Can’t Wait to Learn Closing the education gap through technology Education in their hands

Can’t Wait to Learn is a proven digital game-based learning model designed with and for children affected by conflict.

THE SITUATION THE CHALLENGE

UGANDA Overcrowding Uganda is the largest refugee A needs assessment of children in + hosting country in : it is refugee-hosting areas in Uganda teacher home to 1,444,856 refugees, conducted by War Child and the shortages including over 1 million from Norwegian Refugee Council: = South . 60% of the refugee low quality population are children. •• Very low levels of literacy education across age groups, including visual literacy (interpretation of pictures, symbols, images).

•• High expectations on the school environment and the SCHOOL teacher to be the sole source 60% of the refugee population are and location of knowledge and children, over 350,000 of whom learning. It is a curriculum-based, context-specific solution, certification. In this way, Can’t Wait to Learn aims to are out of school. which brings together the know-how of locally based reinforce the education pipeline across informal and •• Language, distance, education stakeholders, such as ministries of formal education, to decrease drop-out rates and EDUCATION RESPONSE overcrowded classrooms, Education, international and community-based encourage transition into formal primary and PLAN poor or lack of facilities and organisations alongside international expertise in secondary education. In Uganda, Can’t Wait to Learn The Education Response Plan for materials, hunger, age software development, game development and is helping children gain basic maths and reading skills Uganda highlights classroom differences (for overage design. in accelerated education centres and primary schools. shortage - critical in all districts, children), and transition to the but particularly in refugee Ugandan curriculum form the The result is a self-guided serious gaming format settlements. The resulting GENDER GAP main barriers to education accessed on tablets that takes children through overcrowding, coupled with There is a significant gender gap in according to the participants. Ministry of Education approved curriculum, providing teacher shortages, impact on the enrolment, with fewer girls in opportunity for children to work toward primary level Above — Child playing Uganda Maths 1-3 game quality of education. school compared to boys.

Page 2 | CWTL Uganda CWTL Uganda | Page 3 The game world is their world…

THEY CAN’T WAIT TO LEARN… Above — Children learning math in Supiri Can’t Wait to Learn’s unique Above — Part of the Uganda Maths 1-3 gameworld, with in the top left a rural city NOW THEY DON’T HAVE TO co-creation process with Can’t Wait to Learn offers: targeted children culminates in …AND THE WORLD the development of locally THEY WANT TO SEE contextualised game content, We know that children are curious about the world outside their immediate context, and also that many including the design, characters, of them have limited opportunity to learn about it. In Maths and reading A digital user interface Diagnostics for every A delivery mechanism storyline and curriculum. Can’t Uganda, for example, the recognisable rural game curriculum educative that is adapted to learner which can be that works across world that children helped design, was also game and full context to support aggregated according to resource-constrained Wait to Learn offers a local supplemented with an urban environment, which instructional model motivation and active, Ministry and sector environments interface that reflects children’s children can explore in the Uganda Maths 1-3 game. based on Ministry of self-paced learning requirements This was included because children expressed Education & Sports reality, which lowers the curiosity about urban environments during the needs curricula and threshold for children to engage, assessment and co-creation activities, but had never requirements visited urban settings. particularly if new to technology.

Page 4 | CWTL Uganda CWTL Uganda | Page 5 Above — Three of the reading game REACHING ALL CHILDREN characters (l) Anna taking care of the animals. (m) Gameguide Simon and (r) Tibo getting water. The game world was designed to help address Left — Childrens co-creation workshop entrenched issues of stigma and discrimination by including characters with disabilities or albinism, for “The mathematics has improved learner’s example daughter Anna in the game. Children with addition, subtraction, counting and application CHALLENGING NORMS disabilities also participated in the consultation in real situation. workshops in Uganda, and the contextualised Then in the Phonics, especially English aspects, During the needs assessment activities in Uganda, Reading games have been designed to reflect these it has improved reading. Some learners wish to which included girls and boys equally, especially boys groups of children as far as possible. have CWTL lessons throughout, which is not showed entrenched gender stereotypes, seeing the possible anyway!!! Honestly there is a lot these primary role of girls as working within the household, learners have gained through this tablet’s or ‘helping their mothers’. In contrast, girls showed lessons. I see change in them. I see in the interest in ‘typically male’ activities such as football. learners; their attendance has improved, As a result, the game settings have been designed to abandonment has reduced, their language i.e take boys and girls out of their traditional gender spoken and written (spellings and sound) has roles, for example, showing girls playing football and improved.”— Filbert, a CWTL Teacher in female characters as doctors or boda boda Mvepi Refugee settlement (motorcycle taxi) drivers.

Page 6 | CWTL Uganda CWTL Uganda | Page 7 counter clockwise — Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim Replicating success: veniam, quis nostrud a scalable model

Can’t Wait to Learn start up in Uganda builds on positive research results in Sudan, which show that Can’t Wait to Learn has the potential to improve children’s chances of reaching required reading competency levels at a rate 2.7 times faster than the Government Alternative Learning Program (ALP).

Thanks to significant testing and refinement of Can’t PARTNERSHIPS FOR SCALE Wait to Learn processes in Sudan, and AND SUSTAINABILITY A 2018 quasi-experimental study to evaluate , in Uganda the total time from country entry to the impact of the Can’t Wait to Learn ‘tablets in the hands of children’ has been just nine Partnerships are the cornerstone of the initiative’s programme in Sudan compared to traditional months (August 2017 - May 2018). This timeframe success, growth to date and scale-up ambitions. In out-of-school education on children’s learning includes game build, teacher and IT training Uganda, the Ministry of Education and Sports is outcomes and psychosocial wellbeing found workshops, game installation, roll-out preparation actively engaged in needs assessment, curriculum that for both Math and Literacy, children in (community sensitization, storage facility installation, revision for the game format, and teacher training Can’t Wait to Learn and control groups solar panel installation), and roll out. processes. Implementing partners in Uganda - who to improved between baseline and endline, Game log data in Uganda to date shows that children date include the Norwegian Refugee Council, Finn however — CWTL children improved are progressing well, and an evaluation is currently Church Aid and Save the Children - are chosen for their significantly more. underway to measure learing outcomes. Initial reach, technical skills, willingness to engage with observations show that teachers and facilitators research and ability to support scale-up. – who play the games as part of training in order to grasp key concepts – are benefiting greatly, indicating Above — Teacher and faciltator training that the approach can have a very positive impact on Arua, group activity teacher’s own understanding, and subsequently on Left — Teacher Charles explaining the quality of instruction. game to the children in Surpiri

Page 8 | CWTL Uganda CWTL Uganda | Page 9 With the addition of Uganda as a programme country 3 years. It is being implemented as part of the Ministry in 2017, Can’t Wait to Learn added a new educational of Education & Sports endorsed Accelerated Education Achievements and and implementing context: a refugee population from Program for South Sudanese refugee and vulnerable and hosted in a low resource setting, who have had Ugandan host community children. limited or no access to education before being scale up ambitions displaced. In Uganda, Can’t Wait to Learn is designed to support children ages 10-14 ‘catch up’ to their age Below — Part of the Uganda Reading The programme timeline below shows achievements grade level by following a condensed curriculum or Game world to date and scale up ambitions in Uganda achieve their primary school certificate in September Roll out in 6 more June/July Outcomes centres in Imvepi (2 evaluation per partner): October Co-creation (including EGRA and reaching 2,000 End 2020 Reading 1-3 EGMA): reporting children Ambition: 20,000 Feb in October Reading game children, with existing and new partners. Aug roll out (10 centres) Consultation – Can’t Wait to Learn Integration of the model workshop with reaching 4,500 within the MoES teacher Congolese refugee children training program children May Q3 2017 (Rwamwanza Reaching Relationship Q1 2018 settlement + ) established Co-creation 1,200 with MoE for Math 1-3 children! Oct–Dec Game build

2017 2018 2019 2020 2023

May Partner technical May staff induction/teacher Jan Curriculum Refresher End 2023 Q1 2018 training. Partner IT & ME approval Needs training/ March Ambition: Can’t staff training end May. anticipated Wait to Learn has assessment reading game Awarded the 2018 Roll out in 4 centres in reached 65,000 children (West Nile, Imvepi introduction UNESCO King Hamad Imvepi with NRC: End 2019 and the MoES takes on with NRC) Bin Isa Al-Khalifa Prize for June reaching 400 Ambition: data, hardware, the Use of Information and Roll out children 10,000 children funding etc. for Communication Reading and Math in 2 refugee with existing scale up Technologies (ICT) in partners October Education settlements (2 September Can’t Wait to Learn centres in each) Partner technical selected by the public for – Chaka, staff induction/ the Dutch Coalition for Kyangwali teacher training. Humanitarian Innovation’s April Partner IT & ME staff ‘Best Humanitarian Curriculum training – Save the Innovation’ review (math Children and Fin Award game) by Church Aid Page 10 | CWTL Uganda MoE CWTL Uganda | Page 11 PARTNERSHIPS

Can’t Wait to Learn is managed globally by War Child Holland. In Uganda, War Child works in partnership with the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC), Finn Church Aid and Save the Children as implementing partners. The Ministry of Education and Sports – at national and District levels - has been involved at all programme stages, particularly with regards to Left — Lily the boda boda supporting integration of Can’t Wait to Learn into (taxi) driver from the Maths 1-3 game accelerated education programming (AEP).

Can’t Wait to Learn receives funding from key supporters and implements with partners:

CONTACT

For more information, please contact us:

Kate Radford Laura Miller Programme Director Deputy Programme Director [email protected] [email protected]

July 2019 www.warchildholland.org/cantwaittolearn