Application of EdTech in Tanzania: Effectiveness of Radio and Television in Teaching and Learning amid COVID-19 Pandemic

Abstract

On March 2020 school and university going students experienced termination of classes. The statement declared by the Tanzania prime minister honourable Kassim Majaliwa required all primary and secondary schools to postpone learning for a month and one day later universities were also asked to suspend studies and other activities. It was necessary to do so because of the novel coronavirus disease 2019 named by World Health Organisation as COVID-19 a pandemic that had spread and hit more than 150 countries. This paper intended to attain two major objectives, one was to explore the effectiveness of radio and television in handling teaching and learning process as an alternative adopted to ensure that students continue to be engaged in learning. Second, to examine the capabilities of the country through the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology to continue teaching and learning during the time of classroom disruption. The authors made a case study where radio and television platforms were adopted for teaching and learning. The results show that the transition from classroom teaching and learning to teaching and learning through radio and television stations platform was not effective. Similarly, the study shows that the government has demonstrated incompetence in running and monitoring the programme mostly in terms of programme preparation and implementation. However, this experience has built a solid foundation for the future cases, when the country, facilitators, students and parents will be more arranged than now.