Adolescents 21st century skills: Findings from the large-scale household-based assessments

• In Event: The factors and community inputs that influence policy, practice, and measurement of life skills in East Africa and India

Proposal

Life skills have been understood as an individual’s ability to demonstrate adaptive and positive behaviour that enables him/her to interact with others and the environment (World Health Organization [WHO], 1999). The United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund (UNICEF) defines life skills as “psychosocial and interpersonal skills that can help people make informed decisions, communicate effectively, and develop coping and self-management skills that may help lead a healthy and productive life” (UNICEF, 2012). Evidence shows that high levels of life skills protect adolescents against emotional, educational, and behavioural problems whereby adolescents with outstanding life skills show the most favourable adjustment in all aspects of their life (UNICEF, 2020). However, despite the global concern for life skill education (UNICEF, 2012; WHO, 1999), coupled with the introduction of the competency-based curricula in Kenya, Uganda, and Tanzania that emphasizes the teaching and learning of life skills and values, it is unclear how these life skills have been assessed. Moreover, there is a dearth of literature on the factors that influence the acquisition of life skills and values in East Africa. Therefore, in order to generate large scale evidence on life skills and values among adolescents aged 13 to 17 years, RELI commissioned an initiative called Assessment of Life skills and Values in East Africa (ALiVE) in 2020. The initiative focused on three life skills (problem solving, collaboration, and self-awareness) and one value (respect) which were prioritized through a series of consultive meetings with organizations implementing interventions on life skills and values in East Africa.
Using the performance-based tasks or collaborative tasks developed by a panel of 47 experts from East Africa, the large-scale assessment adopted a cross-sectional design in which over 30,000 adolescents aged 13 to 17 years were assessed at household level. Assessment tools for problem solving (3 task scenarios and 15 items), self-awareness (5 task scenarios and 12 items); and respect (4 task scenarios and 10 items) were based on performance tasks in which adolescents (on a one-to-one basis) were presented with a contextualized scenario based on their day-to-day experiences and asked to respond orally to a series of questions based on the scenario that was read to them. On the other hand, the assessment tool for collaboration (3 tasks and 8 items) was based on collaborative performance tasks in which adolescents, in groups of 4 were presented with a contextualized scenario based on their day-to-day experiences; and asked to perform the tasks as a group. This paper therefore presents the findings of the large-scale assessments in Kenya, Uganda, and Tanzania, highlighting the similarities and differences in the adolescents’ proficiency levels across the 2 life skills (problem Solving and self-awareness) together with characterization of the levels of proficiency through descriptive statements of what the adolescents were able to demonstrate. The presentation will also provide insights on the proficiency levels of adolescents across the sample by adolescents’ gender, age, disability status, schooling status, gender and education level of the household head, household wealth, and household location (rural/urban).

Authors

• Martin Ariapa, Luigi Giussani Institute of Higher Education

• Mauro Giacomazzi, Luigi Giussani Institute of Higher Education

• Mary Goretti Nakabugo, Uwezo Uganda