How one school is teaching special needs children

James Kyoyita welcomes a team from Daily Monitor to Nkozi Demonstration Primary School in Mpigi District, where he is the head teacher to observe how the school teaches children with special needs.

The visit starts in a Primary One classroom where pupils sit attentively, donned in green dresses for the girls and green shirts and black shorts for the boys. As their teacher, Yudaya Kigongo, enters the room, everyone stands up as she says; “Good morning class.” The class responds: “We are very well thank you teacher!”

No ordinary class
At first glance, the class seems like an ordinary class of shy little ones but it soon becomes apparent that it is unique in terms of how Kigongo instructs it.

When she asks the pupils something, she does so while signing to one of the pupils in particular. That pupil is seven-year-old Sylvia, who has a hearing impairment. She is the only one in her class with it but the rest of the class makes it easy for her to keep up with them.

Today’s class is about the environment and what living things are in it. For every example of a living thing given, the entire class repeats after the teacher while also using sign language for Sylvia’s benefit. When they shout out, “birds” as living things, they spread their arms out and flap them like the wings of birds. They do this by mimicking what their teacher, Kigongo is doing.

No easy feat
Although, the pupils enjoy Kigongo’s class, she says: “It is not easy teaching children with disabilities. It takes a lot of patience because they are slow learners.” There is no denying that not every class would warm up to the idea of having to learn a language they don’t need for the sake of one pupil. The Primary One class is young and therefor more open to this way of teaching. On top of this, there is the issue of manpower.

Kigongo is the only teacher at the schools who understands sign language. She normally teaches her classes and also offers special lessons for pupils with hearing impairments, and also braille classes in the afternoon for the visually impaired.
She says she did not attend any training for sign language or using a braille machine but acquired the skills by attending workshops.

“My blind pupils are hindered by lack of recorders while attending inclusive lessons with their seeing colleagues. These would ideally help them to recap what they have learnt in the morning class when we meet in the afternoon,” Kigongo notes.

She applauds World Vision, a Christian based non-profit organisation for providing the school with braille paper machines which the pupils in the upper classes, Primary Five to Seven, use.

How the classes are organised
“We use the braille machines in the in afternoon because if they are used during the morning classes, they can distract the other pupils [the sound they make is loud],” says Kigongo.

Before Kigongo begins her afternoon lessons, she gets a briefing from the others teachers about what topics they taught in the morning hours. This gives her time to prepare lesson plans for the visually impaired pupils who need to transfer what they learnt onto papers using the braille machines.

In her Primary Five class, Kigongo has two pupils, Andrew Sewaya and Glario Ssekumba . According to Kigongo, the two have not yet acquired the skills of using the braille machines to type on braille papers which they are able read.

In her introduction to the braille lessons, Kigongo directs the two pupils on how to identify the different parts of the machine, how to fix and move the braille paper and how the machine works.
“I have learnt how to press the machine,” says Sewaya after the braille lesson.

“I like teacher Kigongo very much. She teaches me well,” says Sewaya, adding that he wants to become a Finance Minister in future.

His colleague, Ssekumba is 19 years old and is in a lower class because his guardian delayed to take him to school. The two pupils have mastered all corners of the school as they move around without the the assistance of walking canes, which they do not have.

No extra pay
Despite the heavy workload of teaching pupils with disabilities besides her other assigned classes, Kigongo does not get any special emoluments for her extra effort at the school.

She says she does not have time to rest and just gets her basic monthly pay from the government.
“I only earn Shs480, 000 as my monthly pay and it is per my level of experience and academic qualifications,” says Kigongo who holds a diploma in education from Uganda Martyrs University Nkozi and has been teaching for 30 years.

Challenges of a special education
Charles Kaboggoza, a community development facilitator working with World Vision, says their relationship with the school is to create a good learning environment for pupils like Sylvia, Sewaya and Ssekumba.

“We are working with teacher training institutions like Kyambogo University to help incorporate inclusive education in schools to help attract children with disabilities,” Kaboggoza says.

He adds that they provide the school with braille paper and machines, which are very expensive. The machines cost about Shs2.3 million. “We provide wheel chairs to those children who are both in and out of school,” Kaboggoza says on the areas where these children have been assisted.

James Kyoyita, the school’s head teacher, says that he is challenged by the lack of teachers to teach special needs children.
“I am now faced with the challenge of getting get teachers to replace Kigongo now that she is soon hitting her retirement age,” Mr Kyoyita adds.

Every child should have access
“Children with disabilities are so many in the villages but parents neglect to take them to school yet they can be better citizens in future,” Kyoyita says, adding that the school provides children in the school with an opportunity to be in the boarding section free of charge.

This is just one example of how one school is helping children with disabilities get access to an education. While there are several schools like it in the city, there is still a gap in rural areas, which needs to be addressed.

The law encourages access to services
The National Disability Act defines disability as “substantial functional limitation of daily life activities of an individual caused by physical, sensory or mental impairment and environmental barriers”.

“People with disabilities are a vulnerable group just like women and children. Therefore, their rights are given a lot of priority. But to fight for these rights we need to know who falls under this group,” says Elizabeth Nanziri, an advocate for people with disabilities, adding that the Act is one way through which Uganda protects their rights.

Section 38(1) of the Persons with Disabilities Act sates: “Persons with disabilities have a right to access public services, facilities, and public building and not to be discriminated against in exercising this right.”

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