Does the Expected Teaching and Learning Take Place in Preprimary Grades in Zambezi Region, Namibia?

Objective. This paper investigated the occurrence of teaching and learning in preprimary grades in Zambezi region of Namibia. This understanding is crucial as a lack thereof may have negative effects on the country’s future possibly as a result of a weak human capital generated by the foundational phase of the country’s education system. The researcher’s belief therefore is that a weak human capital due to teaching and learning not happening in the foundation grade, in this case preprimary, where children are expected to be empowered with basic skills on which all future learning will be based, weakens the performance of such learners in their future learning. Materials and Methods. Using the lens of Vygotsky’s Sociocultural Theory, data for this research were generated through interviews, and lesson observation, and every participating teacher in this study was observed while teaching to establish whether indeed learners benefited from their teaching and whether their teaching escalated into learning; participants were sampled purposively from three different school contexts of urban, peri urban and rural. Results. The key question which this study sought to provide answers to was: Does the expected teaching and learning take place in preprimary grades in Zambezi region of Namibia? This key question was answered through the following sub-questions: Is there any teaching and learning taking place in 3 selected preprimary grades from 3 different schools in Zambezi region of Namibia? What challenges do teachers face in ensuring that teaching and learning take place? How can the situation be mitigated? Conclusions. The study found that teachers had a superficial understanding of teaching and learning, and that though teachers claimed teaching happened, no learning took place, and teachers did not understand what learning encompassed as they simply understood it (learning) as learners’ ability to answer questions during lessons.