LET me take this time to appreciate those who have been able to express opinions and seeking clarity on what has been discussed in the past three weeks.
Questions have been asked if the changes affect the private schools as well.
If a private school has been administering exams prepared by the Examinations Council of Zambia (ECZ), it is a must that its internal candidates will also sit for the same examination.
From my observation private schools are not informed in time when such changes have been made.
Additionally, it is rare even for teachers from private schools to attend association meetings. The case remains the same for academic or subject competitions private schools rarely participate in such competitions.
The other question has been when are the changes in the structure of the examination papers going to be implemented.
As stated in the first article, the changes are in effect with this year’s Grade 12 ECZ internal candidates. The revised curriculum was implemented in 2014 when the current Grade 12s were in Grade 10.
While for Junior secondary the last year’s intake was the first to sit for exams under the revised curriculum. Additionally, as shared from the previous articles, General Certificate Education (GCE) candidates will sit for their examination under the old curriculum hence they are not affected by the changes in the papers lay out.
This week, I am exploring the changes that have been made to Religious Education. The Zambian curriculum has two Senior Religious Education syllabi; 2044 and 2046. Religious Education (RE) 2044 is traditionally known as the RE taught in mission schools.
Religious Education 2044 has previously been known to have five themes or major topics from the lay man’s language.
These were as follows; Man in a changing society which had three sub themes which are living in a changing society, working in a changing society and Leisure in a changing society. Order and freedom in society, the sub- themes were Justice in society, service in society and Loyalty to society. Life and it had three sub-themes are Happiness, Unending life and Success.
The fourth theme was Man and woman, the sub themes included Family Life, Sex differences and the person, and courtship and marriage. Man’s response through faith and love was the last theme and its sub themes included Man’s search for God, Man’s turning away from God and involvement in the world.
The format of the Final exam paper was that the Paper had five sections from section A, B,C,D and E with three questions per section. Hence in total the paper had fifteen question; each of the themes contributing a question to the final paper.
These questions were derived from the fifteen sub themes, each of the major themes had three topics.
Candidates were required to attempt five questions from each of the five sections or fifteen questions.
Religious Education 2044 as the case with other subjects has also experienced changes in terms of the number of the topics that are in the new syllabus.  RE 2044 still has five themes as earlier stated. However, there are five sub-themes that have been removed from each of the themes and this entails that the number of questions for the exam paper have been reduced as well.
The following are the sub-themes that have been removed and this means there will be no question which will be asked about the same themes. The following are the themes and the sub-theme that have been removed.
Section A, the theme is Man in a changing society and the sub theme which has been removed is Living in a changing society. Section B- Order and Freedom in Society, sub theme which has been removed is Loyalty to society. Section C- Life, sub theme removed is success. Section D- Man and Woman- the sub theme removed is Sex differences and the person. While in Section E- Man’s response To God through faith and hope.
The new lay out of the RE 2044 is as follows; the Paper still has five sections, each section is represented by a theme. The number of questions in a paper has been reduced from three per section to two per section all derived from the sub-themes discussed above. However, candidates will still require to answer five questions each question carrying 20 marks.
The other changes have been in the allocation of marks per question, though still 20 marks but the distribution of 20 marks has been altered.
Previously, the question of every part A of EITHER… OR had four  marks. While part B had two parts Part one and two.
The first part of part B which was Bible passage had 12 marks and part two the application part had 4 marks. This translated in 20 marks.
The new format has experienced changes in the allocation of marks per part. Part A, the EITHER…OR question has 6 marks. Part B, the first part- The Bible passage has 10 marks while the last part- the application part has 4 marks. This is also translated in 20 marks.
Look out for next week article as I share insights on the changes that have been made in Religious Education 2046 and Civic Education subjects.
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