Welcome to our weekly blog for Teacher Tapp Ghana!

Every Monday we summarize our most surprising and interesting survey findings from the week before. This weekly blog provides an easy way for you to learn about the experiences and opinions of teachers across Ghana.

Please encourage your colleagues to use the Teacher Tapp app to keep engaged with education even when they’re not teaching. Your responses are also a vital data source that will guide decision-making around best policies and approaches for enhancing the welfare of educators/teachers and ensuring robust educational sector management.

Many more teachers will like to be heard and this can be done through Teacher Tapp. Do share this blog with your colleagues and encourage them to use the download links at the bottom of the page. In the meantime, here are this week’s intriguing findings…

1. Exam stress

We wondered how schools and students are coping with having to sit examinations in uniquely difficult circumstances.

Nearly 60% of schools reported finding it more difficult to implement examinations this year than this time last year.

Nevertheless, over 60% of our respondents told us that their students are coping well with current exam pressure, despite the circumstances. That’s some positive news!

The next challenge for many schools and students is to plan for results for students and how these will fit into the new career and education landscape for young people in Ghana.

2 . Independent Learning

School closures have forced students to engage in more independent learning this year than perhaps ever before. But perhaps independent learning is the best way for students to learn?

We asked and just over a third of our respondents told us that they believe students learn best when left to work independently. However, just under a third disagreed showing that the teaching community is divided on the issue.

Perhaps the issue is one of competence? Students require a suite of skills in order to learn independently – well-developed metacognition, good self discipline among others. If students do not have these skills, then independent learning is not necessarily the optimal educational approach for them.

However, teachers remained confident that their students can learn independently. Nearly 70% of teachers believe their students can learn independently if they need to.

With the current educational climate, students may have to engage in even more independent learning. Teachers need to reckon with how they can make this as effective as possible for their students.