 SUMÁRIO EXECUTIVO ...... 7 1. PROGRAM OVERVIEW ...... 8 Program Description ...... 8 2. PROGRESS TO DATE ...... 9 Summary of the Quarter: Progress towards the Program Goal ...... 10 Overview of Activities by Intermediate Result (IR)...... 10 3. MONITORING EVALUATION, & COMMUNICATIONS ...... 32 Monitoring & Evaluation (M&E) and Research ...... 32 Status of Contract Deliverables ...... 33 Communications Activities ...... 42 Security ...... 34 Key Meetings with USAID and Partners ...... 34 4. MANAGEMENT & OPERATIONS ...... 38 Staff Actions ...... 38 Staff and Consultant International Travel ...... 39 5. PLANNED ACTIVITIES AND EVENTS FOR NEXT QUARTER...... 39 6. APPENDICES ...... 40

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ACRONYMS

ABE LEARN Assistance to Basic Education Learn to Read Now AIR American Institutes for Research AWP Annual Work Plan CAI Creative Associates International COP Chief of Party CSO Civil Society Organization DCOP Deputy Chief of Party DINEP National Directorate of Primary Education DIPLAC National Directorate of Planning and Cooperation DNFP National Directorate of Teachers’ Training DNGQ National Directorate of Management and Quality DPEDH Provincial Directorate of Education and Human Development EGR Early Grade Reading EGRA Early Grade Reading Assessment EMIS Education Management Information System G1/G2/G3 Grade One / Grade Two / Grade Three GRM Government of the Republic of Mozambique IDIQ Indefinite Delivery, Indefinite Quantity IFP Teacher Training Institutes (Insitutos de Formação de Professores) INDE National Institute for the Development of Education IR Intermediate Result L1/L2 Language One (local language)/ Language Two (Portuguese) LEMA Local Education Monitoring Approach M&E Monitoring and Evaluation MEPT Network of NGOs Education for All MINEDH Ministry of Education and Human Development NGO Non-Governmental Organization OP Oficina Pedagogica OSC Overseas Strategic Consulting PIRS Performance Indicators Reference Sheets PMEP Project Monitoring and Evaluation Plan PMP Performance Management Plan SBCC Social Behavior Change Communication SC School Council SD School Director SDEJT District Education Offices (Serviço de Educação, Juventude e Tecnologia) STTA Short-term Technical Assistance TOT Training of Trainers TWG Technical Working Group UEM Universidade Eduardo Mondlane UP Pedagogical University (Universidade Pedagogica) USAID United States Agency for International Development WEI World Education, Inc. ZIP School clusters (Zona de influencia pedagocica)

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SUBMISSION REQUIREMENTS

USAID Award A Contract No. AID-OAA-I-14-00052 Number B USAID Objective Title Investing in People (IIP) Contract Number AID-656-TO-000003 C USAID Project Title Under Assistance to Basic Education - All Children Reading (ABE- ACR) IDIQ: SOL-OAA-12-000068 USAID Program Area Education (program area 3.2) D and Program Element Basic Education (program element 3.2.1) E Descriptive Title FY 20 Quarterly Progress Report 1: October 2019 – December 2019 Leesa Kaplan-Nunes, Chief of Party Joan Cohen-Mitchell, Project Director F Author Name(s) Christine Beasley, Deputy Chief of Party for Technical Management Trymore Mafucha Dhliwayo, Senior M&E Specialist Creative Associates International 5301 Wisconsin Avenue, NW, Suite 700 Washington, DC 20015 G Contractor name Telephone: 202 966 5804 Fax: 202 363 4771 Contact: Joan Cohen-Mitchell, Project Director [email protected] Eyole Luma, CO H USAID CO, COR Antonio Francisco Mize, COR I Date of Publication January 2020 Language of English, Executive Summary also in Portuguese J Document

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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

Vamos Ler! is a five-year program, funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), whose goal is to strengthen the Mozambican government’s ability to ensure that students in the target regions of Nampula and Zambézia can achieve grade-level fluency and comprehension in the local language in Grades 1-3. To this end, Vamos Ler! provides evidence-based technical and material assistance to improve early grade literacy instruction in Emakhuwa, Elomwe, and Echuwabo, along with new language acquisition and literacy support to prepare children for transition to Portuguese in Grade 4. Vamos Ler! supports the Ministry of Education and Human Development (MINEDH) to strengthen classroom and systems support and to lay the foundation for sustaining and expanding bilingual early grade reading instruction. In the last quarter of FY19, USAID/Mozambique requested that Vamos Ler! present a contract modification and budget realignment and Vamos Ler! did so. USAID/Mozambique issued and approved the fully executed contract modification M04 on October 28. The FY20 workplan, which had been on hold pending the approval of the modification, was submitted to USAID on November 26. Other programmatic highlights of the quarter are outlined below.

1) Early Grade Reading Classroom Instruction Improved The primary focus for IR 1 was the printing of close to 7 million teaching and learning materials, including new Grade 3 materials. Vamos Ler! divided the printing between local and international printers. Sending a reading team staff member to India to correct and approve samples greatly accelerated the approval process. Delivery of the materials first to the Vamos Ler! provincial warehouses and then to the schools, will be done in Q2. In addition to printing the Vamos Ler! materials, in Q1 the program supported MINEDH by printing nearly 200,000 additional books in L1, L2 and mathematics for Nampula, Zambezia, Cabo Delgado, and Niassa, and covered the illustration and reformatting of the Grade 3 Portuguese math textbook. Detailed plans and curricula for the FY20 training of school directors, coaches, and teachers were also developed in Q1. In what will be the final year of Vamos Ler! training, several important changes were made to training content in response to EGRA results and also to ensure that the program makes the most of the training time remaining.

2) National Early Grade Reading Policy Framework and Delivery Systems Improved Vamos Ler! contracted a Senior Government Relations consultant with more than thirty years of experience working with MINEDH who will support the program in further strengthening the relationship with the Ministry at the senior directorate level. The systems strengthening team engaged with the DPEDHs in both provinces and with key MINEDH directorates in Q1, including DNGGQ, DIPLAC, DINEP and DNFP, and provided inputs and budget information to ensure the inclusion of Vamos Ler! activities in MINEDH’s Annual Activity Plan. The team also began discussions with MINEDH on workshops for reading and teacher standards, which will take place in Q2.

3) Parental and Community Engagement in Early Grade Reading Increased Q1 was a time for planning the inclusion of guidance for community engagement meetings, the expansion of reading clubs, and reading day celebrations and competitions to all 1,950 Vamos Ler! schools. The program’s four local NGO partners continued to implement the three packages of community engagement and mobilization interventions, including Let’s Talk, radio listener groups, community theater performances and community feedback meetings.

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SUMÁRIO EXECUTIVO

Vamos Ler! é um programa financiado pela Agência dos Estados Unidos para o Desenvolvimento Internacional (USAID), com a duração de cinco anos, com o objectivo de fortalecer a capacidade do governo moçambicano em assegurar que os alunos das regiões visadas, Nampula e Zambézia, possam atingir fluência e compreensão nas línguas locais, no primeiro ciclo do ensino primário (1ª – 3ª classe). Para este efeito, o Vamos Ler! proporciona assistência técnica e material com base em evidências, para o melhoramento do ensino da literacia nas classes iniciais, nas três línguas locais, Emakhuwa, Elomwe e Echuwabo, em simultâneo com a aquisição da segunda ou nova língua e apoio na literacia, no sentido de preparar as crianças para a transição para o Português na 4ª classe. Atrevés de uma abordagem de três vertentes e baseada em resultados (descrita abaixo) o Vamos Ler! apoia o Ministério da Educação e Desenvolvimento Humano (MINEDH) no fortalecimento do apoio no ensino e em sistemas, bem como na criação das bases para manter e expandir a literacia bilingue nas classes iniciais em todo país.

No primeiro trimestre do AF20, a USAID/Moçambique solicitou que o Vamos Ler! apresentasse uma modificação do contrato e reajuste do orçamento, e o Vamos Ler! o fez. A USAID/Moçambique emitiu e aprovou a modificação do contrato executado na íntegra, M04 no dia 28 de Outubro. O plano de actividades para o AF20, que esteve pendente, a aguardar a aprovação da modificação, foi submetido à USAID a 26 de Novembro. Abaixo, apresenta-se outros destaques programáticos do trimestre.

1) Melhorar o Ensino da LITERACIA nas Classes Iniciais O enfoque primário para o RI 1 foi a impressão de mais de 6.5 milhões de materiais de ensino e aprendizagem, incluindo novos materiais da 3ª Classe. O Vamos Ler! dividiu a impressão por gráficas nacionais e internacionais. O envio de um membro da equipa de leitura à Índia para corrigir e aprovar amostras, o que acelerou, em larga medida o processo de aprovação. A entrega de materiais; primeiro, para os armazéns provinciais do Vamos Ler! e depois para as escolas, será concluída no 2º trimestre. Para além da impressão dos materiais do Vamos Ler!, no 1º trimestre, o programa apoiou o MINEDH na impressão de aproximadamente 200,000 livros adicionais em L1, L2 e de Matemática para Nampula, Zambézia, Cabo Delgado e Niassa e nos custos de ilustração e reformatação do livro de Matemática em Português da 3ª classe. No 1º trimestre, foram elaborados planos detalhados e currículo para a capacitação de gestores escolares, acompanhantes e professores no AF20. No que será o último ano das formações do Vamos Ler!, foi feita uma série de alterações importantes, para assegurar que o programa tirasse o máximo proveito do remanescente tempo limitado de formação.

2) Fortalecimento de Sistemas e Políticas Educacionais no Âmbito da LITERACIA nas Classes Iniciais O Vamos Ler! contratou uma Consultora Sénior de Relações com o Governo, com mais de trinta anos de experiência a trabalhar para o MINEDH, que apoiará o programa no maior fortalecimento das relações com o Ministério a nível sénior das direcções. A equipa de fortalecimento de sistemas estabeleceu relações com as DPEDHs em ambas províncias, e com direcções-chave do MINEDH, no 1º trimestre, incluindo a DNGGQ, DIPLAC, DINEP e DNFP e proporcionou contributos e informação orçamental, para assegurar a inclusão das actividades do Vamos Ler! no Plano Anual de Actividades do MINEDH. A equipa iniciou, igualmente, discussões com o MINEDH referentes aos workshops sobre padrões de leitura e de professores, que terão lugar no 2º trimestre .

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3) Melhorar o Envolvimento dos Pais e da Comunidade na LITERACIA nas Classes Iniciais O 1º trimestre foi o momento para planificar a inclusão das directrizes para as reuniões de envolvimento comunitário, a expansão dos clubes de leitura, celebrações e concursos do dia da leitura para todas as 1950 escolas abrangidas pelo Vamos Ler!. As quatro ONGs locais parceiras do programa continuaram a implementar os três pacotes de intervenções sobre envolvimento e mobilização comunitários, incluído o Conversemos, Grupos de Escuta Radiofónica, Grupos Teatrais Comunitários e Encontros Comunitários.

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PROGRAM OVERVIEW

Program Name: Vamos Ler! (Let’s Read!) Activity Start and End Dates: August 12, 2016 – July 10, 2021 Name of Prime Implementing Partner: Creative Associates International Contract Number: Contract Number AID-656-TO-000003 Under IDIQ ABE LEARN SOL-OAA-12-000068 Reporting Period: October 1, 2019-December 31, 2019

Program Description

The Government of Mozambique has committed to improving its early grade literacy outcomes through its recent commitment to the expansion of the national bilingual education program. With the rollout of bilingual education training and revision of the bilingual education curriculum, the government hopes to reverse the worrisome trends plaguing its school system: Fewer than half of Mozambican children complete primary school, many who complete cannot read on grade level, and rates of teacher absenteeism are among the highest in the world. Mozambique’s bilingual education policy highlights its ambition to significantly improve early grade reading (EGR) outcomes. Reform efforts focus on L1 to L2 transition, strengthening EGR policy frameworks, and building the capacity of MINEDH to roll out the bilingual education program across the country. Funded by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), under the Assistance to Basic Education Learn to Read Now (ABE LEARN) IDIQ, the Vamos Ler! program is working to strengthen the Mozambican government’s ability to ensure that students in Nampula and Zambézia can achieve grade-level fluency and comprehension in the local language in the first cycle of primary education (Grades 1-3). Vamos Ler! focuses on early grade literacy instruction in three local languages - Emakhuwa, Elomwe, and Echuwabo, and provides new language acquisition and literacy support to prepare children for transition to Portuguese as the language of instruction. Through a three-fold, results-based approach Vamos Ler! supports MINEDH to strengthen classroom and systems support and lay the foundation for sustaining and expanding bilingual early grade literacy throughout the country: • IR 1: Early Grade reading (EGR) classroom instruction improved • IR 2: National EGR policy framework and delivery systems improved • IR 3: Parental and community engagement in EGR increased

Lead implementing contractor Creative Associates International, and sub-contractors, World Education, Inc. (WEI), American Institutes for Research (AIR), Oversees Strategic Consulting (OSC), and blueTreeGroup (bTG) are committed to support the government of Mozambique to realizing these aims over the five-year program, through high quality, cost-effective and evidence-based technical and material assistance.

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2. PROGRESS TO DATE

This report of the Vamos Ler! program is a quarterly report, covering the period between October 1, 2019 and December 31, 2019.

PROGRAM GOAL: Students in the target regions read fluently and with comprehension by the end of second year of school

Summary: Progress Achieved in FY20 Quarter 1 New Vamos Ler! Grade 3 materials were completed and approved by MINEDH at the end of FY19, and the process of printing close to 7 million teaching and learning materials began immediately thereafter. The 2020 school year, which starts in February, will be the first time Vamos Ler! has a class of Grade 3 students using these new materials. Teachers, school directors, and coaches will all be introduced to the materials in the January Vamos Ler! training. The Vamos Ler! team, in close collaboration with MINEDH, was engaged in intensive planning for the first training of FY20, which will take place from January 9 to January 25. The training plans incorporate a number of adjustments to focus on those elements with the largest potential impact on student reading outcomes, including enhanced in-school coaching for teachers, both from experienced teachers and from school directors, and more emphasis on word recognition and decoding, understanding that additional support needed by students to transition from recognizing letters to reading words. The FY20 training will also give teachers more concrete tools to improve the inclusion and increase the participation of girls in the classroom and will support the expansion of out of school reading support activities such as reading clubs. In addition, in Q1 Vamos Ler! supported the DPEDHs on the selection and competency testing of new Grade 1 bilingual education teachers entering the system and held discussions with MINEDH on plans to award certificates of participation and performance to teachers who have been part of the Vamos Ler! program and met certain criteria.

Challenges and Associated Actions • Collaboration with MINEDH continued to be relatively smooth with some directorates and somewhat challenging with others, particularly DIPLAC and INDE. Vamos Ler! has engaged Zaida Cabral, who is well-regarded and respected at the senior levels in MINEDH, to support the program on strengthening the relationship with DIPLAC and has sought support from USAID to ensure that INDE understands the terms and conditions on which Vamos Ler! assistance can be provided. • The number of teacher training days was reduced in FY20 to be in line with the Vamos Ler! contract and budget, challenging the technical teams to restructure the agenda to include the required material. As a result, training days were extended, and non-essential content was reduced. • The persistent chronic teacher absenteeism, while well-known to all education stakeholders, will continue to make it difficult for any program to reach its full potential. Anecdotal commentary from MINEDH suggests that Vamos Ler! schools are better attended than non-program schools. Vamos Ler! is discussing with MINEDH ways the program can contribute to reducing teacher absenteeism in FY20.

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Lessons Learned • Materials development, procurement, and field operations are managed by different Vamos Ler! teams and the quantity of TLMs that Vamos Ler! is designing, printing, and distributing annually is massive. These realities combined with weak capacity of the local printing and distribution providers made it difficult in the past for Vamos Ler! to complete the distribution of materials to nearly 2,000 remote rural schools in an organized and timely manner. To mitigate this challenge for the final distribution of TLMs in FY20, the program conducted a lessons-learned workshop to identify specific bottlenecks in the system, and from that exercise Vamos Ler! determined there was a need for one dedicated staff person to coordinate the entire materials printing and distribution supply chain process from beginning to end. As a result, the program hired a short-term Process Manager with extensive logistics and supply chain experience. The Process Manager is responsible for overseeing the FY20 TLM production and distribution under the leadership of the Director of Operations and the Chief of Party. • Another key bottleneck identified was checking and approving sample materials from the printers before printing of mass quantities could begin. For the limited quantities printed in Mozambique, this could be done by having the printers bring hard copy samples to the office. But for the vast majority of materials printed internationally, large files had to be sent electronically, which was time consuming and frustrating given internet connectivity challenges and time differences with the countries where printing was taking place. In FY20, Vamos Ler! took a different approach and sent a technical team member fluent in all three L1s to India to work directly with the printer at their facility. In ten days, he accomplished work that would have taken at least six weeks to complete if the program had continued with its previous approach.

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Overview of Activities by Intermediate Result (IR)

IR 1: Early Grade Reading Classroom Instruction Improved

IR 1.1: Evidence-based, gender-responsive early Grade reading materials in Mozambican languages produced and used

1.1.1 Print Teaching and Learning materials (TLMs)

Progress Achieved Vamos Ler! Grade 3 TLMs were completed and approved by MINEDH by the end of FY19. In the first quarter of FY20 Vamos Ler! began the printing procurement process and finalized the complex and detailed logistics plan for the materials distribution.

As was the case in the previous year, the program divided the printing between local and international printers, as local printing capacity is still not able to handle large orders. Grade 1-3 student books and supplementary readers were chosen to be printed internationally1. Thirteen applicants submitted bids for the work and Burda Education GmbH was selected to print and deliver 6,504,185 books to the Vamos Ler! warehouses in Nampula and Quelimane.

All teacher manuals, scripted lesson plans and posters were chosen for local printing and twelve applicants competed for the contracts. Minerva Print and Academica presented the best value for money proposals. Minerva was selected to print, pack, and deliver 229,468 scripted lesson plans and posters and Academica was selected to print, pack, and deliver 22,255 teacher manuals and alphabet charts2.

After delivery to the warehouses, another company will take over the distribution process to the 1950 schools. Vamos Ler! launched a public tender (RFQ 361 2019) to which eight firms responded. AS Transportes was awarded the contract to organize and distribute materials to the schools.

During the quarter, Vamos Ler! received a request from MINEDH to print additional quantities of Grade 1 and 2 materials, including L1, L2, and math student books for Nampula, Zambezia, Cabo Delgado and Niassa3. The program agreed to print the books, and AS Transportes will deliver them to a warehouse at the district level in Nampula and Zambezia. From there, the SDEJTs will be responsible for the last-mile distribution to the schools.

1 Decisions about which materials would be printed internationally vs locally were made first based on past experience. Even with shipping times included, international printers have proven to be able to deliver the books to the provincial warehouses before local printers. Secondly, some of the inputs, such as binding for printing certain materials. are not available locally and are slow and expensive to import. 2 Although Minerva had the best proposal in terms of price, the team decided to divide the work and give part of it to Academica as a risk mitigation measure, because Minerva had been unable to meet their contractual deadlines in FY19. The program was also aware that these two printers were also printing all materials for the 2019 Mozambican presidential elections, which at the end of the day they would inevitably prioritize over the Vamos Ler! order. It was considered less risky to give them the lower priority materials and to divide the work between them. 3 The books are for non-Vamos Ler! districts and schools in Nampula and Zambezia, and Emakhua schools in Cabo Delgado and Niassa.

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Regular quality checks were done to monitor the quality of book production both in Mozambique and abroad. For the local printers, the Vamos Ler! Process Manager made regular visits to the printing sites, and the Vamos Ler! reading team technical specialists checked samples in the program office. For materials printed outside Mozambique, the program sent Reading Team Materials Development Coordinator Abdala Machude to India to work directly with Burda on reviewing and correcting the book samples. From October 22 to November 1, Machude worked in Uttar Pradesh, completing the revision and approval of 229 titles in both L1 and L2 during that time. Machude was able to check for grammar, spelling, and linguistic errors in addition to verifying paper weight, color, formatting, and finishing. The result was that all the teaching and learning materials printed by Burda were approved in record time for mass printing. Challenges and Associated Actions • Local printer Minerva failed to meet the contractual deadline for delivery of their materials. Although their proposal stipulated a certain number of work shifts and workers to be allocated to the Vamos Ler! print job, Minerva did not hire enough staff to complete the work by the deadline. Vamos Ler! issued a cure letter and Minerva responded with a plan and commitment to accelerate the process to meet the deadline. • Because of the renewal of occasional armed conflict in central Mozambique, Vamos Ler! determined that it would be unwise to continue with the original plan for Burda to ship materials to the port of Beira. In addition, constant congestion at the ports of transfer (Dar es Salam and Mombasa) and in Nacala port itself will likely result in some additional delays. The program has been working closely with the logistics firm to speed up customs clearance in Nacala and try to make up for time lost due to the unavoidable change of port. • Vamos Ler! was receptive to MINEDH’s request to support the Ministry by printing additional books for non-Vamos Ler! schools, districts, and provinces. However, getting timely responses and concrete quantities of materials needed from MINEDH was extremely challenging and delayed. An initial request for 88,350 books was not adequately broken down by book type, language, or location. This was followed a month later by a revised request, this time with breakdowns but for 195,600 books, more than double the original request. Difficulty in obtaining accurate information from MINEDH threatened to cause significant delays and additional costs for the program. Bringing this issue to a successful conclusion demanded labor-intensive follow- up from program staff. Fortunately, the program was still able to provide this support in the end.

1.1.2 Develop Grade 3 Student Math Book

Progress Achieved Prior to the start of FY20, MINEDH’s Institute of Educational Development (INDE) requested support from Vamos Ler! on their Grade 3 math textbook. This involved illustrating and reformatting of the Portuguese version of the book, followed by translation to the three Vamos Ler! languages, and final formatting. Support for math books was not included in the original Vamos Ler! contract but was approved in the contract modification and budget realignment this quarter.

Coming to an agreement with INDE on a mutually acceptable and reasonable budget for the math books was a lengthy exercise that took place early in Q1, and was followed by a request for approval

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from the program to USAID, which was necessary as the Vamos Ler! contract in force at the time did not include support for mathematics. USAID approval was obtained for a six-day workshop in Boane for INDE staff to complete the reformatting. Illustrators were later contracted and completed their work, which was approved by INDE and paid for by Vamos Ler!

By the end of Q1, the reformatting and illustration of the Portuguese textbook was complete. Translation to L1 will be done in Q2.

Challenges and Associated Actions Widely divergent understanding of the conditions for per diem payments made successful collaboration on this activity between Vamos Ler! and INDE very difficult. In alignment with USG and Government of Mozambique regulations, per diem is paid when staff are working a certain distance from their home offices. When Vamos Ler! staff verified that these conditions did not apply for two out of six agreed- upon days of the Boane workshop, those days of per diem were discounted. INDE’s displeasure threatened to spill over into other areas of collaboration between the program and MINEDH but, eventually, through dialogue and a meeting between the INDE Director and the Vamos Ler! Chief of Party, the impasse was overcome, and an agreement was reached on how to move forward with the translation of the book.

1.1.3 Distribute Teaching and Learning Materials

Nothing to report this quarter. Distribution will be done in Q2.

1.1.4 Revision of all TLMs, Validation by MINEDH and Transition to MINEDH Ownership

Nothing to report this quarter. The activity will begin in Q2.

IR 1.2: Teachers’ use of evidence-based, gender-responsive instructional practice in early Grade reading increased

1.2.1 Gender-sensitive Pedagogical Capacity Building for Bilingual Education Teachers on EGR and Math

Progress Achieved In October, Vamos Ler! began preparations for the January trainings. Initial steps included determining the priority content to be covered, drafting the training programs and agendas, drafting the initial training budgets and technical coordination and consultation meetings with MINEDH to discuss and agree on the training content and calendar. In November, the program presented the draft training plan to DNFP senior technicians. The teams discussed and agreed on the January training calendar and the priority themes and content for school director, teacher, and coaches training. At the conclusion of the meeting the calendar was finalized, with the trainings starting on January 9 and ending on January

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25. MINEDH recommendations were incorporated and included clarifications on the L2 content of the training for Grade 3 teachers and specification on the content for math for both Grade 1 and Grade 3 teachers.

Once an agreement had been reached with MINEDH on all key points, the program team completed detailed curricula and agendas for school directors, Grade 1 teachers (Cohorts 1 and 2), Grade 3 teachers (Cohort 1), and coaches. The program decided not to train Grade 2 teachers for a second time, as they had already received the mandated number of training hours, conserving these resources for supervision and support visits.

Vamos Ler! made several changes to the training curricula for FY20, which is the last full year of training. First, the team decided to administer simple pre-tests and post-tests to training participants to more accurately gauge learning during the training. Secondly, the technical teams decided very early in the planning process on the quantities and types of forms (fichas) and other materials that would be needed by the training participants.

After internal discussions, the program also decided to do the large trainings twice in FY20, eliminating the August training. The decision was made as the contractually mandated number of training days could still be met with two trainings occurring in the year. Vamos Ler! also decided to reduce the number of Saturday oficinas from seven to three in FY20. Having fewer Saturday refresher trainings will be less of a burden for teachers, who do not receive any financial support for transportation. The program will work closely with the SDEJTs and ZIPs to incentivize teachers to participate in the three oficinas, providing certificates for high rates of participation and successful training completion (for all Vamos Ler! training including oficinas) at the end of the year. Instead of holding separate oficinas for school management and reading, in FY20 these will be done jointly.

The teams also revised the teacher training content based on information received from the midterm effectiveness evaluation and EGRA as well as feedback from MMEMS studies. Some of the adjustments made to the training content include the following: • Enhanced focus on in-school coaching for teachers, both from experienced teachers and from school directors; • More emphasis on word recognition and decoding, acknowledging the additional support needed by students to transition from recognizing letters to reading words; • Additional focus on the importance of gender-sensitive pedagogy for girls’ classroom participation and inclusion that can positively impact school performance; and • More attention to out of school reading support including reading clubs and parental involvement in education.

Putting together a training of this magnitude and complexity, with such a large number of participants soon after the Christmas holidays, requires a high level of organization, coordination, and detailed planning. While the technical discussions and negotiations were ongoing with MINEDH, the Vamos Ler! operations and field implementation teams developed detailed logistical plans and timelines for the training, including allocations of tasks and responsibilities both to program staff and SDEJT bilingual education focal points.

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In addition to planning for the January training, in Q1 Vamos Ler! supported the DPEDHs on the selection and testing of new Grade 1 bilingual education teachers entering the system. The teachers were nominated by school directors and the nominations were approved by SDEJTs. Because Vamos Ler! encountered a number of cases in FY19 of selected teachers who were not proficient in L1, the program decided to take a more hands-on approach to supporting teacher selection in FY20. L1 proficiency tests were administered to 2,617 teachers on October 28 at the ZIP level, to check on whether teachers were able to speak and teach using L1 and L2. The tests also checked teachers’ L1 and L2 reading, writing, and comprehension skills. Tests were marked by local literacy trainers from the districts.

Table 1: Results of New Teacher L1 Competency Tests

Participation Teachers with good performance based on pre-defined Province criteria Planned Actual % # teachers % Nampula 1935 1294 67% 1139 88% Zambezia 1708 1323 77% 833 68% Total 3643 2617 72% 1972 75%

In total, 3,643 teachers were expected to participate in the testing, but only 2,617 teachers appeared to be tested on the appointed day. Of these, 1,972 teachers, equivalent to 75%, passed the test. District literacy trainers and Vamos Ler! then worked together to draft lists of teachers who passed the competency tests and submitted them to the SDEJTs for approval.

Challenges and Associated Actions • Nearly one third of teachers did not show up for language proficiency tests, and a percentage of those tested did not pass. It was somewhat challenging to come to a clear agreement with the DPEDHs on next steps for dealing with both situations. Proposed bilingual education teachers who were not tested in the first round needed to be rescheduled for testing, and close follow-up was required from DPEDH and SDEJT to make sure that all proposed teachers were tested. For those teachers who failed, ideally there would have been a plan for remedial support (for those teachers who could be brought up to speed with some reasonable amount of assistance), or replacement of those teachers by others who would then also need to be tested. The success of bilingual education rests on the presence of qualified and trained teachers but this cannot be ensured without the DPEDH taking ownership of the process.

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IR 1.3: School management and governance in support of EGR strengthened

1.3.1 Gender-sensitive Capacity Building for School Directors on School Management

Progress Achieved The Vamos Ler! systems strengthening and reading teams collaborated closely in planning for the January training in Q1, beginning in October with determining the priority content to be covered, drafting the training programs and agendas, drafting the initial training budgets, and holding technical coordination and consultation meetings with MINEDH to discuss and agree on the priority themes and topics. This was vital for the school director training, as Vamos Ler! had determined the need to focus more intentionally on teacher absenteeism and school director responsibility for helping manage this issue, as well as on in-school coaching. With the agreement of MINEDH and USAID, the program moved away from focusing on a new school management manual for bilingual schools and focused more on the core competencies and skills that all school directors must possess to function effectively and manage their schools and staff.

Challenges and Associated Actions The training program for coaches had to be developed jointly by the Vamos Ler! reading and systems strengthening teams. School directors have a dual administrative/managerial and pedagogical responsibility and strengthening their role as in-school coaches is important to providing on-site, consistent, and sustainable support to teachers. The technical teams had to find ways to balance different ideas and priorities on programming the days allocated to coaches training in the most effective way and how to modify coaching tools and instruments that are user-friendly enough to be used by the people for whom they are designed. This was a valuable exercise for the teams, particularly as the senior technical specialists were on leave for part of the process, so much of the initial design work was done by their deputies. This was an excellent opportunity for the two deputies to collaborate and to show what they were capable of doing and was a good reminder for senior management of the importance of creating opportunities for all staff to grow and to take on new challenges.

1.3.2 Support to MINEDH on school management materials and training curriculum

Nothing to report this quarter. The activity is planned for Q2.

IR 1.4: Coaching and supervision of early grade reading instruction improved

1.4.1 Supervision and Monitoring of In-school Coaching for Teachers

Nothing to report this quarter. Monitoring of in-school coaching will begin after the training in January.

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1.4.2 Implementation of Local Education Monitoring Approach (LEMA)

In Q1 the program continued to work on the MINEDH district supervision platform. In December, Vamos Ler! Senior Data Manager had a meeting with MINEDH technicians to discuss a step-by-step plan to add LEMA to the platform by 2020. The next meeting will be in February when the teams will study in detail how to merge both LEMA and district supervision on the same platform. The plan is for MINEDH to be able to take over this platform and use it even after the end of Vamos Ler!

LEMA will be implemented in Q3 in all 21 districts to provide information for each district on specific areas to improve upon regarding school performance.

IR 2: National EGR policy framework and delivery systems improved

IR 2.1 National mechanisms for coordinating EGR interventions strengthened

2.1.1 Support to MINEDH on Disseminating Bilingual Education Strategy and Increasing Support for BE

Progress Achieved On December 3, the Vamos Ler! new Senior Government Relations Manager began her consultancy with the program. Zaida Cabral has more than thirty years of experience working in education in Mozambique and has strong relationships with several of the MINEDH Senior Directors. One of the things she began working on immediately is setting a meeting with the DIPLAC Director Antuia Soverano to discuss quarterly meetings for Vamos Ler!. Concrete planning and scheduling will be done early in Q2.

Dr. Cabral will also be leading on coordinating Vamos Ler! efforts to increase understanding of and support for bilingual education among education donors and implementing partners, finalizing and scheduling the presentation of the Vamos Ler! implementation strategy at MINEDH, and strengthening the collaboration between the program and MINEDH on national-level policy dialogue and reforms. She will work closely with senior management as well as with the systems strengthening team, who will continue working primarily at the technical level.

Vamos Ler! staff participated in a number of coordination meetings with MINEDH departments and other education implementing partners during Q1, including the primary education interest group, the Expanded Education Coordination Group (GCC Alargado) meeting to discuss MINEDH’s draft Annual Activity Plan (PdA), and a meeting to review the results of the independent evaluation of MINEDH’s 2012-2019 strategic plan. A number of meetings were held to ensure that Vamos Ler! activities were integrated into the new MINEDH PdA, both at the central and provincial levels. The program gave written feedback on MINEDH’s Education Strategic Plan (PEE).

On November 6 a meeting was organized by the Zambézia Technical Working Group (TWG) for Bilingual Education. Topics discussed included an evaluation of the Vamos Ler! August trainings, the

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FY19 Saturday oficinas, the new teacher selection process for 2020, participation of DPEDH and SDEJT staff in Vamos Ler! activities and integration of Vamos Ler! activities into the Ministry’s national, provincial and district Activity Plans (Plano de Actividades or PdA).

TWG members agreed that trainers and supervisors should be regularly evaluated by Vamos Ler! and SDEJT staff using tools such as the observation forms and that these evaluations should be part of the normal reflection and evaluation meetings that occur immediately after every training. This will help ensure that trainers receive support to build their capacity in areas where they may be weak, and that those who are consistently failing to perform even with support can be replaced. The group also discussed the ongoing difficulty with low and irregular SDEJT participation in the Saturday oficinas. They agreed to work on awareness-raising with SDEJT focal points on the importance of their presence, and to come up with concrete ideas for support from either Vamos Ler! or DPEDH to help SDEJTs improve on topics such as travel planning and logistics.

Table 2: Zambezia Bilingual Education Technical Working Group Meeting - Participants Institution Males Females Total Vamos Ler! 5 5 10 DPEDH 4 6 10 Total 9 11 20

The Nampula Bilingual Education TWG met on December 19. The group discussed 2020 activity and training plans, and the program’s need for strong participation and support from DPEDH, particularly during the TLM distribution planned for January, as well as the follow-up plans for supervision. In addition, the meeting served to orient members on the Vamos Ler! FY20 training plan, which includes the focus on decoding, gender, coaching, and improving teacher attendance, expansion of reading clubs and the reduction of the number of oficinas.

Table 3: Nampula Bilingual Education Technical Working Group Meeting Participants Institution Males Females Total Vamos Ler! 2 3 5 DPEDH 2 5 7 Total 4 8 12

Challenges and Associated Actions

• It continues to be challenging to have full support and participation in program activities from some SDEJT staff because Vamos Ler! does not provide monetary incentives. Nevertheless, the program will continue to support and encourage SDEJT to organize school visits and participate in ZIP-level workshops and trainings and will continue to discuss with the DPEDHs ideas for how the SDEJTs can be motivated without direct handouts.

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2.1.2 Participation in National and/or International Education Symposia

Progress Achieved In Q1 the program had discussions with DIPLAC and DINEP on MINEDH participation in the CIES conference, which will take place in Miami in March. Vamos Ler! plans to support two MINEDH staff to attend the conference, and the final selection of representations will be done by MINEDH and communicated to Vamos Ler! in January.

Challenges and Associated Actions

On account of potential government staff changes and pressing needs to finalize the ministry activity plan and strategy, the March timing of CIES is challenging for some senior MINEDH directors whom Vamos Ler! would like to include. Ministry internal processes and response times can also be challenging when working with deadlines for conference registration and visa applications. However, the program is in close coordination with MINEDH on these issues and is being supported by the new Senior Government Relations Manager to move things forward.

2.1.3 Facilitation of Lessons Learned and Sustainability Event

Progress Achieved As Vamos Ler! moves from full activity implementation towards transition and handover to MINEDH, it is important for the program to facilitate an open dialogue with the Ministry on which aspects of Vamos Ler! they want to and are able to sustain and expand. The program has included in its plans a lessons-learned and sustainability planning event in FY20 for this purpose. The Senior Government Relations Manager started working with Vamos Ler! in Q1 and began discussions with the program’s senior management team on the objectives for this event. Vamos Ler! has also started discussions with partner OSC who may lead a sustainability review of the Community Engagement and Mobilization component of the program. The review will make recommendations to MINEDH on more cost- effective versions of these interventions that could be adapted. The sustainability event itself is planned for Q4. Challenges and Associated Actions None to report this quarter.

IR 2.2: EGR standards, benchmarks, and curricula for Mozambican languages developed

2.2.1 Completion of Student and Teacher EGR Standards and Student Fluency Benchmarks

Progress Achieved Following on two successful workshops in FY19 with MINEDH and program partner AIR on Grade 1- 3 reading standards and teacher standards, in Q1 MINEDH requested that Vamos Ler! support two, three-day workshops in Nampula (for participants from northern Mozambique) and Zambezia (for participants from southern Mozambique). The purpose of the workshops will be to socialize the draft reading and teacher standards developed earlier with a larger group. The exact dates will be confirmed

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by DNGGQ in early Q2. After the workshops, the next step will be to have the standards validated first by MINEDH’s technical council (conselho tecnico) and then by the higher-level consultative council (conselho consultivo).

In order to create benchmarks (define performance levels for oral reading fluency), Vamos Ler!, working with program partner AIR, has prepared a plan which will start in Q2. A critical piece of this plan will be to engage MINEDH leadership to solidify buy-in for the process of establishing fluency benchmarks. This will start immediately following the January 2020 trainings.

Challenges and Associated Actions • Initial budgets submitted by MINEDH for the standards workshops were inconsistent, given the circumstances. Efforts to have MINEDH take responsibility for part of the cost were also unsuccessful. After a series of discussions between Vamos Ler! and DNGGQ, we reached an agreement on a more realistic budget and the two workshops will take place in Q2. • The similar data structure of the 2016 and 2019 EGRA data presents several challenges for developing fluency benchmarks. In order to conduct a benchmarking workshop, there needs to be a normal distribution of scores. As in 2016, in 2019 there were relatively few scorers at the higher end of the scoring distribution in the key skills of oral reading fluency and reading comprehension. Benchmarking does not require a nationally or regionally representative sample, but it does require that the data sets analyzed have high scorers as well as low scorers. Additional data collection will be integrated into the Q3 LEMA activity and will allow establishment of the benchmarks.

IR 2.3: Research-based policies in support of EGR instruction implemented 2.3.1 Action research on gender and education to support improved policy-making

Nothing to report this quarter. This activity will begin in Q2.

IR 2.4: EGR systems strengthened

2.4.1 Effectiveness Evaluation

Progress Achieved For the Vamos Ler! midterm effectiveness evaluation, quantitative data was collected in 535 schools in the period of September 2 - 24. Additional qualitative data was collected from 29 schools, divided into two groups of 15 high-performing schools and 14 low-performing schools from September 30 to October 2. The purpose of this qualitative data was to provide better insight into the factors that are most important in determining student performance. The FY19 annual reported provided a summary of the data collection.

In Q1, Vamos Ler! organized presentations of the preliminary effectiveness evaluation and EGRA results for USAID and MINEDH. The USAID presentation took place on October 18 and included

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Mission Director Jennifer Adams, Deputy Mission Director Martin McLaughlin, Acting Education Team Lead Arturo Acosta, Vamos Ler! COR Antonio Francisco Mize and M&E Specialist Rosa Vique in addition to the Vamos Ler! senior management and M&E teams. The presentation was well-received, and the Mission Director congratulated the program on work well done, remarking that while everyone would have liked to see bigger gains in numbers of students reading fluently, the reality is that students tested had had at most 1.5 years of time using the program’s materials, with teachers trained by the program. From the USAID perspective, she said, Vamos Ler! in five years was able to design, produce and distribute high quality L1 TLMs and train teachers to use them and this was quite an outstanding accomplishment. She also acknowledged the importance of an open dialogue on the teacher absenteeism issue.

Table 4: Data presentation for USAID – Participants Sector Male Female Total Vamos Ler! 8 4 12 USAID 3 3 6 Total 11 7 20

After this first presentation, Vamos Ler! incorporated feedback and suggestions from USAID and adapted the presentation for MINEDH. This second presentation took place on October 30 and was moderated by DGGQ Director Luis Nascimento and had a total of 32 participants including DNEP Director Guibunda and DNEP Deputy Director Telesfero de Jesus among others.

Table 5: Data presentation at MINEDH – Participants Sector Male Female Total Vamos Ler! 5 1 6 USAID 1 1 2 MINEDH 15 9 24 Total

The presentation of the results included the discussion of school director, teacher, and student absenteeism as one of the biggest challenges experienced during data collection visits to schools, even though the SDEJTs were advised in advance about the week that the visits would take place. On the day of the first visit, 8% of schools were not functioning at all. For the follow up visits to low-performing schools, the SDEJTs were advised of the exact day of the visit, and still 5% of the schools were not functioning, a reduction of only 3%.

In terms of early grade reading and oral assessment, the results reflect the performance of students after only a year and a half of program implementation and consequently the students have not yet fully learned all of the Grade 2 content that is being tested. There was a considerable improvement in student performance across all assessed subtasks and a considerable reduction in the percentage of students with zero scores in the different subtasks evaluated.

The main findings presented noted that: • Significant gains in means scores observed from baseline to midterm in all student outcome measures.

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• Zero score percentages substantially reduced for all student outcome measures, e.g.: • Baseline: 81% of students could not identify a single letter • Midterm: 42% of students could not identify a single letter • Gains were most visible in letter name and letter sound identification, with 75% of students still unable to read a single word of grade-level text in their L1. • Home and school level factors have measurable impact on student performance. • Students with more support at home read on average an additional 6.2 letters and 2.6 words • Students with high performing teachers read on average an additional 4 letters and 1.5 words • Students in better managed schools read on average an additional 3 letters and 1.1 words • Boys outperformed girls on all student outcome measures, but the gap between boys and girls was substantially reduced when students had a female teacher.

Based on the findings and additional data from the qualitative follow-up visits, the program considered the following points for integration into the 2020 implementation approach:

• Teachers: • Include instruction practices that reduce differences in results for boys and girls • Place a greater focus on decoding and comprehension skills • Address motivation (certificates and other forms of recognition for outstanding practice) • Improve coaching • School Management and Supervision: • Include greater involvement of local authorities (administrators, district director, local leaders) to address absenteeism • Involve the provincial inspectorate to support calls for administrative measures • Create opportunities for districts and schools to analyze their results and develop additional measures to improve performance • Review and simplify instruments introduced by the program • Community: • Expand reading clubs • Promote reading competitions and other events to stimulate schools and communities for improved performance

Work on a detailed report for the midline was conducted during the quarter and will be finalized early in Q2.

IR 2.4 Challenges and Associated Actions • The high proportion of zero scores for the oral reading fluency limits the extent to which more advanced techniques such as Hierarchical Linear Modeling (HLM) can be applied. Simple linear regression models were used to examine the effect of individual variables and this allowed us to estimate the overall relevance of key variables (e.g. parental support was found to be the most important factor in improving student reading skills).

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• A meeting was planned to present the results of the midterm to the conselho tecnico of MINEDH, but due to shifting MINEDH agendas, the presentation did not take place. The program will continue to coordinate with MINEDH to make the presentation in the next quarter.

IR 3 Parental and community engagement in EGR increased

IR 3.1: Awareness increased about the advantages of bilingual education 3.1.1 Implement Community Engagement Campaigns in Support of Bilingual EGR

Progress Achieved In Q1, Vamos Ler! developed detailed implementation plans for the community meetings that are the core of the Let’s Go to School community campaign activity. These plans will be shared with school directors and teachers at the January trainings. Within thirty days of the start of the 2020 school year, all school directors are expected to convene community meetings at their schools. The key message of the campaign is that everyone - school directors, teachers, and parents - has a role to play in reducing teacher and student absenteeism that so seriously hinders learning in Mozambique.

The other major community engagement initiative in FY20 is Reading Day, which will take place on April 25. Planning for logistics and procurement for this large-scale event began in Q1. Whereas in FY19 reading day events were held only in the 315 Vamos Ler! schools in districts where the program is working through local NGO partners, this year the activity is being expanded to all 1,950 schools. The expansion is due to the extremely positive response from communities and schools. It is also an effort to respond to some of the preliminary EGRA recommendations about the importance of creating a culture of reading in communities, strengthening the relationships between communities and schools, and providing more opportunities for reading outside of school.

As part of the Q1 planning for the FY20 trainings, detailed, step-by-step guidance was developed for integrating Reading Day and community campaign meetings into the agenda for both the ToT and the teacher and school director trainings.

In the seven4 districts where Vamos Ler! is working through local NGO partners, outreach through community meetings, radio listener groups, and community theater performances continued in Q1.

Through community meetings, NGO staff and volunteer facilitators not only transmit and reinforce the program’s key messages on the value of bilingual education, on the role of parents in supporting their children’s education, and on the importance of regular school attendance. Meetings also include local education authorities and traditional and religious leaders and use the opportunity of the gatherings to stress the importance of teacher attendance and school accountability to the communities. Parents and other key stakeholders have the opportunity ask questions and discuss solutions to problems that may be facing the local schools or the school-community relationship.

4 Alto Molocue, Lugela, Namarroi, Memba, Lalaua, Mossuril, and Ilha

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Community Meeting in Naquessa, Lalaua District, Nampula November 11, 2019. Community meetings and many other NGO activities are organized by NGO staff and volunteer facilitators and therefore unlike activities with Vamos Ler! staff, do not have USAID branding.

Table 6: Community Meetings # Meetings Participants District NGO Male Female Alto Molocué NAFEZA 0 0 0 Ilha de Facilidade 01 12 0 Moçambique Mossuril Facilidade 02 87 12 Lugela NANA 58 315 422 Namarrói NANA 80 1430 1347 Memba APRODER 12 862 1019 Lalaua APRODER 6 767 983 Total 159 3473 3783

In communities where illiteracy is very high, and television and internet penetration is very low, community radio broadcasts in local languages can be effective in transmitting the Vamos Ler! key messages. Radio ownership in the Vamos Ler! districts is still not very high, so in an effort to reach more listeners at the community level the NGO partners organize groups to come together in a central place and listen to the programs that community radio stations are broadcasting on bilingual education, upcoming program events and activities, and on how parents can support education. The radio is supplied by the NGO through the grant. In Q1 the NGO partners held radio listening sessions in six5 districts. At the end of the sessions, participants discuss the program’s themes and ask questions.

Table 7: Radio Listener Group Session # Themes Discussed Participants District NGO sessions Male Female 1. Helping children be on time for school 2. Parental involvement in education Lugela NANA 4 Importance of enrolling children in 30 59 school at the right age 3. Impact of a nomadic lifestyle on children’s learning outcomes 4. Involvement of parents in keeping girls in school Namarroi NANA 7 1. Student and teacher attendance and 109 37 punctuality 2. Advantages of bilingual education

5 In Lalaua the community radio station is not functioning so this was not possible to do there.

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Mossuril Facilidade 2 1. How to ensure that children continue 26 10 coming to school 2. Teacher punctuality and attendance Ilha de Facilidade 2 1. How to ensure that children continue 36 16 Moçambique coming to school 2. Teacher punctuality and attendance Memba APRODER 8 1. How parents can monitor their 87 132 children’s school performance and learning 2. Advantages of bilingual education for children’s learning 3. Community involvement in bilingual education 4. School performance and accountability 5. Mobilizing the school community to improve performance Alto NAFEZA 46 1. Preparing for the start of the school 297 233 Molocué year 2. Importance of enrolling children at the right age Total 69 585 487

Community theater performances in local languages are another effective way that the NGO partners engage communities and disseminate the Vamos Ler! key messages. These short dramas are developed and performed by local groups in an open space in the community. They are highly engaging and normally draw large crowds.

One play that was performed in Q1 was about two families in the same community. One of the families enrolled their children in school, enforced regular attendance, and monitored homework. The second family declared that school was a waste of time. They did not enroll their children in school but took them to the fields to work. In the end, the head of the second family got sick and had to go to the hospital. He was discharged with prescriptions that none of his children could read. By the time the family sought help from the children in the first family to read the prescription instructions, the man had died. Meanwhile the children who went to school learned a lot. They could help their parents read things such as letters, instructions, and the Bible without having to ask neighbors for help.

The community performances are followed by lively discussions and question/answer sessions in which audience members say what they have learned and what actions they are going to take to support the key messages.

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Table 8: Community Theater Performances # Theme # Participants District NGO shows Male Female Alto NAFEZA 45 1. Preparing for the start of the school 331 379 Molocué year 2. Enrolling children in Grade 1 3. What is the Point of bilingual education? Ilha Facilidade 4 1. What is the point of bilingual 299 394 education? 2. Punctuality and Staying in School Mossuril Facilidade 5 1. What is the point of bilingual 570 437 education? 2. Punctuality and Staying in School

1. Motivating children to attend schools 2. Parental involvement in education and Lugela NANA 14 making sure their children are at school 70 86 3. Enrolling children at the right age 4. Impact of nomadic lifestyle on children’s learning 5. Parents’ role in keeping girls in school Namarroi NANA 21 1. Punctuality of students and teachers 1023 582 2. Advantages of bilingual education Memba APRODER 10 1. Advantages of bilingual education for 727 1137 children’s learning 2. Community involvement in bilingual education 3. Importance of providing a snack for children before school Lalaua APRODER 16 1. Advantages of bilingual education for 904 1482 children’s learning 2. Community involvement in bilingual education 3. Importance of providing a snack for children before school Total 115 3924 4497

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Challenges and Associated Actions • During the planting and harvesting seasons, it is more difficult to have community meetings with high levels of participation. The geographically disperse schools, which are the natural setting for community meetings, create difficulty getting community members to come to meetings. As a result, the NGOs identified volunteer facilitators based in the communities where they work, and these people advise on how to best plan meetings and events for maximum participation. • It is particularly difficult to get women to participate in activities because of their double burden of farm work and housework. The NGOs must be flexible to schedule events when women have more time.

IR 3.2: Family members’ assistance increased to improve the children’s literacy skills

3.2.1 Implementation of Package 2: Let’s Talk

Progress Achieved Let’s Talk! is being implemented in 47 communities in the districts of Ilha de Moçambique and Mossuril, Nampula province, through a partnership with the local NGO Facilidade. Let’s Talk! sessions aim to develop children’s oral language skills by facilitating interactive conversations between parents and their children. In Q1, a total of 231 sessions took place. In Q2, Vamos Ler! will undertake a rapid assessment of the results of the Let’s Talk pilot. The assessments will include session observations, as well as focus group discussions with parents, teachers and Let’s Talk facilitators. Results will be reported in the next quarterly progress report.

Table 9: Let’s Talk Sessions

Number Parents Children Facilitators Total Month District of Participants sessions

M F M F M F

Mossuril 11 66 59 212 88 11 2 438 Ilha de

October Mocambique 18 11 81 217 199 16 8 532 Ilha de Mocambique 23 69 133 289 288 16 7 802 Mossuril

November 11 42 58 157 120 22 2 401 Ilha de 106 223 542 1522 1587 63 29 3966 Mocambique Mossuril

December 57 133 265 724 772 28 7 1933 Total 215 411 873 3121 3054 156 55 8072

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Challenges and Associated Actions • Motivating the volunteer Let’s Talk! facilitators continues to be challenging, since they do not receive payment or incentives of any kind. It is difficult to prevent volunteers from dropping out of the program. One motivator which may contribute to preventing attrition is to be formally identified as a facilitator. To do this Vamos Ler! will be providing T-shirts to the volunteers in Q2 as a non-monetary incentive for them. • While Let’s Talk! is designed to encourage and facilitate improved communication between parents and their young children, some parents still see it as a form of preschool or free babysitting and do not attend with their children. Ongoing awareness raising with parents is necessary so that they understand the importance of their participation. • Almost all the Let’s Talk! sessions take place outside, which means that many sessions do not take place during the rainy season. Through discussions with leaders in the communities, churches and mosques, Facilidade has had some success in finding indoor spaces for some of the groups to meet when it rains.

3.2.2 Implementation of Package 3: Reading Clubs

Progress Achieved Reading clubs are sessions outside of school, where children in the early primary grades, under the guidance of a volunteer facilitator from the community, can practice and improve their reading skills as well as enjoy fun educational activities. Community leaders decide on the best time to organize clubs and commit to holding these sessions regularly, either after school, on weekends, or both.

In Q1, reading club sessions took place in 54 schools and 13 communities in the district of Namarrroi, Zambezia province, where Vamos Ler! has been implementing this small-scale initiative through a partnership with the local NGO NANA. During the reading club meetings, facilitators worked on several tasks with the children including reading aloud, reading in groups, practicing letters and syllables, word recognition, and numbers and counting.

In Q1, 128 children in Grades 1 and 2 (74 boys and 54 girls), who were previously labeled as at risk of failing, participated in reading clubs and showed significant improvement in their reading levels. Those children are now no longer considered at risk of failing. The table below shows the number of sessions held in Q1. This was a short quarter for reading clubs as they are based at the schools and use books that are kept at the schools; they do not meet when school is not in session. The last term of the 2019 school year ended in the second week of November.

Table 10: Reading Club Sessions Communities Month # of Sessions Participants M F Sicote, Namua, Muaquiua, Mussisse, October 432 702 460 Mulosse, Insaiha, Mutuela, Nassecuane, Regone, Mulemeyeque, Rumala, Maquiringa e Phuli.

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November 54 681 468 Sicote, Namua, Muaquiua, Mussisse, Mulosse, Insaiha, Mutuela, Nassecuane, Regone, Mulemeyeque, Rumala, Maquiringa e Phuli.

Total Participants 486 1.383 928

In Q2 the January training will ensure that all school directors and teachers understand how the reading clubs are meant to operate, and that they know their roles and responsibilities in setting up and monitoring reading clubs. Following the January training and at the beginning of the 2020 school year, the process of scaling up reading clubs to all 1,950 Vamos Ler! schools will begin. This is in response to the midline EGRA, which pointed to out-of-school reading reinforcement support as a key factor influencing children’s reading performance.

Challenges and Associated Actions • The biggest challenge is lateness and absenteeism. Children often arrive late for the reading club sessions and volunteer facilitators sometimes fail to appear at all. To address this issue, NANA is in constant contact with community leaders who then communicate with parents to ensure they bring their children to the sessions. At the October NGO coordination meeting, this best practice was shared with the other NGOs.

IR 3.3: Local NGOs’ ability to mobilize communities in support of Improved EGR Increased 3.3.1 Monthly supervision visits to NGO Partner Offices and Field Activities

The Vamos Ler! grants and community mobilization teams made monthly supervision and support visits to the NGO offices and activity sites in Q1. The objective of these visits was to verify NGO compliance with the approved workplans, check progress toward milestones, assess the technical quality of activity implementation and provide technical support as needed, monitor the implementation of acceleration or improvement plans, reinforce the role of the SDEJTs in following up on Vamos Ler! activities and monitoring NGO progress, and complete the NGO scorecards to measure and track performance.

Across the board there is a need to improve involvement of the SDEJTs regarding joint planning, sharing of plans and reports, and field activities. This is always a challenge as many SDEJTs lack initiative to

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undertake any activities in the absence of special payments to do so. On the positive side, participation and ownership of community leaders is very high and they are very supportive and pleased with the results of the NGO activities.

Table 11: Strengths and Weaknesses of NGO Grantee Programming APRODER FACILIDADE

Positive Aspects Aspects to Improve Positive Aspects Aspects to Improve

1. Strong 1. Strong involvement of 1. Sharing of plans and reports involvement of 1. Sharing of work plans community and with SDEJT community and and reports with religious leaders in SDEJT activities. religious leaders 2. Weak school and inactive in activities. school councils 2. All activities are 2. NGO staff and volunteers show in- taking place as 2. There are some depth understanding planned. theater groups that do not really of the program 3. Good understand the basic objectives, and as a collaboration techniques for result, better with Vamos Ler! performing a play, understanding of the District Officer such as time keeping, purpose of the activities. flow, etc.

NANA NAFEZA Positive Aspects Aspects to Improve Positive Aspects Aspects to Improve 1. Activities being 1. Involvement of 1. Alignment of activities 1. Communication / implemented SDEJT performed / visited interaction with according to with the milestone communities plan and annual plan; (Communication difficulties 2. Quality of evidence prevail in local language); 2. Parents and for milestone communities completion needs 2. Improvement seen in 2. Understanding Vamos Ler! understand the improvement collaboration with key messages key messages SDEJT 3. The quality of debates / very well content in radio programs 3. Involvement of 3. Collaboration with community and VL District Officer in 3. Involvement of local 4. Weak collaboration with VL religious leaders planning activities and community and District Officer sharing information; religious leaders in activities.

At the conclusion of each visit, the program team met with NGO senior management and technical staff to provide summary feedback. The most common recommendation from the Q1 monthly visits was for the NGOs to provide more technical support to the volunteer facilitators who are doing most of the frontline implementation work with communities and delegate more responsibility to the same facilitators to support communication between the program and families. The facilitators are known and trusted in the communities and this role is a natural fit for them.

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Table 12: Monthly NGO Supervision and Support Visits Province Institution Male Female Total Zambezia NANA and NAFEZA 10 4 14 SDEJTs 1 1 2 Vamos Ler! 1 1 2 Nampula APRODER and FACILIDADE 4 1 5 SDEJTs 1 0 1 Vamos Ler! 1 1 2 Total 18 8 26

Challenges and Associated Actions None to report this quarter.

3.3.2 Quarterly review meetings with Local NGO Partners

Progress Achieved

The Q1 quarterly NGO meeting took place on October 24 in both provinces. The objective was to assess implementation of the quarter's activities including successes, challenges, and lessons learned. The meeting also allowed the grantees to discuss and learn from each other, as well as to conduct joint planning for the next quarter’s activities. During the quarterly meeting, the Vamos Ler! team shared the quarterly NGO scorecards with all participants. This allowed everyone to see the performance trends. Based on these, the NGOs developed performance improvement plans as needed. Most of the NGOs were on track, but NAFEZA, who has consistently struggled to meet deadlines, was able to receive additional support, not only from the program team but from the other local NGOs. The meeting was an opportunity for the NGOs to finalize their workplans for FY20.

The NGOs made some suggestions for changing the NGO scorecard including using it quarterly instead of monthly scorecards and reviewing the indicator definitions as well as the methodology for scoring. At the end of the meeting, each NGO had an approved FY20 workplan and performance improvement or activity acceleration plans.

Challenges and Associated Actions The NGOs were initially very resistant to the concept of the scorecard. But they were eventually convinced that Vamos Ler! was not using the tool to punish the NGOs for failing to meet their milestones. The point was rather to have a standardized tool that could track progress over time and help the NGOs focus on specific areas for improvement. By the end of Q1 the partners acknowledged that the scorecard was also a useful tool for their own internal management.

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Table 13: Participation in Q1 NGO Quarterly Review Meeting Sex Province Sector Total Female Male Vamos Ler! 1 2 3 DPEDH 0 1 1 Nampula SDEJT 4 0 4 ONG’s 5 0 5 Vamos Ler! 1 3 4 DPEDH 1 0 1 Zambézia SDEJT 0 3 3 ONG’s 3 3 6 Total 15 12 27

Challenges and Associated Actions • Retention of volunteers, who are tasked with running the reading clubs and Let’s Talk sessions, is difficult in the absence of any type of motivating incentives. Vamos Ler! is moving forward as quickly as possible with the procurement of T-shirts for the volunteers as being identified formally is expected to contribute to keeping them motivated to continue working.

3. MONITORING EVALUATION, & COMMUNICATIONS Monitoring & Evaluation (M&E) and Research

In Q1 the team continued finalizing the EE data analysis and report-writing process. The final EE and EGRA report will be shared with USAID in Q2, and after approval it will be translated and shared with MINEDH.

The Vamos Ler! PMEP was revised and submitted to USAID on November 25. The M&E Plans and the effectiveness evaluation tools are now aligned with the PMEP and the annual workplan. Major changes to the PMEP include: • Addition of two indicators proposed by USAID: 1) number of primary school classrooms that receive a complete set of essential reading instructional materials with USG assistance and 2) number of primary school educators who complete professional development activities on implementing evidence-based reading instruction with USG assistance (ES.1-7); • Removal of indicators that were linked to Community Mobilization package 1 as there will be no new Cohort 3 schools that will need these community awareness-raising activities. • All data based on research was changed to be filled in by the effectiveness evaluation and the new EE tools were adapted for reporting on those indicators; • New PIRS were drafted based on the new PMEP and new data collection methods were based on field knowledge of data availability.

A significant undertaking for the M&E team was verification of all participant lists for the January trainings. This process ensures that the program has correct and updated information for all teachers participating in Vamos Ler! training, including full name, grade taught, working phone number, and other key identifying information. Having accurate information is important both for the program and

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for MINEDH, and it also is essential for facilitating payment of teacher training per diems via MPESA. Prompt and accurate payments have proven to be essential in maintaining high rates of teacher participation. This verification process was completed by November 25.

One potential challenge for the January trainings will be the number of Grade 1 teachers participating in the training for the first time. The program anticipates that there may be some glitches in getting accurate information from them and thus in paying per diem on time. Extra effort will be focused on working with these teachers to explain the process of payment, ensure that the program has accurate information and can pay without delay.

From October to December Vamos Ler! conducted a pilot in two districts (Laluaa and Mulevala, five ZIPs each) in which the program assigned tablets to ZIP coordinators to collect monitoring and coaching data from schools during their regular visits. This information could then be uploaded to a central platform and analyzed by Vamos Ler! technical staff. The objective was to reduce time and paper wasted by the use of hard copy forms which have to be hand carried from the schools to the ZIPs, improve speed and accuracy of data transmitted, and provide more useful information to decision- makers on indicators (e.g. which schools are doing well and which need more support). In addition to saving time and reducing waste, the pilot showed two major advantages of using the tablets:

• Having data loaded on the tablets greatly accelerated the data cleaning process and facilitated fast feedback to the field even during the data collection allowing for timely rectification of data errors; • Faster feedback allowed the program and SDEJTS to implement recommendations and solutions to challenges faster and have more time to see positive results, as measured through better pedagogical practices in the classroom and the management practices that reinforce reading and writing. Improvements depend to a large extent on the existence of reliable, consistently collected data that communicate information about teaching and management strengths and weaknesses in particular schools as well as in the ZIPs overall. Having the data on the tablets also greatly facilitates information sharing among various stakeholders.

Although the pilot has shown some clear advantages and potential, the expansion of the use of the tablets for ZIP level monitoring and coaching depends on a number of additional factors. The lack of electricity for battery charging, controlling the use of the tablets, network challenges, and cost of airtime would all need to be taken into consideration. Overcoming these challenges would require a certain amount of focus, political will, and creativity.

Communications The Communications and Events Officer continued to collect information from the technical specialists and drafted weekly news bullets which were submitted to USAID. He traveled to Lugela district, Zambezia in December to conduct interviews and draft the FY20 Q1 success stories. Status of Contract Deliverables

Table 14: Q1 Deliverables

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Deliverables Due date Delivery Date approved by client date FY19 Q4 and Annual October 30, 2019 October November 26, 2019 Progress Report 30, 2019 FY20 AWP November 26, November Pending 2019 25, 2019 FY20 PMEP November 26, November Pending 2019 25, 2019 FY20 Q1 Accrual December 15, December Confirmed Receipt December 19, Report 2019 13, 2019 2019

Security There were no security incidents in Vamos Ler! operating areas this quarter. The Field Implementation and Security Coordinator closely monitored the situation during the national election campaign in September and October as the program’s EGRA data collection activities were taking place in the field at this sensitive time.

As part of preparation for two major events in January - materials distribution and training - the Field Implementation and Security Coordinator is responsible for staff travel and fleet management to ensure the safety of all program and rented vehicles. Working closely with the Process Manager, he is also responsible for providing logistics support and training for the teams involved in the materials distribution which will take place in early Q2.

Key Meetings with USAID and Partners On October 29 the Vamos Ler! Washington DC based project team convened all project subcontractors for a partners meeting. The meeting provided a forum to discuss project updates and celebrate programmatic successes. The new HQ Project Director Dr. Joan Cohen-Mitchell took this opportunity to lay out her vision for the next two years of the project. That vision includes:

1) ensuring that the field team leads project implementation, with HQ supporting as needed; 2) prioritizing girls’ inclusion and interventions that directly impact early grade reading skills; 3) focusing on sustainability and strategically engaging MINEDH, and 4) documenting lessons learned and telling the Vamos Ler! story.

The meeting also allowed all project partners to highlight the high-quality deliverables accomplished by the project to date, with particular emphasis on the midline EGRA results given that this data will help frame project activities in years four and five. Overall, the meeting was successful in bringing together project partners who don’t often have the opportunity to actively collaborate and receive feedback in real time. It also strengthened the relationship between partners, setting the project up for a successful final year of full implementation. The Vamos Ler! field team participated in the partners meeting by teleconference.

In Q1 the Vamos Ler! management and technical staff continued to coordinate closely with USAID during the quarter to strengthen the relations between Vamos Ler!, relevant MINEDH directorates and other implementing partners in the education sector. (see list below).

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Table 15: Q1 USAID and Partner Meetings Date Key program Key client and / or partner Topic / focus Key decisions / representative representative(s) of meeting outcomes (if any) October COP, DCOP for MINEDH National Deputy Additional The program agreed 14, 2019 Technical Director of Primary Education MINEDH to consider the Management requests for request, with the final math and for answer dependent on non VL quantities requested provinces. October COP, DCOP for USAID Mission Director, Presentation of The program was 18, 2019 Technical Deputy Mission Director, EGRA approved to present Management, Education Team Lead, USAID preliminary results to MINEDH DCOP for Field Vamos Ler! COR, M&E results to after incorporating Implementation, Specialist USAID USAID feedback M&E Team October DCOP for Field USAID Vamos Ler! COR Presentation of 30, 2019 Implementation, DGGQ Director, DNEP EGRA Reading Team Director, DNEP Deput preliminary Senior Specialist, Director results to M&E Team MINEDH November PD, COP USAID/Washington, USAID The workshop 12, 2019 USAID/Mozambique and workshop on focused on integrated Implementing Partners Positive Youth PYD in Development project/program Strategy design and implementation. November PD, COP USAID Deputy Mission Courtesy USAID/Mozambique 18, 2019 Director, USAID Education Meeting for expressed its Team Creative appreciation of the Project recent management Director changes on Vamos Ler and the program shared its dedication to addressing all challenges and moving forward successfully. November PD, DCOP for ADPP Country Director Discussed new 19, 2019 Technical USAID Management opportunity for local NGOs for community engagement and bilingual education

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November COP, Senior DNEP Director, other Discuss new Partners noted that 20, 2019 Systems MINEDH implementing MINEDH draft PdA needed Strengthening partners Activity Plan significant Specialist (PdA), present draft revision. November PD, COP MINEDH National Deputy Courtesy MINEDH National 21, 2019 Director for Primary meeting for Deputy Director for Education Creative Primary Education Project gave input and verbal Director and approval for the presentation of FY2020 AWP. FY2020 AWP November Systems senior DNFP and DNEP senior Share 26, 2019 coordinator reading technical specialist preliminary VL senior coordinator, training plans teacher training for January senior coordinator 2020 November DCOP for Technical UNICEF Early Childhood Discussed new The program agreed 26, 2019 Management Development Specialist and early childhood to provide samples of Education Cluster Lead education Vamos Ler! EGR project and materials do UNICEF workshop UNICEF is holding with MINEDH and the Vamos Ler! materials production and printing process November COP, DCOP for USAID/Mozambique and USAID IPs presented project 26, 2019 Field Education Implementing Education Team successes and Implementation Partners Learning Event challenges. Vamos – Reflection Ler! and Peace Corps Day negotiated future collaboration on training. November COP, DCOP for USAID/Mozambique, Vamos Presentation of 27, 2019 Field Ler! Vamos Ler! Implementation midterm evaluation results to USAID stakeholders December Teacher Training US Peace Corps Volunteers Deliver 5, 2019 Specialist presentation on Vamos Ler! and bilingual

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education in Mozambique December Gender and 200 attendees including Dr. GirlMove 11, 2019 Inclusion Specialist Jorge Ferrão (former Minister Academy event of Education and current showcasing rector of UP Maputo) ; Prof. efforts toward Dr. Alda Salomão ( jurist and the creation of environmentalist); and Stella a new Mendonça (Mozambican generation of Opera). transformative and innovative young women leaders to contribute to the development of Mozambique. December COP and Senior Donor Primary Education Preparatory Vamos Ler! has 17, 2019 Systems Interest Group meeting to shared all FY2020 Strengthening discuss PEE and project activities with Specialist PdA at the relevant MINEDH central level directorates for and priority inclusion in Annual action matrix Activity Plans December COP Primary Education Interest One on one Information sharing 18, 2019 Group Coordinator coordination Embassy of Finland meeting on bilingual education December Senior Systems All of MINEDH’s GCC Alargado FASE MoU to be 20, 2019 Strengthening implementing partners were discussed the revised, developed Specialist represented PdA again, timeline for discussed the finalization and independent approval of PEE 2020- evalution of the 2029 PEE 2012-2019 December Vamos Ler! COP, INDE Director Review process INDE suggested way 23, 2019 Senior Systems of math book forward for Vamos Strengthening development Ler! to contract Specialist and translation. translators. Vamos Ler! agreed. December Vamos Ler COP, DNFP Director Courtesy visit Discussed way 27, 2019 Reading to update on forward on teacher TeamTeacher collaboration certification. Training Coordinator

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MANAGEMENT & OPERATIONS Staff Actions

In Q1 the following staff actions took place:

• The HR Manager, Nampula Provincial Coordinator, Alto Molocue District Officer, and Nampula Administrative Assistant left the Program.

• The Maputo and Nampula accountants were promoted to Finance Officers as of October 1.

• There were seven new hires: • A Finance Assistant, a District Officer for Moma and a Driver were hired in Nampula. Two Finance Assistants were hired in Zambezia. An Operations Director and a Senior Program Support and Reporting Coordinator were hired in Maputo. The two new hires in Maputo are female and the remaining five are male.

• The quarter ended with seven open positions. Recruitment for all is ongoing. • One logistics coordinator in Maputo • Four positions in Nampula: Administrative Assistant, Senior Community Mobilization Coordinator, Senior Finance Manager, and Provincial Activity Implementation Coordinator. • Two positions in Zambezia: An Office Cleaner and a District Officer for Alto Molocue. Recruitment is ongoing.

• The Provincial Coordinator for Nampula will not be filled due to the restructuring of Nampula office and the role will be taken over by Provincial Activity Implementation Coordinator.

As of the end of Q1, Vamos Ler! has a total of 103 staff, of which 67 are males and 36 are females. In Nampula the breakdown is 72% male and 28% female, in Maputo 43% male and 57% female, and in Zambezia 72% male and 28% female. Overall, the Vamos Ler! staff breakdown is 65% male and 35% female.

Table 16: Q1 Staffing

October November December VL New New New Total Female Male Exits Hires Total Female Male Exits Hires Total Female Male Exits Hires Maputo 27 15 12 1 1 27 15 12 0 0 28 16 12 0 1 Nampula 39 11 28 1 2 40 11 29 1 1 39 11 28 0 0

Zambezia 35 9 26 1 0 34 9 25 0 2 36 9 27 0 0 Total 101 35 66 3 3 101 35 66 1 3 103 36 67 0 1

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100% 35% 65% 3% 3% 100% 35% 65% 1% 3% 100% 35% 65% 0% 1%

Staff and Consultant International Travel

Table 17: Q1 Staff and Consultant International Travel Name of Organization Destination(s) Dates of Purpose of Trip Traveler Travel Adam Turney World Education Maputo, Nampula September Support the 2019 midline data International & Quelimane, 12-October collection specifically through Mozambique 11 supervision of activities for data quality and input gathering for evaluation reporting and dissemination. Haiyan Hua World Education Maputo & October 5-19 Support the Effectiveness International Quelimane, Evaluation (EE) midline data Mozambique analysis and present to the VL team and USAID in Mozambique. Abdala Creative Associates Uttar Pradesh, October 22- Check and approve student book Machude International India November 1 and complementary materials specifications sent to Burda Education for printing Leesa Kaplan- Creative Associates Washington DC, October 21- Meetings at HQ, pack out of Nunes International El Salvador November 11 household goods, visa renewal Joan Cohen- Creative Associates Maputo & November Provide overall technical and Mitchell International Nampula, 11-21 management support to the COP Mozambique and senior management staff during the project’s period of transition Yuri Machkasov WEI Quelimane, November Provide support on financial Maputo 11-29 management and budgeting to WEI

PLANNED ACTIVITIES FOR NEXT QUARTER

ACTIVITY DATES IR 1: Early Grade Reading Classroom Instruction Improved IR 1.1: Evidence-based, gender-responsive early grade reading materials in Mozambican languages used 1.1.3 Distribution of Teaching and Learning materials (TLMs) January-March 1.1.4 Revision of all TLMs, Validation by MINEDH and Handover to MINEDH March IR 1.2: Teachers’ use of Evidence-based, Gender-responsive Instructional Practice in Early Grade Reading Increased 1.2.1 Gender-sensitive Pedagogical Capacity Building for Bilingual Education January and Teachers on EGR and Math March IR 1.3: School management and governance in support of EGR strengthened 1.3.1 Gender-sensitive Capacity Building for School Directors on School January and Management and Coaching March

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1.3.2 Support to MINEDH on Improving School Management Materials and March Training Curriculum IR 1.4: Coaching and supervision of EGR instruction improved 1.4.1 Supervision and Monitoring of In-school Coaching for Teachers February, March 1.4.2 Local Education Monitoring Approach (LEMA) February, March IR 2: National EGR Policy Framework and delivery Systems Improved IR 2.1 National mechanisms for coordinating EGR interventions strengthened 2.1.1 Support to MINEDH on Increasing Awareness and Support for Bilingual January-March Education IR 2.3 Research-based Policies in Support of EGR Instruction Implemented 2.3.1 Action research on gender and education to support improved policy- February, March making IR 3 Parental and Community Engagement in EGR Increased IR 3.1: Awareness of the importance of using Mozambican languages in EGR increased 3.1.1 Implementation of Community Engagement Campaigns in Support of January-March Bilingual EGR IR 3.2: Family members’ use of evidence-based materials and techniques that reinforce children’s pre-reading and reading skills increased 3.2.1 Implementation of Package 2: Let’s Talk January-March 3.2.2 Implementation of Package 3: Reading Clubs January-March IR 3.3: CSOs ability to mobilize communities in support of improved EGR increased 3.3.1 Monthly supervision visits to NGO partner offices and field activities January-March 3.3.2 Quarterly review meetings with NGO partners January

4. APPENDICES

• Success Stories • Performance Targets and Indicators • CRG Annexes • TRAINET – under separate cover • DEV Results – under separate cover

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