Innovative, Low-cost and Effective Community and CBOs Model for Supporting Schools and Teachers

USAID Read Liberia Activity is a five-year early grade reading (EGR) activity managed by RTI International in close collaboration with the Ministry of Education (MOE). Read Liberia objective is to improve EGR skills of Liberian students in grades one and two (G1 and G2) and to pilot test support for the development of emergent literacy skills among kindergarten (KG) students.

Read Liberia has designed an SBC component that applies behavioral theories that targets real and perceived barriers, and motivates parents, teachers and community members to adopt positive behaviors, or practices, that support a child’s ability to learn to read. Read Liberia’s integrated SBC plan uses multiple strategies, including, communication such as interpersonal communication (IPC), limited mass media, advocacy, social mobilization, and community engagement.

Read Liberia’s Community and CBOs model for supporting schools and teachers in early grade reading is one piece of Read Liberia’s overarching SBC Communication Plan. This document presents in detail the Read Liberia Activity’s innovative, low-cost, and effective model for community engagement. The first section describes the fundamentals of community engagement and that it is a strategy of Read Liberia’s integrated Social and Behavior Change approach. The second section of the document illustrates the “how” of community engagement and its application under the Read Liberia Activity.

This document has been prepared in fulfillment of IR 4, Technical Deliverable No.1, of the USAID Read Liberia Activity contract. It was prepared with RTI’s Read Liberia subcontractor Another Option, LLC.

World Reading Day is April 23

To celebrate the day, USAID Read Liberia has produced three Public Service Announcements that are airing in the six counties where the early grade reading activity is working. Each PSA's includes the voices of Peaches, a Hipco musician and rapper, Christopher Jackson, a football player on the Liberian National team, and Teah Dennis, also a football player on the Liberian National Team.

On the recordings, the group shares why reading has been important for their successful careers and what simple actions parents can do at home to help their children to learn to read.

Produced by Accountability Lab in Liberia, the PSAs were approved by USAID and the Liberia Ministry of Education.

Parent Peer Education Participate Guide published for Early Grade Reading in Liberia

Research shows that barriers to education, parental aspirations, and societal norms are similar across the world and do not change that dramatically—whether you are in West Africa or South Asia. Another Option has been working in early grade reading for four years in Africa and Asia under several USAID-funded awards.

As part of the USAID Read Liberia project, our technical experts have just published two guides for peer educators and lead trainers working across Liberia to promote early grade reading. These guides were vetted through a series of focus groups to ensure that they were relevant to parents and caregivers in urban and rural communities across Liberia. One major component of making the two documents accessible to Liberian parents and caregivers were illustrations by local artist Brima Wolobah which show real life situations that parents can use to talk about reading with their peers or support their child’s learning. 

These materials are available for download and may be adapted for use with attribution, under Creative Commons Attribution. Specific requirements for reuse can be found within each document.

Adapting intervetions to local cultural contexts

Another Option has been working in early grade reading for four years in Africa and Asia under several USAID-funded awards. Research shows that barriers to education, parental aspirations, and societal norms are similar across the world and do not change that dramatically—whether you are in West Africa or South Asia.

As part of the USAID Early Grade Reading Program (EGRP) in Nepal, we’ve provided technical support in early grade reading Social and Behavior Change. We’ve worked closely with the Government of Nepal stakeholders including the Department of Education and the National Center for Education Development to design and develop numerous training materials for parents and caretakers, teachers, and education officers to support early grade reading. Developed resources including a peer education module for parents, and an interpersonal communication toolkit for teachers to bridge communication gaps with students’ parents.

In Nepal, we worked very closely with the government of Nepal to design and create all of our materials. And, we’re really pleased that the teacher training guide has been accepted by the government of Nepal as part of its national teacher training curriculum.

Because the social mobilization and interpersonal communication have shown results in Nepal, we wanted to test these materials in Liberia to see if they could be adapted to the Liberian setting and its needs for our USAID Read Liberia.

With permission from the Liberian Ministry of Education to pre-test the peer education materials, we set out to answer three critical questions: do parents understand the content (particularly the graphics and illustrations); was the guide culturally sensitive; and would it resonate with Liberian parents of young readers.

We conducted an assessment with twenty-one parents-twelve women and nine men-in two communities – one urban and one rural—at Slipway Public School and King’s Farm Public School. We found that the barriers to education and aspirations were similar to parents and teachers in our Nepal-based early reading program. Parents we interviewed in both places cited factors related to economics, social norms, existing education infrastructure, and gender as real challenges in their attempts to ensure their children received a decent education.

Illustration from Another Option's Peer Guide created for parents and caregivers in Nepal.

The Liberian parents overall did relate to the illustrations that were developed for Nepali parents, and that the tools were able to generate insightful discussions about the roles of parents in the reading lives of their children both in and out of school. Parents at both of our focus groups said they could see themselves and their challenges reflected in the illustrations.

Parents also provided feedback on specific visual details that Another Option could do to make the resources more relatable to the Liberian context. For example, participants indicated that some of the hand gestures used in the Nepali context varied in their interpretation in Liberia and could confuse the user. They also asked for more illustrations bridging into the community and not just in the school setting to allow parents to see their roles as educators throughout their daily interactions with their children. Additionally, much discussion was held around the differences of the education setting in rural areas versus urban areas and how these could be better portrayed.

An illustration from the Liberia edition of our Peer Guide.

Based on these responses, we worked with local illustrators to improve the cultural resonance of the illustrations in efforts to make it more relevant to parents and caregivers in urban and rural communities in Liberia. Additional materials like flyers and posters will be developed for social mobilizers to use during community engagement activities promoting early grade reading. The final Liberian version has been shared with the Ministry of Education and we have received the go ahead to test it in the field across several counties.

With these changes, parents will have specific examples on what they can do to help their children learn to read. These include children reading aloud for ten minutes a day, children having a quiet place to read, and regularly going to school.

In both Nepal and in Liberia the support and guidance from the Ministries of Education were invaluable. The Nepal version is endorsed and carries the seal of the Ministry of Education, and we hope that the Liberian ministry also adds its endorsement to this early grade reading tool.

Early Grade Reading: Adapting to Cultural Context

Another Option has been working in early grade reading for four years in Africa and Asia under several USAID-funded awards. Research shows that barriers to education, parental aspirations, and societal norms are similar across the world and do not change that dramatically—whether you are in West Africa or South Asia.

As part of the USAID Early Grade Reading Program (EGRP) in Nepal, we’ve provided technical support in early grade reading Social and Behavior Change. We’ve worked closely with the Government of Nepal stakeholders including the Department of Education and the National Center for Education Development to design and develop materials for parents and caretakers, teachers, and education officers to support early grade reading. Developed resources including a peer education module for parents and an interpersonal communication toolkit for teachers to bridge communication gaps with students’ parents.

In Nepal, we worked very closely with the government of Nepal to design and create all of our materials. And, we’re really pleased that the teacher training guide has been accepted by the government of Nepal as part of its national teacher training curriculum.

Because the social mobilization and interpersonal communication have shown results in Nepal, we wanted to test these materials in Liberia to see if they could be adapted to the Liberian setting and its needs for our work with USAID Read Liberia.

With permission from the Liberian Ministry of Education to pre-test the peer education materials, we set out to answer three critical questions: do parents understand the content (particularly the graphics and illustrations); was the guide culturally sensitive; and would it resonate with Liberian parents of young readers.

We conducted an assessment with twenty-one parents-twelve women and nine men-in two communities – one urban and one rural—at Slipway Public School and King’s Farm Public School. We found that the barriers to education and aspirations were similar to parents and teachers in our Nepal-based early reading program. Parents we interviewed in both places cited factors related to economics, social norms, existing education infrastructure, and gender as real challenges in their attempts to ensure their children received a decent education.

An illustration showing a girl reading to her family in a typical Nepali home.

The Liberian parents overall did relate to the illustrations that were developed for Nepali parents, and that the tools were able to generate insightful discussions about the roles of parents in the reading lives of their children both in and out of school. Parents at both of our focus groups said they could see themselves and their challenges reflected in the illustrations.

Parents also provided feedback on specific visual details that Another Option could do to make the resources more relatable to the Liberian context. For example, participants indicated that some of the hand gestures used in the Nepali context varied in their interpretation in Liberia and could confuse the user. They also asked for more illustrations bridging into the community and not just in the school setting to allow parents to see their roles as educators throughout their daily interactions with their children. Additionally, much discussion was held around the differences of the education setting in rural areas versus urban areas and how these could be better portrayed.

Based on these responses, we worked with local illustrators to improve the cultural resonance of the illustrations in efforts to make it more relevant to parents and caregivers in urban and rural communities in Liberia. Additional materials like flyers and posters will be developed for social mobilizers to use during community engagement activities promoting early grade reading. The final Liberian version has been shared with the Ministry of Education and we have received the go ahead to test it in the field across several counties.

An illustration showing a child reading to her family in a typical Liberian household.

With these changes, parents will have specific examples on what they can do to help their children learn to read. These include children reading aloud for ten minutes a day, children having a quiet place to read, and regularly going to school.

In both Nepal and in Liberia the support and guidance from the Ministries of Education were invaluable. The Nepal version is endorsed and carries the seal of the Ministry of Education, and we hope that the Liberian ministry also adds its endorsement to this early grade reading tool.

Rebecca Martinez, who wrote this blog post, is the Program Coordinator for USAID Read Liberia. She conducted the pre-test in partnership with local counterparts on the ground in Liberia.