Evaluating the Strategies Used in Teaching Life Skills Education for Management of Conflicts among Secondary School Students in Kakamega County, Kenya

Abstract

Life Skills Education (LSE) is internationally recognized for equipping people with abilities to adapt to daily challenges. Students face heightened peer group interaction making interpersonal conflicts rampant as they try to assert themselves while also seeking cooperation. Life skills become prerequisite for conflict management. It is disturbing that despite mainstreaming LSE in Kenya's school curriculum in 2003, students continue to experience heightened relationship-based conflicts with insurmountable consequences that jeopardize learning as revealed in a survey of schools in Kakamega County. This paper evaluated the strategies used in teaching LSE for management of conflicts among secondary school students with the intention of providing insight into what can make LSE more proactive in conflict management. The research was a Descriptive Survey that employed the Ex Post Facto Design. Interviews, questionnaires, Focus Group Discussions (FGDs) and observation checklists were used to collect primary data. Probability and non-probability sampling techniques were used to select the 456 respondents including students, school administrators and sponsors, LSE and G & C teachers from four Sub Counties in Kakamega County. Study findings confirmed that LSE can indeed equip students with life skills for conflict management; however, the participatory learner-centered methods for teaching LSE were hardly used by the teachers. These methods such as miming, song and dance, role play, poetry/recitals, games and storytelling were associated more with other subjects like oral literature, Fasihi, and drama festivals than with acquisition of life skills. In most schools the teachers lacked interest in participating with the students in LSE so as to help students acquire the life skills. Focus Group Discussions confirmed that in most cases LSE lessons were peer-led with limited or no direction from significant others such as the parents, church and school. The students relied heavily on these peers led discussions to acquire knowledge, information, attitudes and skills and this contributed to conflicts when wrong information, attitudes and skills were learnt. Leaving these inept peers with the pivotal role of imparting life skills promoted conflict. The results on forums that relay LSE indicated recognition that LSE was not only taught through the classroom lessons but also through other forums such as Guidance and Counselling, invited guest speakers, peer counsellors, house/ class meetings, open forums, assembly talks, straight talk club, notice boards, and pastoral care. The school environment promoted non-violence and anti-drug messages through posters on notice boards as reported. It however emerged that the schools unconsciously used these forums that relay LSE without giving the LSE significance; it is as if the programs are more of routine than purposeful. There was incongruence among stakeholders; the administrators, the LSE and G & C teachers who ought to implement LSE did not rate Guidance and counselling forums and class lessons as best forums for relaying LSE as believed by the Sub County Director. The interview with religious leaders revealed that religious institutions concentrated mainly on teaching their religious tenets and life skills came in often by coincidence. It is recommended that the LSE teachers, who are at the core of teaching LSE should maximize student involvement and participation in LSE through use of the diverse heuristic methods so that the students internalize the skill rather than merely retaining the knowledge on LSE. The G & C teachers should choreograph programs in the school that will ensure that LSE is imbibed in learners. They should spearhead peer activities in the school while ensuring that the information the peers have is accurate, clear and free of misconceptions that may derail fellow students.