Developing Multimedia Enhanced Content to Upgrade Subject Content Knowledge of Secondary School Teachers in Tanzania Joel S. Mtebe, Mussa M. Kissaka, Elia Kibga, and Alfred Mwambela University of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania

1. Developing Multimedia Enhanced Content to
Upgrade Subject Content Knowledge of
Secondary School Teachers in Tanzania
Joel S. Mtebe, Mussa M. Kissaka,Elia Kibga, and Alfred
Mwambela
University of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania
Presenter: Joel S. Mtebe
Lecturer of Computer Science and eLearning
http://works.bepress.com/mtebe/

2. Motivation, problem area
• Tanzania is faced with severe shortage of qualified school
science teachers in Tanzania
• The country needs 26,998 secondary school science teachers
immediately but the tertiary education institutions in the
country can only produce 2,300 graduates annually.
• Of the current 10,400 in-service secondary school science
teachers, many do not have sufficient pedagogical and
subject content knowledge
2015 2nd International Conference of the African Virtual University

3. Motivation, problem area
• While science and mathematics account for 46 percent of the
curriculum, only 28 percent of teachers are qualified to teach
these subjects.
• Physics subject was 26.3% in 2008 and was dropped to 13.7%
in 2011.
• Chemistry was 32.9% in 2008 and was dropped to 15.8% in
2011.
• Biology dropped from 15.1% in 2008 to 9.4% in 2011.
• Mathematics dropped from 9.2% in 2008 to 5.8% in 2011.
• 2015 2nd International Conference of the African Virtual University

4. Research Objectives
• To upgrade subject content knowledge of science and
mathematics teachers using multimedia enhanced
content
2015 2nd International Conference of the African Virtual University

5. Research approach, Methodology
• Need assessment to identify topics that were difficult to
some students and thus needed improvement
• Perceived difficulty topics to teach and for students to
understand were identified.
Subject Topics Subtopics
Physics 20 34
Chemistry 20 47
Biology 14 34
Mathematics 16 32
Total 70 147
2015 2nd International Conference of the African Virtual University

6. Research approach, Methodology
• Course content template was developed to guide teacher
during digitalization process.
• Using the template 12 Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) ( 2 for
each subject) developed the content blue print under the
support of instructional designers
– summarized directly from secondary education textbooks
– summarized from teachers’ handouts
– downloaded from OER repositories and other Internet
sources but they were edited to meet the context of a
given topic
2015 2nd International Conference of the African Virtual University

7. Research approach, Methodology
• Course content were then integrated with various
multimedia elements
2015 2nd International Conference of the African Virtual University
Subject/Type Physics Chemistry Biology Mathemati
cs
Total
Edited Videos 16 6 39 7 68
Animations 7 4 1 45 57
Recorded Videos 10 9 5 1 25
Still pictures 0 0 5 0 5

8. Research approach, Methodology
2015 2nd International Conference of the African Virtual University

9. Research approach, Methodology
• The developed multimedia elements were
integrated into content using Lectora software
and burned into DVDs.
• The same content were uploaded in a customised
Moodle LMS accessible via
http://retooling.udsm.ac.tz.
2015 2nd International Conference of the African Virtual University

10. 2015 2nd International Conference of the African Virtual University

11. Validation of Multimedia Enhanced Content
2015 2nd International Conference of the African Virtual University
• The content was validated by a team 60 facilitators
from four universities (DUCE, MUCE, OUT and SUZA)
and 20 teachers from secondary schools
– If the content covered the knowledge gap identified in the
needs assessment of difficult topics
– The quality of multimedia elements
– If multimedia elements were meeting the proposed
instructional principles and
– The design and presentation of the multimedia enhanced
content.

12. Validation-Interface
2015 2nd International Conference of the African Virtual University
0% 1%
21%
53%
25%
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
70%
80%
Strongly Disagree Disagree Neutral Agree Strongly Agree
Easy to Use
User-Friendly
Easy to Learn
• Respondents were asked to rate the ease of use, user-friendliness,
and the ease to learn the interface.

13. Validation-Content quality
2015 2nd International Conference of the African Virtual University
• Respondents were asked to rate the quality of the multimedia
enhanced content.
0% 1%
15%
42% 42%
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
70%
Strongly Disagree Disagree Neutral Agree Strongly Agree
Up-to-Date
sufficient
educationally significant

14. Validation-Content Accuracy
2015 2nd International Conference of the African Virtual University
• Respondents were asked about the accuracy of the content and if
the content was free of spelling and grammatical errors.
0% 4%
28%
58%
10%
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
70%
Strongly Disagree Disagree Neutral Agree Strongly Agree
Spelling errors
Accurate

15. Problems may not be where you think
they are…
2015 2nd International Conference of the African Virtual University

16. Way forward
• The content were improved and used to train 2,000 teachers
in 19 centers countrywide.
• Conducted Pre test and Post testing
• Formative assessment via SMS quizzes and reminders to
assess the mastery of subject content knowledge of science
and mathematics teachers.
2015 2nd International Conference of the African Virtual University

17. Thank you
2015 2nd International Conference of the African Virtual University