Tracking learning to deliver impact, including recent findings from Nigeria

• In Event: Improving learning equity outcomes and policies: Concepts, methods and empirical findings from India, Nigeria and Malawi.

Proposal

Tracking student learning progress overtime is essential for understanding children’s learning levels and needs, and informing design and implementation of programs to improve outcomes with an equity perspective. This presentation will examine the role learning information can play in both creating openings for systems improvement and contributing to the design and implementation of learning-focused reforms.

We begin by presenting data on learning outcomes and learning trajectories across a variety of countries and datasets, and discussing the role that learning trajectories analysis can play in understanding student progress and informing policy priorities and design. We will show how learning trajectories can be created with data that is more readily available than is typically realized.

We will next discuss a framework for understanding the role that information plays in systems diagnostics and accountability, using results from a systems diagnostic recently conducted in Nigeria to illustrate our points. Finally, we will present results from tracking learning outcomes in implementation of a structured pedagogy reform in Nigeria and discuss how insights from tracking learning progress contributed to iterative improvements to the implementation.

The study collected individual learning outcomes data at regular intervals over several years of program implementation. It found that implementation of structured pedagogy was associated with improved learning outcomes in foundational subjects, and that students in schools with more advanced program uptake saw greater improvements.

The above analyses contribute to a better understanding of how metrics for tracking students’ learning can lead to ways to improve equitable outcomes in education.

Authors

• Martin De Simone, The World Bank Group

• Michelle Kaffenberger, What Works Hub for Global Education, University of Oxford

• Marla Spivack, The World Bank Group