Conceptual issues

LEESP introduced new concepts such as action competence and whole-school development. The concept of action competence was reported by most respondents to have been highly welcome by educationists in Lesotho. One respondent said:

I think action competence was… people had a feeling that yes we having been having education all these years but the learners do not seem to be doing anything about what they have learnt at school. So action competence was greatly received as one way of putting life into subject. I think learners having gone through a programme they would be able to take action. (NCDC staff 3)

In describing her impression of the introduction of environmental education, another respondent explained the potential value of action competence in geography.

I was very happy because I had realised that geography has some weaknesses. For instance, we learned about geography as students as teachers, we know about soil erosion, soil conservation, we learned about the importance of clean environment, but there is no difference between me and a person who has not learnt geography. So the project came up with the concept of action competence which can be used to improve the teaching of geography. (NCDC

While most respondents said that action competence was well received, another respondent who is a senior professional staff at NCDC expressed a different view:

The contestation was that they advocated school-based professional development and also they advocated action competence, which is based on Eastern Europe philosophy of Bildung, which is a socio-political philosophy about democracy. (NCDC staff 1)

One other respondent explained that although the concept of action competence seemed to be a good idea in the Lesotho context, in terms of teaching and addressing environmental issues, there was at the same time an awareness of the limitations associated with examinations and a disciplinary approach. The respondent therefore felt that an opportunity should have been created for project staff and local experts to co-construct the new concepts over a period of time.

It is worth noting, however, that while the concept of action competence appeared to be new in the education system of Lesotho, one respondent felt it had been there before but in a different version. Responding to the question on whether the Lesotho conception of learner-centred pedagogy had always been in line with the notion of action competence, the other respondent said:

I would say we actually didn‟t understand it. That is why I say we had picked it. But other subjects had, methodologies in science were already like that through the help of the projects [citing a few examples of other previous project], without calling it action competence. (NCDC staff 2)

This view reflects what Bertram (2008), after Spillane et al. (2002), describes as the natural tendency to view new curriculum ideas, especially in developing countries, as minor variations on what is already known and practised. Chisholm and Leyendecker (2008) also observe that in many African countries grand philosophies are generally acceptable because they appear not entirely new and are ambiguous. If this is the case, then little can be achieved in terms of translating new policy into practice.

Another controversial issue was the whole school development approach, which was one of the key concepts introduced by the project. Two respondents said that they protested in vain that the whole school development approach would not work in Lesotho, given the limited resources and typical style of leadership. One respondent added that the approach had been introduced in 1973 as part of what was then known

in Lesotho as the experimental school project, but had never worked out. This information is corroborated by the findings of a study commissioned by LEESP (during its extension period) to assess curriculum dissemination models previously tested in Lesotho. In that study Jobo, Mokuku and Nketekete (2005) report that whole school development was the first model introduced in Lesotho to support a learner- centred approach. However, according to their findings, this model was officially abandoned because practical conditions in schools were not conducive to its implementation.

There was a feeling that, although the local school contexts in Lesotho were known to be unsupportive of the whole school development idea, the Danish had insisted that it was part of the strings attached to the funding of the LEESP project.

….they [Danish project staff] drove it in as part of donor agency

conditionalities. They drove it in as… you know even the teacher educator consultants were bringing that, like I pointed Bildung philosophy is the Danish philosophy, they bring it here. It appeared as if it was a driving force that in order for EE to succeed we should be looking at educational issues from this perspective. (NCDC staff 1)

One might ask why it was in the interests of the Danish to push this idea into the educational system of Lesotho? Although it would be risky to make conclusive statements at this stage, given the data I have, it seems to have been part of an attempt to impose Danish hegemony in the implementation of LEESP. Whether this was done consciously or unconsciously could not be established by this research.