Sign language makes remote learning accessible in Morocco

April 14, 2021

By Evelyn Rupert

2 min read

When the COVID-19 pandemic closed Lina’s school in Rabat, Morocco, she feared she wouldn’t be able to keep up with her education at home well enough to graduate into middle school.

Lina, 13, is deaf. And while school closures pose challenges for all students, those with disabilities face extraordinary hurdles in accessing remote learning.

“I was so concerned. The schools closed because of the coronavirus, and we stayed home. How was I going to study?” Lina recalls. “I felt so sad … no one could teach me. My mom doesn’t know sign language.”

When the pandemic began, the Moroccan Ministry of Education created extensive online learning resources for primary school students. Without sign language interpretation, however, these lessons weren’t reaching students like Lina.

The U.S. Agency for International Development’s Reading for Success-National Program for Reading partnered with the ministry to close this gap. The program supports professional interpreters and teachers to record lessons for grades 1-6 in Moroccan Sign Language, covering all primary school core subjects. The ministry uploads the lessons to its online learning portal and broadcasts them on national television channels.

“I saw new sign language lessons on TV. Arabic, French, Islamic education, math, everything. I was so happy! I took my notebook and started copying the lessons and learning from the TV,” Lina says. “I kept writing and learning step by step.”

Since recording began in May 2020, the interpreters have produced about half of the 556 total lessons. The work continues, and the ministry expects to complete the interpretation of every lesson for grades 1-6 by July 2021.

With remote education opportunities within reach throughout much of 2020, Lina was able to complete her coursework and has started her first year of middle school.

International Women’s Day 2021

March 8, 2021

8 min read

‘I see women coming out to demand equal rights and to speak about what happened to them, even after being attacked.’ Davita Andow, USAID/OTI Nigeria Early Recovery Initiative

International Women’s Day 2021: Voices from the Field

Rebecca Sewall, Gender Specialist for Creative Associates International:

While the global development community shows a more nuanced understanding of the dynamic relationship between women’s autonomy and their ability to contribute to development efforts, many practitioners continue to see the “value” of promoting women’s advancement only in terms of optimizing their contribution to larger development goals.

This position presumes that what is good for the economy or for “development” is also good for women – a presumption that is not always true. In line with this International Women’s Day theme, I want to #ChooseToChallenge this position, it is time we move away from asking what women can do for development and instead ask ourselves what development can do for women.

There are signals that this perception is starting to change, as the voices of women in Creative’s projects below attest. There are glimmers of hope that paying attention to women and gender in development is not just viewed as a means to an end, but an end in itself. Nearly 50 years after the passage of the Percy Amendment – which required that attention be given to integrating women into national economies to improve their status and to assist the overall development effort – it is time we focus on the other goal it was intended to achieve: Ensuring women are equal beneficiaries of development.

Florinda Puac, Community Facilitator Supervisor

USAID’s Peacebuilding Project, Guatemala

What do you want to see change for women in your context in the coming years?

The reality of women’s participation in community processes is very limited because they are generally invited to meetings or training activities on health, food security, food demonstrations, etc… topics closely linked to the gender roles that society has set for women. While of course these trainings have contributed to improving their health and nutrition, this still places them in a passive or information-gathering role. We saw in some community assessment processes that when people were consulted about women’s participation, it revealed that most people looked to assign women tasks unrelated to community development. These are things that have historically limited the substantive participation of women compared to the active role that men have played.

But the Peacebuilding Project (Tejiendo Paz in Spanish) is designed to change this paradigm because it identifies women as important actors in the analysis, approach and transformation of community conflicts together with other actors traditionally involved in decision-making. We work to give women a seat at the table in all our activities.

Habiba Suleiman, Business Development Manager at WACOT Rice Ltd.

Habiba inspects a rice paddy with a local farmer. Photo by: Rasheed Photography

Partner with the West Africa Trade and Investment Hub, Nigeria

What is your project’s biggest success or most inspirational moment related to gender inclusion?

We conducted preliminary meetings with farmers across the communities to inform them about the project and to seek their support in on-boarding new farmers. A young lady in her early 20s showed up [to our office] and we told her to wait for the interview in the next room, assuming she was there to be interviewed for a field officer role. After the [interview], she walks up to me to say that she came for the farmer meeting, as she was a rice farmer, too. I sat down with her and learned that on her own, she had raised funds and cultivated rice on half a hectare during the last season, and that she had employed laborers to work for her, yielding 25 bags in harvest. Her wit, bravery and commitment were beyond impressive, considering the fact that she was a graduate and could go seek a white collar job instead. I visited her farm and ensured she was on-boarded into the program. She came along with more women rice farmers too! This experience further reinforced for me the fact that women can do it all.

Lydia Onuoha, Deputy Chief of Party

USAID’s Northern Education Initiative Plus, Nigeria

Has there been a moment or experience that hit home for you the reason why more work needs to be done in the ongoing fight for gender equality? 

I came from a very large family with older uncles and cousins. Whenever there are events, everyone contributes some amount of money, usually prorated: the oldest pay more, regardless of gender. But when there are properties to be shared, women are left out and do not get a share of the family inheritance. I have never been given any share of my father’s property, but my younger brothers get very large shares. Land can never be distributed to women and this tradition has lasted for years. I keep wondering when this disparity and neglect will end. The struggle and campaign on gender equality have to be intensified.

I hope that in the not-too-distant future there will be a freedom of participation for women in community affairs, especially more women in decision-making spaces. Although today women’s participation in popular election positions has seen an increase, the participation of indigenous women is still very low. So I think it is as important as ever for us to raise awareness of men for this paradigm shift or stereotypes about the importance of the women in leadership positions.

Rehab David, NGO Capacity Building Officer/Gender Specialist

Northern Education Initiative Plus, Nigeria

What do you, both personally and professionally, hope to see change for women in your context looking ahead?  

I want to see a firm commitment to gender equality and female empowerment in education. I want to see more commitment and steps taken to overcome gender discrimination and to realize equal opportunities for women and men. I want to see more programs that increase women’s awareness of their rights and ability to advocate for themselves.

I want to see adolescent girls and youth get access to practical life skills training, trainings that will make them more aware of the options and services that are available to them and raise their expectations for their own lives. I want to see them empowered to speak up for themselves and make informed decisions. I want to see all barriers to education addressed and all girls mainstreamed into formal schools after graduating from non-formal learning centers.

Yajaira Hernandez, Gender Specialist

Yajaira gives a women’s health presentation in rural Honduras. Photo by: Victor Mercado

The Dry Corridor Alliance Project, Honduras

What is the greatest challenge you see for achieving women’s equality in your context?

An important aspect of my work is that women have for many years moved in and out of the working world even with children, but men still do not contribute to household tasks so that women can have more time to mobilize, participate in community affairs, become leaders and entrepreneurs. I work to slowly sensitize families to share responsibilities for domestic affairs.

The biggest challenge I see for women is access to resources. Globally, women only own 1 percent of property, rural women have access to land, the lack of bank loans for lack of guarantee continues to limit their participation in productive or income-generating work, conditioning them to domestic space, another major challenge is violence against women that is still a taboo or dare not denounce for fear or shame.

Hafsa Drissi Semlali, Program Coordinator

USAID’s Reading for Success – National Program for Reading, Morocco

What do you want to see change for women in your context in the coming years?

I was hired as an administrative assistant for another project with Creative, and that was the opportunity that eventually led to the leadership position I have now as a project manager. Having this chance to develop as a professional has made me more passionate to see the same for other women. So, what I really hope to see is more women in decision making positions. At the professional level, I see this gender inequality play out all the time. For example, there are more women working in our field, but in leadership roles there are still more men holding positions of power.

We work closely with teachers and most teachers are women. But when we hold workshops, it’s mostly men who show up and that’s because there are always more pressures on women to remain at home with their kids or families instead of traveling to these professional development trainings. As a mother myself, I understand those constraints. But I hope that in the future we can find ways to even this out and make accommodations so more women can take these important career steps.

Yelfign Ayenew Tesfahun, Cross Cutting Issues Coordinator

USAID READ II, Ethiopia

What is your project’s biggest success or most inspirational moment related to gender inclusion?

Based on a study we conducted in the Amhara region, we decided to ensure 30 percent of women leadership in the education sector. This is one of the remarkable results we achieved in government policy changes through evidence-based consultations.

The gender radio drama we produced and broadcasted to incite discussion is changing attitudes has shown also a very encouraging results. We have confirmed through an assessment study that the drama has helped girls and boys, parent and community to discuss gender related issues and the drama raised awareness on things considered taboo, such as girls’ menstruation, the responsibility of both boys and girls in sharing household chores, boys’ participation in the gender clubs, etc…

Another inspirational activity we have done is that while the project provided training to teachers, mothers who breastfeed their children were having trouble participating the trainings. The project provides childcare and place where the children can stay while the mothers participate in trainings, which has made a huge difference.

Patricia Vahanlé, Educational Leadership Officer

Vamos Ler! Mozambique

Why is it necessary to have women working in development?

It is important to have women working on development because they are intellectually equal to men and can contribute equally to the development of a country or society. I hope that in the future there will be a gender balance in hiring staff in both private and state organizations and that women can take advantage of opportunities on an equal footing with men. Many women miss opportunities because they have not been properly prepared or trained. That is why it is necessary to have a gender balance in training centers and universities.

It is necessary to make women aware from an early age that they can contribute to the development of the place where they live and the country in general.

On a personal level, my greatest success was having managed to reconcile family, work and training. The fact of being a mother, wife and worker did not prevent me from continuing my higher education. In this, I was the first of my family to complete a course in higher education. Today, I am an example for my older and younger brothers.

A Moroccan teacher uses video, love and imagination to connect with deaf students

March 5, 2021

By Daniel Lynx Bernard

5 min read

USAID/Morocco and Creative add Moroccan sign language to remote learning during the pandemic.

Mina Daoudi began to receive desperate messages from her students when Morocco closed schools in response to COVID-19. The students are deaf and hard of hearing, and typically their parents don’t know Moroccan sign language (MSL), which meant they were cut off from the only place where they can communicate with other children with similar disabilities and teachers trained in MSL.

“They felt excluded at home, where they don’t have anyone to talk to,” says Ms. Daoudi.

Sympathizing, Ms. Daoudi, like other teachers in Morocco, began to use video to teach children with hearing loss. She began informally holding video calls with groups of her former students during the lockdown so they would have a chance for MSL conversation.

Soon Ms. Daoudi would find herself providing the same sort of relief to students with hearing loss throughout Morocco, who confronted cultural and learning limitations before the pandemic. Although the government had rushed to record video versions of standard lessons for primary-school students during lockdown, the videos lacked MSL interpretation. Supported by USAID’s Reading for Success-National Program for Reading implemented by Creative Associates International, the Moroccan government filled that gap.

Ms. Daoudi and another interpreter, Fouziya Boulaftali, are adapting standard lessons to meet the needs of first through sixth graders with hearing loss. These lessons, which are recorded in a Ministry of Education studio, are then shared on a national television channel, website and app. The U.S.-Moroccan cooperation is on track to produce almost 600 adapted video lessons in math, science, Arabic, French, and Islamic studies by July.

Ms. Daoudi, who has 24 years of experience as a classroom teacher, has earned a reputation for inspiring devotion in her students, even the difficult ones.

She recalls a boy her co-workers warned her about, Yassin, a deaf 8-year-old who was alternately disobedient and withdrawn. She looked for an inroad. “When a student comes to me, I don’t know what background s/he comes with. I don’t know if s/he is angry or if s/he has some kind of problem at home,” she says. “In order for a student to be educated, the student needs to feel comfortable.”

Ms. Daoudi noticed Yassin had an affinity for maps, and she encouraged it. He began drawing maps at home and bringing them in to show her.

“One day, he came in and hugged me and told me, ‘I love you.’ After that, when he would come into the classroom, he wanted to be the first one to write what he learned and share it with the students,” she says.

A jarring transition, a beautiful result

Despite her extensive experience, the transition to remote teaching was jarring. When the camera pointed at Ms. Daoudi, she felt fear. For the first few days, she would record only a brief segment and anxiously play it back to see whether it was clear.

“I wasn’t sure if what I was teaching would reach those students, if they would grasp it,” she says.

After the first lessons were broadcast, Ms. Daoudi began to receive messages of thanks. One former student, 13-year-old Lina, had been worried she would have to repeat sixth grade when school closed. “I have been waiting, but no one can teach me,” Lina signed to Ms. Daoudi. “One day I saw new sign language lessons on TV. I took my notebook, started copying, writing and learning on TV. I followed every lesson.” Lina was able to advance to seventh grade.

The next time Ms. Daoudi stood in front of the camera, instead of an empty studio behind the cameraman, she imagined seeing the faces of her former students filling the room.

“When I prepare the lesson, I imagine the students who were in my class. And when I choose the sentences, I try to find varied sentences that certain students would like. For example, Yassin loves football, so I would include a sentence that includes football.”

Imagining that the remote students are present makes a difference. “People who saw the videos told me they noticed I’m smiling while I’m giving the lesson. That’s because I don’t see only chairs and walls in front of me while I’m speaking,” Ms. Daoudi says. “When I speak, I see in front of me a real classroom.”

As classes resumed in person in parts of the country, Ms. Daoudi received messages of praise from teachers in Morocco’s different regions who were using the videos in class.

“I found the sign language that you did amazing and beautiful,” said Nora Tamrarad, a teacher in Oujda, Morocco, in a voice message.

So Ms. Daoudi’s vision evolved again. Instead of picturing her own former students before her as she recorded, she imagined every student in Morocco with hearing loss, an estimated 4,000 children.

“What’s very special about this work is it’s targeted at a minority of students who cannot understand the typical lessons but need it to be translated to MSL,” she says. “Not everybody can do it. What makes it special is I need to make these students love me before I educate them. How can I teach someone who doesn’t love me? I can’t convey the information like a machine. I need to build that relationship between me and the learner.”

Across the distance via video, Ms. Daoudi is still giving students the love and positivity she used to give in person. If she cannot receive hugs in return, she draws sustenance from the notes she receives on Facebook and voice recordings on WhatsApp.

“When I get a message saying, ‘Lina loves Mina,’ ‘Mohammed likes the video of Mina,’ that’s my feedback.”

This article was written with support from Laila Khana.

Adapting to COVID-19 and embracing new learning materials in Morocco

January 21, 2021

By Mounya El Asri and Kathleen Wilson

4 min read

As we mark International Day of Education, we celebrate the resilience of teachers, students and education partners who have adapted to the challenges posed by COVID-19. In Morocco, schools were shuttered from March to September 2020, disrupting children’s classroom education. Students and teachers are excited to be back in the classroom and are adapting to a new normal — one with masks, social distancing, hand sanitizer dispensers and new learning materials.

While schools were closed, the USAID Reading for Success – National Program for Reading (RFS-NPR) worked with a group of Moroccan education and Arabic language experts to curate a collection of 100 colorful, age-appropriate and interactive stories. The stories are specifically tailored to students’ reading levels and to the Moroccan context.

When children read the stories, they see themselves reflected in the characters and feel a sense of belonging after a period marked by distance and isolation.

Mohammed Abdellaoui, a Director in one of the pilot schools in Temara, near Rabat, notes, “The stories are very attractively designed, and their content is well adapted to students’ levels, diversity and Moroccan culture.”

RFS-NPR has distributed nearly 24,000 printed copies of the 100 story titles to its 90 pilot schools. Students are eager to pull the books off the shelves and engage in reading new stories outside of their assigned textbooks.

A Moroccan girl reads a story on a laptop. — Alae, 8, clicks through a story on an online reading platform. Photos by Mounya El Asri.

In a first for Moroccan schools, the Ministry of Education set aside time for students to enjoy these new materials and read independently. In November 2020, the Director of Curriculum mandated that the pilot schools dedicate 30 minutes per week for reading enrichment in the classroom. RFS-NPR has conducted a series of trainings for school directors and teachers to equip and inspire them with strategies for how to use the new storybooks.

With the wide variety of exciting stories and dedicated reading time in the classroom, RFS-NPR expects Moroccan children will build their vocabularies, improve reading outcomes, and develop a stronger love of reading and learning.

COVID-19 made clear the value of education — and the importance of remote learning opportunities. To reach students at home, RFS-NPR partnered with education technology company 3asafeer to make these same stories available online.

Whether students are out of school for any reason or if they just want to read for practice or fun, they can access high-quality materials at home through a computer or mobile phone. For many children, it may be the only opportunity to read at home.

“The 3safeer platform is going to solve the enormous issue of the lack of reading materials at home,” says Abdellaoui. “We will be reaching out to parents on the importance of free reading in supporting school learning and improving students’ learning performance.”

Through 3asafeer, the stories come to life with audio recordings, cartoon video lessons, worksheets, comprehension quizzes, and educational games. To date, the platform has granted unique login codes to more than 23,000 students and 835 teachers from the pilot schools.

Just as they have taken to the print books in their classrooms, students are excitedly exploring all that 3asafeer has to offer while at home. Within the span of a week, fourth-grader Nizar Al-Tijani read 90 of the 100 stories on the platform and completed all the related exercises.

A Moroccan boy reads a story on a smart phone. — Nizar reads a story on the mobile version of the 3safeer platform.

Because Nizar does not have many books at home, the online stories have opened a door for his continued and self-guided learning. His parents say the platform is also helping their shy son to open up.

“Having access to this digital library is the best thing that happened to my son,” says Nizar’s father, Mohammed Tijani. “When we were granted access to the 3asafeer library, he would wait for me to come back from work every day to pick up my cell phone and spend hours reading and practicing. His mom and I noticed that he is more joyful and talkative than ever.”

In addition to making time for independent reading during the school day, teachers are incorporating the online and print stories into their teaching. Nadia Rochdi, Nizar’s teacher at Oum El Mouminine school in Inezgane, uses conversations about the stories to encourage Nizar’s oral communication. She is excited to see Nizar not only embrace a love of reading but also begin to grow in his confidence and self-expression.

“I was amazed by Nizar’s achievement, and I am now trying to help him trust himself more and have the courage to speak up,” she says. “Nizar has a strong determination to satisfy his thirst and love for reading. When I discovered his performance, I promised myself I would work on his oral communication issues. I let him tell his friends the stories he has read and explain how the platform is fun and easy to use. I can see how he is improving.”

Kathleen Wilson is the Project Manager for the Reading for Success-National Program for Reading. Mounya El Asri is the program’s Communications Specialist.

Advancing toward Morocco’s digital goals amid COVID-19

January 11, 2021

By Linda Wafi

4 min read

For people around the world, 2020 will be remembered for the COVID-19 outbreak and how it transformed the way we live, learn, work and interact with one other. As the pandemic spread, we found ourselves propelled into the “future of work,” having to suddenly adjust and adopt new ways of doing our jobs. For those of us in education development, this meant not just shifting how we work personally but also how our programs deliver services and collaborate with partners.

The crisis brought into sharp focus USAID’s first Digital Strategy, formally published in April 2020, and its goal of strengthening digital ecosystems and using technology to achieve development outcomes, including in education. Within the USAID-funded Reading for Success-National Program for Reading in Morocco, we had a challenge – and opportunity – to put this strategy into practice and respond to the pandemic with digital innovation.

NPR pivoted its work to ensure our program continued to reach teachers and students in Morocco, even though in-person training workshops and meetings were no longer possible.

First, we had to develop ways to convert our teams to a digital mindset and adopt new digital tools that enabled us to continue to work together remotely and seamlessly. Then, we redesigned some of our interventions to include digital tools for partners, teachers and students to utilize to improve learning outcomes.

More importantly, we were very aware that some marginalized groups, including people living in remote or rural areas, people with disabilities and people with low digital literacy, might be excluded from the digital ecosystem. NPR worked to rethink interventions to ensure that they are inclusive and accessible to the widest number of beneficiaries.

By the end of the year, NPR had not only pivoted its programs to adjust to the reality of the pandemic but also made great strides in increasing access to quality educational tools and blazed new trails in the Arabic curriculum delivery methods in Morocco.

Morocco’s first Digital Supplementary Reading Materials (SRM) platform

A Moroccan girl takes notes during an online course. — A Moroccan student takes notes while watching the Ministry of Education’s online resources.

NPR forged a partnership between the Moroccan Ministry of Education and the Dubai-based Assafeer Digital Library to develop Morocco’s first digital reading platform dedicated exclusively to elementary school learners. This platform contains 100 illustrated titles that are leveled by grade, edited to include Moroccan terms and cultural references and include story lines and illustrations that promote Gender-Equity and Social Inclusion (GESI) principles. This platform provides elementary school-level children with free access to these reading materials, so they can continue to read and learn outside of the classroom as well as develop their digital literacy skills.

Ensuring equal access of deaf students to Morocco’s educational digital tools

When schools closed in late March, the Moroccan educational system immediately went online. Morocco was already one of the few countries in Africa to have a dedicated educational TV channel and an online platform where school lessons of all levels were broadcasted daily.

However, students who are deaf or hard of hearing were not able to benefit from these educational resources due to the absence of Moroccan Sign Language interpretation. Within a few months, NPR engaged in discussions with the ministry and recruited a number of MSL teachers who provided interpretation for all elementary school subjects for grades 1 to 6. Over the summer, the rollout of the interpretations began with grade 6 lessons that were posted on the TelmidTice and TaalimTice online platforms and broadcasted nationally on the Moroccan channel Al Amazighia. NPR continues to work with the Ministry on translating, recording and producing the remaining lessons, which are scheduled to be completed by July.

A Moroccan teacher interprets a lesson into Moroccan Sign Language — Behind the scenes as teacher Mina interprets and records a lesson in Moroccan Sign Language for broadcast on TV and online.

Developing a digital teacher training platform

Over the past two years, NPR started to work with international and local partners to develop a Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) in support of pre- and in-service teacher training. Based on that groundwork put in place before the pandemic, the workshops to design the course continued virtually during the past several months.

To ensure that teachers with varying levels of access to digital technology and digital literacy can still benefit from the MOOC, NPR worked on incorporating Universal Design for Learning principles to help package the curriculum in a format that increases engagement and remote learning. This includes presenting information in different ways to encompass learning styles, using visual or audio cues, and integrating questions at every step to further the user’s ability to navigate the platform and their knowledge acquisition.

Upon completion of the MOOC, primary-level teachers across Morocco will be able to access online training and integrate the new Arabic-language curriculum and instructional methods within their classrooms. The MOOC is designed with self-paced courses and will include downloadable modules that enable teachers to access the courses offline.

These interventions are grounded in USAID’s Digital Strategy, which aims to achieve two core objectives: to improve USAID’s development and assistance outcomes through the responsible use of digital technology; and to strengthen openness, inclusiveness and security of the digital ecosystems.

This became even more pressing throughout the past year.

While the pandemic has been challenging on so many levels and its repercussions will continue to be felt, we can at least say that it compelled us to rethink the way we deliver our programs and pushed us to seek solutions that fully embrace digital technology and contributed to Morocco’s digital goals of self-reliance.

Looking ahead, NPR’s programs should continue to deliver quality educational programs via digital tools that help decrease the technology divide. With the increased reliance on digital technology, programs and policies will need to address digital equality by providing equal access to broadband, opportunities for digital skills training, and motivating people to acquire those increasingly vital skills.

Linda Wafi is the Project Director for the Reading for Success-National Program for Reading in Morocco.

Successful Arabic language curriculum reform in Morocco

August 12, 2020

4 min read

In his book “Stratosphere,” noted educator Michael Fullan asserts: “Change really isn’t as hard as we thought if we capture people’s interest and give them enjoyable, worthwhile experiences.” That’s what we sought to do in Morocco, where the USAID Reading for Success-National Program for Reading (NPR) is working with the Ministry of Education to transform the country’s primary school Arabic curriculum.

A Moroccan teacher looks at a book with a young boy and girl. — New Arabic language curriculum was developed to improve reading and other educational outcomes in Morocco. Photo by Ashley Williams.

On Aug. 7, the Ministry officially released of the first complete draft of its primary education program curriculum for grades 1-6, including the Arabic language curriculum. This new curriculum is the result of six years of relentless preparation, development, implementation and revision that had widespread participation of educators, including ministry technical experts in language and pedagogy, academic inspectors, teacher educators and teachers.

After decades of working to expand access to schooling, educators were calling for a transformational reform of curriculum to increase the quality of education.

USAID/Morocco supported three important situation analysis studies on reading instruction that explored classroom context, teacher attitudes and skills, teacher training and supervision systems, and the structure and content of curriculum and teaching learning materials. Engaging teachers, supervisors and decision-makers in data collection and analysis, the studies identified the factors that favored or harmed acquisition of literacy in the early grades.

The conclusion was clear: The literacy curriculum in primary schools was failing both student and teachers. It needed to change to reflect best practices in literacy teaching and learning.
Despite many different perspectives about how to bring about educational change in Morocco, there has been a growing consensus among the policymakers and practitioners on the importance of the Arabic language curriculum — the language of instruction in primary, middle and secondary school — as a driving force for improving educational quality. What remained was a debate about the curriculum reform process: how to make “enjoyable and worthwhile” experience for the different players in the basic education field, so that they would readily support and use it.

In 2016, with USAID support, the Ministry launched a phased and iterative cycle of Arabic Language curriculum reform, simultaneously developing, testing and refining the materials. NPR guided the reforms, crafting a participatory process with influential stakeholders from all parts in the Ministry of Education who held the key to its success on the national stage, in the regions, and in the schools.

A Moroccan man and woman look over papers at a table. — Education inspectors work together on the curriculum development process. Photo by Mounya El Asri.

The process involved three groups of key stakeholders. At the central level, the NPR technical team and a small group of Ministry of Education technical experts assigned by the Director of Curriculum developed the curriculum framework, including the scope and sequence. At the regional level, a core group of 19 regional inspectors and teacher trainers from four target regions served as a liaison between the project and the eight districts where the NPR’s 90 experimental schools are located.

This group has been of special importance to the curriculum development process from inception to scale-up. They trained teachers on the new curriculum and its delivery (i.e., methods and materials) in the experimental schools, coached teachers to reinforce its application, and monitored its adoption and identified challenges for refinement in content, materials and pedagogy (e.g., oral reading fluency measurement and interactive writing). As the Ministry of Education began the rollout of new curriculum nationwide in 2018, they served as co-trainers to the third group of stakeholders: 763 inspectors across all 12 of Morocco’s regional academies.

Building consensus on the curriculum at all levels and keeping these stakeholder groups engaged throughout the process allowed the NPR team to effectively scale up the curriculum and move from experimentation and testing in select regions to validation nationwide.

With the outbreak of the COVID-19 crisis, the curriculum reform process faced unexpected challenges. However, the commitment of the group never faded, even as schools closed and all meetings moved online. After introducing the new curriculum in grades 1-4 during the 2018-2019 and 2019-2020 school years, the group is now preparing to enter phase three with grades 5-6 this fall. At a July 2020 virtual meeting, attended by the curriculum director and many directors and representatives from the regions, the group discussed the updated grade 5-6 curriculum document, the new textbooks and teacher guides to be released at the beginning of the school year, and the scale up training in their respective regions. Their engagement through the process helped ensure that it could continue smoothly through the uncertainties of a global pandemic.

In a letter addressed to inspectors, trainers, professors and teachers introducing the final curriculum document, Mr. Fouad Chafiqi, the Curriculum Department Director, stated:

“(This curriculum) is the conclusion of more than five years of continuous work by researchers, inspectors, teacher trainers, and teachers who worked under the supervision of the Office of Curricula … This work adopted the early grade reading approach and was accompanied, in parallel, by rewriting all textbooks for the elementary school based on quality specifications and rigorous evaluations, training inspectors in four national training workshops, dozens of regional meetings, and training of all teachers. This process will be continued over the next year until we have a comprehensive curriculum document by the school entry in 2021.”

Through this collaborative, enjoyable curriculum reform process, the Ministry of Education, USAID Morocco and NPR technical team were able to achieve a significant change that will improve the learning of millions of children across the country,

Fathi El-Ashry, Ph.D., is Senior Technical Advisor of Literacy Instruction at Creative Associates International and Technical Lead of the National Program for Reading project in Morocco.

COVID-19 puts educators in the shoes of distance education learners

July 29, 2020

By Linda Wafi

2 min read

The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has made the shift to online learning more pressing than ever. It has also forced designers of digital learning tools to look at the process through a new lens.

This became clear during a recent training — delivered online, of course — to educators from the Moroccan Ministry of Education on the topic of distance learning tools.

The training was conducted in mid-July by the USAID-funded Reading for Success – National Program for Reading (NPR), which is developing a Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) in support of pre-and in-service teacher training. Upon completion of the MOOC, primary-level teachers across Morocco will be able to access online training and integrate the new Arabic-language curriculum and instructional methods within their classrooms.

Conducted in partnership with World Learning, the workshop brought together educators from the Moroccan Regional Center of Education and Training and school inspectors who have been working for the past year on developing this MOOC for teachers. It was the third in a series of similar workshops and focused on readability and the need to present content in a way that helps the MOOC developers to better communicate their ideas and students to better engage with the content.

Previous MOOC workshops were held in person, with participants working together and with the trainers to think through the design, structure, and content of the MOOC in hands-on, dynamic sessions. With COVID-19, we were forced to move the training sessions online. And, for the first time, participants had to learn about building distance education tools through distance education. The training put them in the shoes of the end user, and they experienced firsthand the many challenges of online learners, such as interruptions from the environment around them or online distractions.

The online training served as a perfect experiential learning opportunity, requiring the participants to think about packaging the curriculum in a format that furthers user engagement. For example, presenting information in different ways to encompass learning styles, using visual or audio cues, and integrating questions at every step can help ensure user engagement, knowledge acquisition, and retention along the way.

While technical difficulties during an online training can be very frustrating to both facilitators and participants, in this case, it served to remind the participants to structure the content in an intuitive way that helps guide the user through the courses.

Even the issues with internet connectivity at times were a useful reminder to take into consideration that the MOOC users might have different levels of familiarity and accessibility to technology.

COVID-19 has quickly transformed the way we communicate, work and learn. And just as the pandemic has demonstrated the importance of online education, it also is a reminder of online learning challenges – and a motivation to develop solutions.

Linda Wafi is a Project Director in Creative’s Education for Development Division.

COVID-19 exposes education systems’ Achilles heel

April 23, 2020

4 min read

Technology has long been the Achilles heel of many education systems, and the COVID-19 pandemic has brought this shortcoming to the forefront. There has been much discussion over the past twenty years about the need for schools to foster a new skill set for the twenty-first century that includes multimodal literacies, problem-solving and redefining the role of teachers. But, innovation is often restrained by budgets, digital divides, legislative gaps, the rapid evolution of technologies in the face of feasible implementation and a lack of professional development for teachers.

The time is nigh for providing educators and policymakers with more examples of what actually works with technology in real-life settings so that they can quickly work to mitigate lost learning potentials during COVID-19 and sustain effective technology use as a central part of the ongoing learning landscape.

Creating enhanced content

The central question is how to lessen disparities here and now in communities strained beyond their means and sometimes still recovering from previous disasters and instabilities.

We need tools that have the power to sustain academic rigor, accountability and collaborative learning as much as teachers and administrators do in person. Alternative education or “edutainment” can successfully transmit information and help students acquire facts, but they simply do not offer the same critical learning experiences, active citizenship and psychosocial benefits that traditional classrooms afford.

Students can gain the most — especially within distance learning — when lessons are inquiry-based, scaffolded and rooted in providing the learners with their own agency. Subject matter works best when it is not compartmentalized — when it has real-life application and adds meaning to how a learner processes and conceptualizes the world around them.

Basic strategies for dealing with COVID-19 should be encouraging students to engage in authorship. In other words, providing reflections in blogs, social media, wikis, video channels and remix art platforms. Teachers should also utilize backchannel chat platforms to connect and respond in live time with students who have questions as they work through assignments in quarantine.

Relying on alternative ways to share lessons

Information and communication technologies (ICTs) need to be designed to foster connection and hands-on activities. We also need lessons that allow for students to engage in both digital authorship and civic action as a route to resiliency. Especially during times of lockdown and social distancing, power lies in maximizing technology with more human touchpoints.

To a large extent, the right combination of SMS texts, Interactive Voice Response (IVR), and WhatsApp messaging can effectively engage many students and families during COVID-19. Additionally, radio programming is still often the most reliable means to reach the most people in many communities. This radio programming can be further transformed through supplementary mobile messaging.

An interesting model for this idea can be seen in Creative’s work on the Makhalidwe Athu program in Zambia. Here, we supported the successful launch of a mobile reading program that crowdsourced community voices to create reading materials for children who often have no access to books at home.

Through SMS, children received more than 50 local tales crowdsourced from the community. More than 4,000 community members were involved in the project. A local radio station would also regularly discuss stories or invite listeners to submit their own stories to read out and discuss. Households saw 81.4% of parents and caregivers reading the stories with their children at least once a week.

Supporting the teachers

It should go without saying that teachers need more training and comfortability with technology to facilitate virtual education. As a starting point, digital pedagogy is a constructivist approach to learning that equips teachers with instructional concepts tailored to making blended or remote classrooms more effective, inclusive and collaborative.

It has always emphasized equipping teachers with strategies on how to identify the best fitting tool for a particular lesson plan, how to be critically mindful about a technology’s impact and possible consequences, and how to reject the use of technology when it is unnecessary or reinforces rote education. It is essential training for any educator using digital technologies in any capacity.

Yet, most teachers remain untrained in this topic and its practical application. This requires more professional development and awareness of models, such as SAMR and TPACK. In many ways, digital pedagogy also requires more discussion with teachers on their changing roles as 21st Century educators — a shift away from knowledge transmission to one of supportive guidance and co-learning — and Universal Design for Learning (UDL), a proactive approach to ensuring accessibility and meeting the diverse needs of an unknown audience.

In the time of COVID-19, how can new training and exposure to these concepts occur? Our work for the Reading for Success — National Reading Program in Morocco has supported the design of a Massive Open Online Classroom (MOOC) that is specifically designed for disseminating national curriculum reforms to in-service and pre-service teachers.

However, MOOCs can vary greatly in quality and suffer from poor student retention. Universal Design for Learning is what helps create an online classroom that is inclusive, accessible and engaging, embedding intuitive navigation, peer-to-peer interaction and multiple modes of expression and engagement. Teachers can also be supported through a range of virtual coaching mobile platforms that provide instant feedback and tailored teaching and learning materials and recommendations based on their strengths and weaknesses.

Overall, the best way that global education networks can reduce vulnerabilities in the classroom is to focus on these platforms that foster expression, collaboration and accessibility. Learning is not sustainable if it does not care for the whole person. These holistic benefits to schooling are often seen as secondary benefits but are no less vital, especially towards fostering resiliency that our youth will carry throughout their lives.

Kate Williams is the Manager of Technology for Education and Economic Growth in the Creative Development Lab.

Inclusive education reaches diverse Moroccan learners

October 18, 2019

5 min read

By Ashley Williams

RABAT, Morocco — Life started with struggle for Ismail. He was born prematurely, refused to eat and sleep and his growth was stunted. He learned more slowly than other children and was ultimately diagnosed with autism.

Ismail, now 12, is a little older and taller than other soon-to-be second graders in Sale, Morocco, but they welcomed him into the fold. His mother, Manbari Kaoutar, saw a dramatic change last year during his third attempt at first grade when the U.S. Agency for International Development-funded Reading for Success — National Program for Reading rolled out in classrooms nationwide, including her son’s.

That’s when Ismail was finally able to pass the first grade.

Ismail, an 12-year-old boy with autism, stands between his summer reading program facilitator and his mother. — Ismail (center) stands with his reading program facilitator (left) and mother, Manbari Kaoutar (right).

The program is working in partnership with the Government of Morocco to improve Arabic literacy skills by enhancing classroom instruction with interactive, hands-on activities, expanding reading opportunities and improving national learning and assessment systems.

“For my child, the way we learned at school [years ago] is not going to work. He is more active, and he needs a lively manner to learn,” says Kaoutar.

She says that with the colorful new materials and engaging lessons her son can take what he sees on the page or board and make a connection to the meaning for the first time.

Ismail continued the momentum by participating in a project-supported summer reading program to sharpen his skills before second grade. The programs were implemented by local nongovernmental organizations — The Moroccan Association for Youth Education and Forum for Creativity and Communication — that received funding, training and materials from the project. These organizations previously hosted traditional summer camps without an educational component, but both parents and students were excited about the new format.

Children still made crafts, played games and performed plays as they would do in a traditional camp, but they added in activities around reading and making literacy more fun.

Ismail’s improvements from his third year of first grade continued to develop during the month-long reading program, making him a more eager reader. Kaoutar says Ismail now brings his backpack to her when he gets home so they can take out his books and read together.

She’s also found that at the summer program Ismail became attached to the other students for the first time and developed deeper social ties. When she would ask him which community swimming pool he wanted to go to, Ismail would ask to go to the neighborhood where his new friends would be.

This is no small feat in a country with limited resources for children with different learning needs. Part of the magic of the summer reading program is its focus on inclusivity.

Bringing hearing and deaf students together for fun and learning

Two facilitators, one fluent in sign language, read to and engage a class of hearing and deaf students. — Fatima Rizki, a university student, and Sanaa Tarkhani, an educator fluent in sign language, co-facilitate a classroom of students who are hearing and deaf.

At another summer program location not far from Ismail’s, there were blended sessions catering to both students who are hearing and deaf. This is new territory in Morocco. Students who are deaf typically attend a separate school until grade six and then can go on to vocational training to become hairdressers, mechanics, cooks and other trades.

Facilitators reported that hearing students were so removed from their deaf peers that they didn’t even want to sit next to the children who are deaf during the first week of the program. But the facilitators — one a university student and the other a trained educator fluent in sign language — worked to build bridges through play and learning.

“You can’t find inclusive classrooms [for students who are deaf] in the Moroccan school system. Teachers don’t have a background in sign language or [deaf] inclusive education,” says facilitator Sanaa Tarkhani.

Tarkhani has three siblings who are deaf and, after seeing the lack of support for them in the education system, became certified in sign language and education. When asked what challenges she faces working in a classroom with deaf and hearing students, she says there are none. She’s accustomed to operating simultaneously for people living in noisy and silent worlds.

But her co-facilitator, Fatima Rizki, saw it a little differently. Rizki, 22, is a university student studying education and she is not fluent in sign language nor does she have the same personal tie to it as Tarkhani.

She notes that sometimes the students who are deaf would tap on their desks or make noises they can’t hear and disrupt the other students.

“The main challenge is engaging all of the students while I’m reading a book or a story. I have to read for all of them,” says Rizki.

To ensure summer program staff like Rizki had the skills they needed to support both hearing and deaf students, the project trained reading program facilitators using a project-designed four-week curriculum. Joanie Cohen, Senior Project Director for Creative Associates International, says involving facilitators fluent in sign changed the dynamic of the training.

“The inclusion of deaf educators absolutely made this so special,” says Cohen. “In our after-training appreciations and reflections, many participants mentioned how much the deaf educators enriched their experiences and made them think differently about educating young children.”

Supporting parents and indigenous communities

An Amazigh mother sits in the school yard. — Hafida Aaouini can see the difference in abilities between her 7-year-old son, who is benefiting from the National Program for Reading, and her older children.

In addition to being inclusive of students with varying needs and abilities, the program also operated in the south of Morocco with Amazigh indigenous people living in Tiznit. Given that their native language is often what they speak at home before enrolling in school, some Amazigh early grade readers struggle entering a system based on Classical Arabic.

Hafida Aaouini’s 7-year-old son Mouad only used Amazigh, but after a year in a National Program for Reading-supported school and a few weeks of the summer reading program, he is comfortable with Classical Arabic.

“Classical Arabic is the language for communication … It’s good for him to speak Amazigh to communicate with his community, but it’s good for him to learn Arabic to go further,” says Aaouini.

She can see a stark difference between Mouad and her older children that didn’t have the methodology the project implements. She says that reading at home is not common in her culture, but now Mouad is asking for a story every day and wants to bring his books to the beach.

In an effort to cultivate a holistic culture of reading outside the classroom, the reading programs targeted classroom facilitators and parents in addition to students. Parents were trained on ways to get involved in their children’s reading at the beginning of the program.

“We learned with our children,” said Aaouini “We didn’t have a chance as parents to be trained before. This training simplified the way to teach your child how to read and they give you tools with short stories and big images.”

As the summer program came to a close, parents and students reported being more prepared for the term ahead and prepared to succeed in literacy development.

With reporting by Mounya El Asri

Photos by Ashley Williams

The Moroccan Ministry of National Education to implement new curriculum

June 3, 2019

1 min read

In May 2019, the USAID Reading for Success-National Program for Reading (RFS-NPR) project marked a decisive turning point in the sustainability of early grade Arabic language reading instruction in Morocco.

The Moroccan Ministry of National Education released a press statement announcing that starting in the 2019-2020 school year, the new Arabic language curriculum for grades 3 and 4 will be implemented in all primary schools nationwide.

Through this announcement, which is a key milestone for the USAID-funded project, the Ministry is instituting and promoting a new methodology for teaching reading in Arabic in all Moroccan primary schools and, thus, paying tribute to the efforts made in partnership with USAID education experts.

In September 2018, the Ministry of National Education implemented a new Arabic language curriculum for grades 1 and 2 after introducing the new teaching methodology and writing new textbooks for grades 1 and 2.

The USAID RFS-NPR project aims to expand USAID’s efforts to support the Government of Morocco’s strategic Vision 2015-2030, specifically “Project 7,” which is devoted to enhancing pedagogy. NPR’s goal is to improve student reading and writing competencies in grades 1to 4. The project runs from May 2017 through May 2022.

The drive to lead: One woman’s quest to break barriers in Morocco

December 3, 2018

By Maggie Proctor

3 min read

When she was a girl, Soukaina Sriti looked for ways to be involved in her community, starting at the local community center in Sidi Boujida, the neighborhood in Fes where she lived. Ever since then she’s been forging a new path for herself and other women leaders in civil society.

After high school Sriti started looking for ways to continue being active and engaged and became a founding member of the youth council of Fes, and a member of a local civil society organization named Citoyens de Rue (“citizens of the street”). She later joined the organization’s board.

Despite taking on these decision-making roles, she began to see that in practice her ability to lead was limited by a critical factor: her gender. Though she and her female colleagues were elevated to positions of leadership, they held little more than token authority in these groups, and they were typically assigned to more “feminine” projects focused on children and illiteracy, while men worked on everything else.

“But why?” Sriti asked herself. “We have the capacity, so why can’t we do it ourselves?”

A realization, a drive to lead

Nevertheless, Sriti was determined to continue building her own skills and expanding her capacity as a leader. As a participant in the Fostering Peaceful Communities in Morocco program, implemented by Creative Associates International, she was trained in facilitation skills, program management and countering violent extremism and worked with religious leaders and civil society actors from Fès to implement community violence reduction projects. She traveled around the country with the program and forged bonds with men and women from other cities and town in Morocco. The program was funded by the U.S. Department of State.

In March 2018, Sriti traveled to Washington D.C. as part of an Fostering Peaceful Communities in Morocco delegation, where she shared her experiences in the project with international stakeholders, met with U.S. government officials and engaged in dialogue with interfaith leaders.

Sriti says this experience opened her eyes. She saw how seriously she was taken, and how other women had assumed active leadership in their organizations.

She described a moment of clarity when she heard another member of the delegation speak about his organization’s work with mothers and young women: “Why does a man need to lead this work with women? Did he provide what they needed, and did they have a say?”

Right then, she thought to herself, “We know our priorities, and we can speak for ourselves.”

Putting ideas into action

When she returned from her trip with renewed commitment to be a leader in her community, Sriti and her colleagues decided to establish their own civil society organization, Association Orchidée pour le Développement et la Citoyenneté (Orchid Association for Development and Citizenship).

Sriti says the association’s main goal is strengthening the capacity of young female leaders in civil society, women like herself.

The group has already begun planning for its first projects, working with Morocco’s Ministry of Education to teach women to read and another seeking to raise awareness of migrants’ rights in the Fes and Meknes region.

As the organization’s president, Sriti hopes to empower women through projects that build their skills and advocate for their rights, and to establish a more equitable and transparent organization that fosters women’s leadership from within.

Her advice for other young women working in civil society is simple and powerful.

Sriti says, “If you think you can’t do it, you can’t. But if you believe in yourself, you will. Of course, you will face challenges, but when you believe in yourself you will overcome them.”

Local actors at the center of international CVE conference

October 18, 2018

By Maggie Proctor

4 min read

While communities around the world experience violent extremism, specific drivers and solutions are best understood and applied locally, said experts at an international symposium on the role of local actors in community resilience, social stabilization and countering violent extremism.

Opening the international event in Rabat, Yasmina Sarhrouny, Chief of Party for the Fostering Peaceful Communities project in four Moroccan cities, urged to the civil society organizations, academics, researchers, religious leaders and government stakeholders in the room to think locally when it comes to addressing violent extremism.

“Usually these actors are not present at discussions of CVE,” she said on Sept. 26. “And is it only the mission of civil society? Maybe it’s a bit naïve to put civil society as the first line of defense against the rise of violent extremist ideology, without taking into account the contexts and conditions in which these actors operate at the local level. Perhaps the magic formula would be cooperation between civil society, religious actors, local elected officials and security actors.”

Sarhrouny know this to be true from experience. The Fostering Peaceful Communities project, which hosted the symposium with Search for Common Ground and the Rabat International University, worked with local actors in four Moroccan communities with high levels of violent extremist activity and recruitment to assess and address local drivers of violent extremism.

The activities ranged from preparing religious students to prevent extremism in their communities to training unemployed mothers to recognize the signs of radicalization. The approach was collaborative and involved a range of local actors. The project was implemented by Creative Associates International and funded by the U.S. State Department’s Bureau of Conflict and Stabilization Operations.

The symposium presented a holistic view of the phenomenon of violent extremism, covering psychological factors that drive extremism at the individual level, relationships within families, the role of governance institutions in the sustainable prevention of extremism, messaging and counter-messaging, and national strategic and legal frameworks.

Going wide and deep to address root cases

Sarhrouny said the symposium intentionally engaged a variety of actors and topics, recognizing extremism has many wide-reaching drivers, manifestations and effects. To find effective solutions, you must get to the core of this phenomenon, she explained.

“If violent extremism only dealt with Islam the response would be easy, but it does not,” she said. “Work on narratives and counter narratives is important, but when we look at the data it shows that the root causes are exclusion and poverty. In my opinion, many organizations and states find it easier to focus on narratives than at their own governance problems and the human rights of their citizens.”

In focusing on the issues of exclusion and marginalization, civil society representatives spoke about their work to help disaffected young women and men find nonviolent opportunities to contribute to their community, meaningfully engage with decision-makers in local government and participate in peaceful dialogue. They noted this approach was more effective than battling over ideology.

“When you try to change someone’s beliefs, it doesn’t work. It creates more resistance,” said Marouan Ben Larbi, a specialist in youth engagement from the northern region of Morocco. “But if you adopt an approach focused on inclusion and understanding – this person doesn’t need to be changed, they need to be heard. The most important thing is that the person feels the love and that they feel heard.”

Other speakers touched on the importance of addressing young men and women’s need to feel connected and empowered within their community, and to take on greater roles in decision-making and leadership.

“I am personally convinced that to address violent extremism, encouraging collective life is the first thing to do,” said Ali Lagsab, president of the Fès-based civil society organization Citoyens de Rue. “When a young person participates he or she is no longer just a consumer, but a producer.”

A global challenge

Symposium participants addressed violent extremism at the international level as well as in Morocco, with discussions about models for messaging in the Middle East and North Africa, approaches for diagnosing and addressing governance problems that can contribute to fragility, and an analysis of armed groups in Mali and the Sahel.

During breakout workshops, symposium attendees developed recommendations for engaging local actors in countering and preventing violent extremism, looking specifically at the northern Moroccan cities of Tetouan and Tangier; the large cities of Fes, Casablanca, and Rabat; and the rural and mountainous region of Beni Mellal-Khenifra.

Attendees will use the recommendations produced at the symposium to guide their research and action to preventing violent extremism using a multidisciplinary approach that mobilizes a comprehensive group of community actors.

Rabat International University will organize an additional four seminars on countering violent extremism that will continue the exploration of this complex phenomenon and expand engagement with a diverse set of local and international stakeholders.

Professor Farid El Asri, Director of the Chair for Culture, Society, and Religion in the Political Science Department of Rabat International University, says that there is still much work to be done to fully understand violent extremism and develop comprehensive, multidisciplinary, and effective approaches for preventing and countering it.

“I don’t think I have an answer, but I have many questions, and maybe a path forward.”