Half of Grade Six Students Unable to Meet Grade Three Literacy and Numeracy Standards

Half of Grade Six Students Unable to Meet Grade Three Literacy and Numeracy Standards.

A nationwide literacy and numeracy checkup has uncovered some serious weaknesses in the skills of Kenya's Grade Six kids, with around half of them struggling to make sense of an English passage or tackle math problems that are actually targeted at grade 3 level.

The bad news is spelled out in the Foundational Literacy and Numeracy Assessment Report (2025), a study released back in early January (2026) by Usawa Agenda, a group dedicated to pushing for better education opportunities for everyone.

The evaluation indicates that there are preparedness problems at the transition level between the primary and junior schooling under the Competency-Based Education (CBE) system.

The report indicates that 51.3 per cent of Grade Six students in the public primary schools could not read and understand a Grade Three passage of the English language. In the case of private primary schools, the percentage of learners who did not have similar skills in literacy and numbers was 42.3 per cent.

On the whole, 43 students out of 100 Grade Six students failed to answer a Grade Three-level numeracy question. The differences were witnessed among the geographical locations where 45 out of 100 learners in rural areas were found to be in trouble as compared to 38 out of 100 learners in urban areas.

The evaluation will be done in June to July 2025 in all the 47 counties. Four thousand nine hundred three hundred and thirty four children aged 10-15 years were evaluated covering learners in Grade Three to Nine in and out of school. The assessment involved the learners who were in refugee camps in the first instance.

Out of the Learners with the refugee learners, 56 per cent of Grade Six learners could not solve a Grade Three-level mathematics problem.

When Usawa Agenda Executive Director Dr Emmanuel Manyasa introduced the report, he highlighted the importance of literacy in the learning outcomes.

Literacy - the mother of all knowledge. Without reading, then learning becomes very tough, as even the numeracy questions are given in the paragraph form, as Dr Manyasa explained.

Dr Manyasa also observed that the literacy and numeracy performances were evidently more culminating in the Grade Six level, the last year of primary education before one is moved to junior school where he or she takes the Kenya Primary School Education Assessment (KPSEA).

Staffing and financing plan of teachers.

Teacher staffing arrangements in the public primary schools were also reviewed in the report. The results show that an average ratio in the primary schools (public and private) is that of 42:1 learner to teacher and 34:1 learner to teacher respectively.

In public primary schools:

★ The Teachers Service Commission (TSC) employs eight out of every 100 teachers on permanent and pensionable contracts.

★ One out of a 100 teachers is under an internship contract.

★ Boards of management (BoMs) employ one out of 10 teachers on temporary terms.

According to the report, parental involvement in teacher remuneration structure of BoM-employed teachers stands at 63 out of 100 shillings of the national spending which rises to 66 out of 100 shillings in rural schools of the country.

"We discovered that teachers in the Board of Management (BoM) are ill paid, with approximately 50 per cent of the teachers earning less than Sh10,000 per month." Dr Manyasa said that in certain instances, school heads have to use capitation funds to compensate them.

School sanitation and school infrastructure indicators.

Infrastructure measurements have been evaluated in the report where sanitation facilities are characterized as limited in most schools. On average:

★There is an area of 173 learners to one water point.

★ One toilet is shared by 47 girls.

★ One latrine is used by 64 boys.

With regards to utility and digital infrastructure:

♦ Primary schools are served by either electricity or solar to 97 per cent.

♦ The internet is available to 46.3 per cent of the primary schools.

Functional computer laboratories exist in 23.7 per cent of primary schools, of which 53.2 per cent of schools have laboratories at the private institutions.

The enrolment trends and the regional differences.

According to the FLANA 2025 report, the national figure of children aged four to 17 years in school is 94.2 per cent on average.

The 10 counties that have a lower than national average enrolment rate are found in arid and semi-arid lands (ASALs). Garissa County, Mandera County, and Turkana County had the highest number of out-of-school children and children aged four and five years were reported to be the most affected group.

Policy direction and government response.

Due to the consistent gaps in the learning outcomes at the early stages, the Ministry of Education has embarked on the formulation of the comprehensive guidelines that are expected to enhance foundational learning in pre-primary and lower primary education.

The initiative is based on challenges pointed out in terms of implementation, coordination, and financing of the rollout of Competency-Based Education (CBE) curriculum.

According to Ms Martha Oduor, Head of Early Childhood Development (ECD) in the Ministry of Education, there are already interventions in the guidelines, which will see us assist the lagging learners.

The Ministry further reported that Kenya is comparing against other international experiences, which include the strategies used in Rwanda and Brazil, which have shown better results in the literacy and numeracy outcomes in the early grades.

Conclusion

The FLANA 2025 findings could be taken as a comprehensive picture of the situation in the primary education sector, the state of literacy, numeracy, staffing, and infrastructure in the Grade Six transition stage under the Competency-Based Education framework. The data highlights the magnitude and allocation of learning outcomes in the type of schools, regions, and learners, as is recorded in the national assessment.

Half of Grade Six Students Unable to Meet Grade Three Literacy and Numeracy Standards.