Disaster Risk Reduction in School Curricula: Case Studies ... - Unicef

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Eastern and Southern Africa
of student understanding during the learning process while the
‘situation approach’, comparing past disaster situations and
interventions with the present situation, is used to assess and,
if necessary, enhance the quality of students’ critical
and creative thinking about disaster responses 60 .
Teacher Professional Development/Guidance
DRR-related teacher training for grade 4 and 5 teachers, lasting
for three days (24 hours of training), commenced in October
2006 at the end of the I Protect My Country from Natural
Disasters project and focused upon the students’ handbook
and teachers’ handbooks published in that year (see above);
some 75 local government officials and 150 teachers were
trained (UNISDR, 2007, 87).
Funding was lacking for the printing of the 400,000 copies
of each of the teachers’ and students’ handbooks that was
required. Only 10,000 copies of each were printed, after the
decision to distribute a quarter of the print-run to 20 schools
in known disaster-prone areas was made. (Ibid. 87, 89).
Training of grade 4 and 5 teachers continues, as does that of
grades 6 and 7 which has followed the orientation of the
curriculum towards climate change in 2009. The total number
of teachers and educational staff to have been trained stands,
at the time of writing, is 1,488. Teachers who have been
trained are then called upon to train others in a cascade process 61 .
The training programme currently includes: a rationale for
education in emergencies, the Education Cluster, the core
commitments for children in humanitarian action, natural hazards
of Madagascar and steps to reduce their impact, student and
teacher manuals, climate change, gender and DRR, INEE Minimum
Standards for education in emergencies, early childhood,
and DRR learning facilitation 62 .
Training units in DRR conducted by members of the Education
Cluster are in the local language (Malagasy) in order to facilitate
message transfer to target groups, students in primary and
secondary school 63 .
Learning Outcomes/Competencies
There appears to be no list of DRR-specific learning outcomes
organized according to knowledge, skills and attitudes but
some broad competencies have been identified for different
grade levels. For example: participating in the protection of
the environment of the school (grades 1 and 2), knowing what
measures to take to reduce the impact of a cyclone (grade 3),
acting as agents of change to convey key messages and
actions to parents and the community (grades 4 & 5), exchanging
ideas with the local community, identifying patterns leading to
local environmental degradation (grade 6), discussing and coplanning
with the community in local languages in order
to raise environmental awareness.
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Jacky Roland Randimbiarison to Fumiyo Kagawa, 14 November 2011
61
Jacky Roland Randimbiarison to Fumiyo Kagawa, 21 November 2011
62
Jacky Roland Randimbiarison to Fumiyo Kagawa, 14 November 2011
63
Jacky Roland Randimbiarison to Fumiyo Kagawa, 14 and 21 November 2011
Disaster Risk Reduction in School Curricula: Case Studies from Thirty Countries