Historical and Philosophical Foundations of Early Childhood Education in Ethiopia

Historical, Sociological and philosophical foundations of early education in Ethiopia 0

Historical and Philosophical Foundations of Early

Childhood Education in Ethiopia

2006

Demeke Gesesse Yeneayhu

Abstract: This article examines the philosophical, historical and social foundations of Early

Childhood Education in Ethiopia and its implication on current societal development. Issues

discussed among others include: Were there really Ethiopian philosophical tenets on the care

and education of Ethiopian kids? If there were such tenets, were they typical to Ethiopia and

Ethiopians? How these philosophical stances shape the Ethiopian child? How traditional

Ethiopian educational institutions care and educate the Ethiopian child? What were the main

principles of these institutions in the care and education of the Ethiopian child? How formal

early childhood education emerges in Ethiopia? Did ‘modern early childhood education’ inherit

the principles of child rearing; care and education recommended by the Ethiopian culture and

philosophy or departed itself away from it? What lessons have to be drawn from the philosophy,

culture, indigenous wisdom and knowledge base of the country to shape its child right, care and

education policy?


Background

A cursory review of the ancient and medieval history of Ethiopia appears to provide some

background information for the emergence of traditional early year’s education in the Country.

Archeological findings indicate that the Country’s recorded history goes back to 800 BC when

the kingdom of D’mt arose in Ethiopia, centering around Yeha (thought to be its capital) in

northern Ethiopia. The D’mt kingdom developed irrigation schemes, used plows, grew millet,

and even made iron tools and weapons. Remains of a large stone temple dating to about 500 BC

still survive at Yeha, near Axum (Stuart Munro-Hay, 1991).

The Country had then passed through different forms of administration after the Kingdom

of D’mt. One of the many successor kingdoms was the Axumite Kingdom which flourished

mainly from the 1st

to the 7th

century AD (Anfray, 1981). The Axumite Kingdom was known for

its high level engineering and architecture. It left many steles, of which the largest Axumite stele

is over 100 feet long carved out of a single rock. The decline of the Axumite Kingdom about the

middle of the seventh century paved a way for the Zagwe Dynasty to come to power. During its

golden ages, from 1150 to 1270, the Zagwe Dynasty left remarkable historical monuments in the

Ethiopian history through the construction of eleven monolithic churches (Tamrat, 1972) which

are recorded by UNESCO as World Heritage Sites. The fall of the Zagwe Dynasty in 1270

marked the beginning a new dynasty system called the Solomonic Dynasty which ruled most

parts of the Country till the second half of the eighteenth century. The decline of the Solomonic

Dynasty marshaled the beginning of the period of the Princes, popularly known locally as the

period of “Zemene Mesafint” which started in the second half of eighteenth century and ended in

the middle of the 19th century. The end of Zemene Mesafint marked the beginning of modern

Ethiopian history (Zewde, 2002a).


Among the above outlined historical periods in Ethiopia, the Axumite period played a

decisive role on the cultural and social fabric of the larger portion of the Ethiopian society

(Zewde, 2002a). It was a period that paved an important milestone for the emergence of a

traditional system of education in Ethiopia. During the 4th

century AD, the then Axumite King,

King Ezana, converted its kingdom in to Christianity. This opened a door for communication

with Egypt and Eastern Mediterranean region (Zewde, 2002a). One of the major forms of

traditional education in Ethiopia-the Church education-was, therefore, the result of the

emergence of Christianity in Ethiopia.

Later in the 16th century, the well-flourished Orthodox Christian tradition had got a

challenge from Jesuit Missionaries, a new phase of interaction of Ethiopia with the West. The

interaction between the Orthodox tradition and the Jesuit challenge created a confusion and

doubt among the Ethiopian communities. As indicated in the Treatise of Zär’a Ya’aqob (1667),

people had faced challenges from two opposite religious gravity as to which religion to follow.

Bahru Zewde hypothesizes that it might be such religious controversy and challenge that

instigated in the seventeenth century the emergence of “rather unusual philosophers by the name

Zär’a Ya’aqob and Wäldä Haywat” (Zewde, 2002b, p. 15) to meditate on many issues of which

religion was but one. Following is, therefore, presented an account of and the role of traditional

church education and the contribution of philosopher Zär’a Ya’aqob and Wäldä Haywat to early

childhood education in Ethiopia.

Child Care and Education: The 17th

C. Ethiopian Philosophers’ Perspective

For the West and even surprisingly for many Ethiopians as well, the existence of

Ethiopian philosophy was seen scornfully and skeptically. That is why there are writers who

have questioned the authenticity of the authorship of the treaties of Zär’a Ya’aqob (1592-1685)


and his disciple Walda Heywot (his age was not recorded) believing that Ethiopia, a country with

no philosophical thoughts. For instance, Conti Rossini claimed that the author of the treatise of

Zär’a Ya’aqob is Padre Urbino. But, in his seminal works Claude Sumner has clearly justified

with evidences that there were indeed Ethiopian philosophers whose thought by any standard

was Ethiopian (Sumner, 1976).

I am not of course a philosopher by profession, but I can think that many of the problems

that we face in ordinary life can only be answered if we ask questions with a distinctive feature

of philosophy. These questions could be questions about life, about knowledge and truth, right

and wrong, mind and matter; about human nature, the universe, etc. Any thought about these

questions counts as philosophy. Thus philosophy is likely to be found in every human society,

past and present- wherever there are people struggling to live and make sense of their lives.

Hence, Ethiopia, a country which has survived as an independent nation for thousands of years,

could not be an exception to this.

In Ethiopia, therefore, there are works of philosophy both translations as well as

originally Ethiopic. The translation may include The Physiologue, a fifth-century Ethiopian

translation-adaptation from a Greek original; The Book of the Philosophers, translated from

Arabic and revised in the early sixteenth-century by the Ethiopian scholar, Abba Mikael; and The

Life and Maxim of Skendes, a sixteenth-century anonymous Ethiopic narrative of the classic

Oedipus tragedy found by Claude Sumner in a manuscript housed in East Berlin archives. The

original work in Ethiopian philosophy includes the Treatise of Zär’a Ya’aqob (1667) and The

Treatise of Walda Heywot, the pupil of Zär’a Ya’aqob (in the early 18th

century). Other modern

Ethiopian scholars have also reflected on different aspects of Ethiopian philosophy: The Oromo


conception of their environment, a book by Workineh Kalbessa, and the Works of Messay

Kebede are worth mentioning among many others.

In this particular section, among the many works of Zär’a Ya’aqob and his disciple

Walda Heywat, an analysis of their thoughts on the care and education of children is presented

below.

These two prominent 17th

century Ethiopian philosophers actually philosophize on many

issues such as examining creation, examining the nature of soul, examining the faith, the nature

of knowledge, the universe, humanity, law, love, nation, health, meaning of life, culture, the

concept of time, hope and virtue, equality of man and women, work and cooperation, religious

tolerance, etc.(Sumner, 1976).

Despite the claim that has been given to Ethiopia for the absence of autonomous thinking,

no methodological investigation, no questioning, no doubt, especially about the existence of

God, these two philosophers have proved that these characteristics have been in existence to the

oral tradition of the Qene School in the traditional Ethiopian church education. Zär’a Ya’aqob

himself wrote in his autobiography that he has been trained in the Qene School and thus

thinking, methodological investigation, questioning and doubt exists in the Qene School

(Sumner, 1976). As he clearly put it in his Hatäta after he finished learning in the Zema bet he

went to another master to study Qene and säwasaw(grammar) where he has got the power to

think, meditate, and critically question and doubt other’s thoughts and writings. He said, after he

finished studying Qene and säwasaw, he entered in to a school of Interpretation of the Holy

Scriptures where he studied for ten years among which he said that “he learned the

interpretations both of the Franğ and of our own scholars. Oftentimes their interpretation did not

agree with my reason”. This clearly shows that Zär’a Ya’aqob was used to applying critical


investigation of what he reads and learns using his power of reasoning to uncover truths and

wisdoms. He has never tried to accept blindly others’ point of view; rather he used to produce his

own meaning of reality using the tool of critical investigation.

Had Ethiopians have the chance to use Zär’a Ya’aqob’s methodology of thinking as a

filter to select portions of Western culture and technological development and combine with

their own traditions like what the East Asians have done, Ethiopia would have, by now, appear to

have a different face; what a missed opportunity indeed!

These philosophers argue that the source of knowledge is reasoning and methodological

doubting which they call it ‘Hatäta’ or Inquiry and they also applied this technique in their

thoughts about child care and education too.

Zär’a Ya’aqob even used rational thought as an instrument for examining the nature of

things including the essence of God. Like Descartes, for Zär’a Ya’aqob faith is not superior to

reason but can become superior to reason, if it is first examined and passes the test of natural

reason. Regarding this, Claude summer argued that modern philosophy in the sense of a personal

rationalistic critical investigation began in Ethiopia with Zär’a Ya’aqob at the same time in

England and France (Sumner, 1985).

Zär’a Ya’aqob and Walda Heywot applied their tool of methodological doubting to their

discourses about the importance of early years education as well. Claude Sumner (1976, p. 15)

translates the thoughts of Zär’a Ya’aqob about the importance of childhood care and education as

follows:

The creator himself wills that we adorn our life with science and work; for such an end

did he gives us reason and power. Manual labor comes from the will of God… because

with out it the necessities of our life cannot be fulfilled. Likewise marriage of one man


with one woman and education of children … Moreover there are many other things

which agree with our reason and are necessary for our life or for the existence of man

kind.

Zär’a Ya’aqob argues that through his own deep, sustained personal reflection and

meditation he has come to the conclusion that our reason can tell us many things which are

necessary for our life and the same with the need for the care and education of children as it is

essential for the becoming and smooth running of a given household and a nation. He equates the

vitality of children’s education with the role of science and work to embellish our day-to-day

life.

Zär’a Ya’aqob also has an answer to some critics of traditional education who argue that

traditional education in Ethiopia was exclusively for children of the nobility. He himself was

from a poor farming family but had entered to the then existing traditional system of education.

Moreover, one could infer from his autobiography that as a child he was cleaver and his teacher

advised his father to send him to higher level of education a testimony for the existence of

traditional system of education from lower level to higher level education like that of the

monastic universities in Europe.

…I am a son of a poor farmer in the district of Aksum. …When I grew up, my father sent

me to school in view of my instruction. And after I had read the Psalms of David my

teacher said to my father: “This young son of yours is cleaver and has the patience to

learn; if you send him to a (higher) school, he will be a master and a doctor.” (Ibid, p. 3)

Zär’a Ya’aqob’s disciple Walda Heywot have continued his tutor’s thoughts more

profoundly particularly in the care and education of children. In his opening pages of his treatise,


he clearly explains that he is writing his book for the children of Ethiopia to know about the truth

and live with it.

You have heard what has been said of the ancients: Give the wise man the opportunity

and he will give [you] of his wisdom. Similarly I thought of writing what God taught me

during my long life and what I examined with the rectitude of my intelligence, that this

book serve as a guide in the counseling and the teaching of science to our children who

come after us, as a stimulant for inquiry on the part of the wise, for understanding the

works of God and for widening their wisdom. (ibid, p.27)

Walda Heywot had basically written his book to help parents how to rear, care and

educate their children. I can say that his book is not only a philosophy book but also a book of

counseling. He advised people to make research and inquiry to distinguish truth form falsehood.

He said we shouldn’t believe everything written in a book before we undertake a thorough

inquiry and critical examination. He said:

…don’t believe what is written in books until you have examined it and found it to be

right…If you examine these books, you will soon find in them a shameful wisdom which

does not befit our God-given reason with which we seek the truth. I do not mean all men

and all books are always false, but I say it is possible they are false. Therefore, you do not

know weather they say the truth or not, unless you examine carefully what is said or

written, that you may clearly know what you ought to accept and that you understand the

work of God; for inquiry is the door through which we have access to wisdom and reason

is the key God gave us, with which we can open this door and enter the hall of his secretes

and share the treasures of His wisdom.(ibid, 28)


Inquiry learning approach is the current tool of active learning recommended by modern

educational philosophers and theorists. However, Walda Heywot has recommended this tool in

search of wisdom and truth back in the 17th

century in Ethiopia as well.

Walda Heywot advises Ethiopian parents of the time on how they could rear their

children as eloquently written as follows:

Thank God for having given your children, be happy in them and live them as part of your

own selves; bring them up with great care and wisdom; see to it that you provide them with

everything necessary for their life; guide them from childhood in the way in which God

wants them to walk; teach them what they should know and do; do not give them bad

example; let them not learn how to do evil by our example; give them an example of

prudence and good conduct that they may be prudent and behave well …(Ibid, p.52)

As we can clearly understand from his ‘Hatäta’, rearing a child needs great care and

knowledge. Parents should fulfill children’s basic needs and teach what is useful for their life.

He was such a Liq (educated) of his time that he explains the role of social models in children’s

education, a popular learning strategy which is highly recommended by today’s educators as

well. Children highly need good role models in every aspect. He advised parents to be good role

models for their children. His counseling for parents on child rearing practices was by any

standard a modern approach.

Among the many works of Walda Heywot particularly his descriptions of the behavior of

young children and his consequent advice-the need for special approaches of taking care of

children that consider their behavior, is his phenomenal work. According to Walda Heywot:

As long as your children are young, let not their angry and enflamed character irritate

you, because they can not as yet distinguish the good from the bad. Be patient and


strength your heart; you yourself were brought up the same way, so you must educate

your children with all patience without lassitude. Leave aside anger and throw out

indignation, and do not be like those fools who get angry at their children and hit them

each time they break a pot by accident or pour out a glass full of water with out their

fault, but keep silent if they act in an evil way. Bear with your children if by accident

they damage unwittingly some of your belongings. But chastise them and beat them if you

see in their hearts malice, pride, disobedience, anger, slothfulness, or if they speak evil,

calumniate, curse, or if they steal, plunder, and tear away the goods of others, or if they

fornicate or do something similar; then chastise them, rebuke them, beat them in the right

time, lest they become accustomed to do evil on account of your silence. Unless you

punish them in their childhood, they grow up in their malice and once they reach

adulthood, they will no longer listen to your warnings. (ibid, p.53)

As you can understand from his advises, what children do at young age which may look

unacceptable in the eye of the adults is something natural for young children. Since young

children are not yet know what is bad and good, parents/caregivers should handle these

behaviors wisely and not in manner that destroys their love and affection to humanity. When

even we know that children misbehave purposefully and if we have to punish them, it shouldn’t

be to hurt them badly but to help them know that what they actually do is not useful for their life.

According to him, the immediacy of the punishment or chastise when children do something bad

could reasonably help them to associate the punishment for their wrong-deeds not for something

else. Of course any form of physical or psychological punishment of young children is currently

against their rights. But I think it seems that Walda Heywot indicated punishment just to show

how early childhood care and education is so important for later success in life. That is why in


his advice, he in advance warns parents that when children are young they may behave angrily,

show enflamed character that may irritate adults, but it is because of the fact that ‘they can not as

yet distinguish the good from the bad”.

That means, he just added the punishment case to give emphasis on the importance of

early childhood care and education on later children’s success in life. For example, as you can

see below from the story that he wrote, if children got the proper care and education at early

years, they will live a happy and decent life later in adolescence and adulthood.

There was a robber who roamed in the countryside; he pillaged and killed passers-by.

The king having heard this sent his soldiers. They caught him and brought him in chains

to the king, who sentenced him to death. As they took him to the place where he was to

be beheaded, the old father of this robber was following him in tears. When this robber

caught sight of his father, he asked to say a few words to him before his death. Once he

got close to his father, he tried to hit him, but he failed to do with his hands tied together.

So he began to inflict upon him a horrible bite with his teeth. All the people around him

shouted; “Really this bandit deserved to death since he wanted to kill even his father.”

But he told them: “It was not I who deserve to death, but my father deserves (it); when in

my childhood I began stealing corn and grain, he praised me when he should have

punched me, and accustomed into robbery. For this reason I become a bandit until I

reached this of my death. Had my father punished me at the appropriate time, I would

not have come this condemnation. Having said this, he was beheaded; but all those who

had children understood the seriousness of the matter. (Ibid, p.53)

Basically in most of his ‘Hatäta’ he used to transmit his advises by making relevant

stories to the issue. This is of course one of the best tradition of Ethiopians. The relevance and


appropriateness of his stories could make me possibly to say that Walda Heywot was a known

story maker and teller of his time. I think he was such a wise man of his time who clearly

understood the viability of stories to better explain issues and teach important life lessons to

people in general and children in particular in an interesting and easier way.

In his treatise on “Respect for Parents” section, which is also one of the major character

taught for children in the traditional church schools as mentioned earlier, Walda Heywot also

advised children to respect parents expressed as follows:

Child and young man, respect and love your parents, for a time will come when you want

the respect and filial piety of your own children….If you are hard and unkind to your

parents and elders, God will order that you be ill treated in your old age…Listen to the

advise of elders; do not spurn their wisdom; do not neglect them in their presence lest

they complain about you, but respect them always with a humble tone of voice and an

affable behavior; keep only this in your mind; examine everything closely, deliberate and

persist in your good [endeavor(Ibid, 42).

Of course respecting parents and elders by young children is typically an Ethiopian

tradition and it is this tradition that Walda Heywot also advised to preserve and respect. Walda

Heywot was such a person to be considered as an early childhood educator for his belief on the

importance of stories for children’s learning and his expertise in story telling. He said:

There was an old blind man; one day he quarreled with his son; his son was cruel. While

they were quarrelling, his son, full of anger, held his father’s leg and pulled it over stones

and thorns; his father was weeping and crying in a weak voice. When they reached a


well-known place, the old man cried out and said to this son: ‘Let go of me for a while

and listen to what I say; [the son] relaxed his grip and said: “speak!” The old man

crying bitterly said the following: “During my youth I quarreled with my father just as

you did with me today in my anger I hit him and dragged him to this place. God the

avenger gives me back today the evil I deserved. But you, leave me now and do not make

your penalty greater than mine; it will not be remitted, but it will fall back upon you”

(Ibid, 42).

One of the most outstanding and repeatedly emphasized works of Walda Heywot is his

advice on the use of good role models in the teaching of good conduct and wisdoms to children.

Use of role models and story telling which are prime important tools to teach young kids

according to Walda Heywot are also the most widely recommended approaches by research.

…. You also should fear for your children and bring them up in the fear of God and in the

knowledge of what they should do. When you admonish your children, do not admonish

them with anger or with words of course or imprecations, but with words of wisdom and

counseling so that they understand the chastisement is for their own benefit and utilize.

Always teach them and instruct them with words of doctrine maxims, stories, and

example of other men so that they may keep from doing evil and learn to do good (Ibid,

54).

When even parents warn children from their bad deeds, Walda Heywot advised not to use

any form of curse and harsh words, rather with wisdom and counseling. Walda Heywot also

argues that education is a lifelong process. Learning never stops. He said:


Do not become disheartened with having to go on learning and do nor give it up during

all your life; do not ever say: “I have learned a lot; I have enough knowledge. Even if

you learn the teaching of all men, there are many things you do not know. Take into

consideration many doctrines in order that you be acquainted with many efforts [to reach

the truth]: do not continue yourself to one doctrine, this would be laziness. Rather look at

the bee which collects [honey] from the flavor of the field: it does not stop at one flower

or at one field, but it goes from one to another, gathering from all flowers and produces

two elements, which are honey and wax., one gives pleasure when drunk during the day,

the other serves as a torch at night while it gives light. In the same way, if you gather

wisdom from all doctrines you can obtain two elements: the honey of good deeds which is

sweet and uplifts your heart, the wax of your doctrine which brings forth the light of your

intelligence, that it will serve as a lamp for the blind of the earth and the illiterate and

will expel darkness from the heart of those who sleep in the night of ignorance and are in

the darkness of their foolishness(Ibid, 43).

The elegance of his metaphor is awesome. He also succinctly argued that there is no

single way of understanding truth. There are multiple ways of uncovering reality. He advised that

one should not limit himself/herself to a single paradigm of knowledge rather to examine things

from divergent perspective would help to clearly understand the essence of things. Walda

Heywot finally recommends the following contents to be taught for children-Writing Skills,

Manual Work, Reading, Ethics/Good Conduct and other important life skills

Despite the existence of great minds like Walda Heywot, Ethiopian kids grow up in a

school system being told that all great men and women in our planet are all non-Ethiopians, non-

Africans. They don’t have any model whom their soul could cherish and stand in his/her


shoulder. I think Ethiopians should start to value and salute their organic philosophers and

intellectuals. Ethiopian kids need to read in their stories that they can be on the shoulder of their

giants.

I wonder the multiplicity of books, monographs, articles, etc. written by consultants

coming from either Europe or America stating all the evils about Ethiopia and very little about its

good culture, tradition, philosophy and science in the Country that could have been bases for

further strengthening our development. I don’t mean to say that the limitations and side effects of

Ethiopian culture shouldn’t be a point of discussion but why not at the same time to know and

emphasize on the important traditional values too.

History of traditional Ethiopian education

While it is difficult to say when exactly early formal education began in Ethiopia, there is

little doubt that its roots emerged from the traditional Ethiopian Orthodox Church (Pankhurst,

1955). As the traditional custodian of the nation’s culture, this institution provided education to

Ethiopian children and adults, equivalent to modern elementary to university level education,

since its establishment as a national Church in 330 A.D (Ethiopian Orthodox Church, 2007).

The higher level education system (monastic university) was devoted to teaching subjects such

as theology, philosophy, computation, history, poetry and music. Many such schools function to

this date, thus forming one of the oldest continuous systems of education in the world (Wagaw,

1979). This traditional church education system enabled Ethiopia to emerge as the only country

in Sub-Saharan Africa having ancient written culture and well-developed numerals of its own.


The traditional system of church education in Ethiopia was actually a system of education

with four distinct and successive stages. In the first level, called ‘Fidel Bet’, children learn the

Ethiopic alphabet, reading and writing, simple arithmetic, and discipline (respecting the elders).

Young kids in the ‘Fidel Bet’ firstly learn the first 26 basic letters in the Ge’ez alphabets and

then the rest 156 syllographs. Syllographs are essentially those additional strokes and

modifications which are added on to the main forms to indicate a vowel sound associated with it

or to make aural adjustments in the basic consonant sound using the Abughida; a simple

Ethiopian pedagogical scheme under which children are taught reading and writing more

quickly. Under this scheme of alphabetization, the various letters to be learned are mixed up in

such a way as to teach the various combinations with vowels with ease. The consonants of the

alphabet are read sideways and downwards in combination with the vowels in such a way that

children grasp the idea of reading more easily. They also learn the Ethiopian numerals side-by-

side with the Abughida (Ethiopian Orthodox Church, 2007).

This level of education was given to children starting from age 4 (Gedey, 1983E.C.). The

‘Fidel Bet’ is similar to the current elementary school, specifically Grade-One in the country.

The second level is the ‘Zema bet’-school of hymn, where students learn the hymnody of

St. Yared, a well-known Ethiopian scholar of music even before the European Mozart. He was

born in the first half of the 6th

century. His hymn has three modes named: Geez, Araray and Ezil.

The hymn books composed by St. Yared are ‘Digua’, ‘Tsoma Digua’, ‘Mieraf’, ‘Zimare’,

‘Mewasit’, and ‘the chant of the Liturgy’ (Ethiopian Orthodox Church, 2007). A clever student

has to finish most of these hymns before promoted to the third and highest stage. Surprisingly, in

the book of Digua, one can find the elaborate system of musical notation with signs and letters as


well as musical dots which indicates rising and/or lowering of the voices and other modes of

pronunciation (Ethiopian Orthodox Church, 2007).

The third level is the ‘Qene bet’-school of poetry which focuses on church music,

composition of poetry, theology, history, painting, and manuscript writing. It also adds the

teaching of philosophy, the main text being ‘Metsafe-Falasfa, Book of Wise Philosophers, which

is a translated version of Ethiopian philosophy.

The next higher level is the ‘Metsahaf bet’–(school of text/books), where students learn

an in-depth study and analysis of the sacred books. In this stage, other subjects like world history

and Ethiopian history are also given. A student who has gone through all the four stages of

education successfully will be called a ‘Liq’ like being a professor. Graduates of this system of

education are characterized by their dedication to give services to their country and to their

church. They are disciplined, well-behaved, with high moral ground, sympathy and thought. It

was these people who were even serving their country in different Ministerial and other offices

during the period of Menelik II, and Haliselasie I and as a chronicle writer in the former kings

during Medieval Ethiopia.

This traditional system of education has contributed in many ways to the social

transformation and cultural advancement of the Country. It has made tremendous contributions

towards enabling the Country to be the master of its own destiny in the possession of a written

language. The expansion of literature as a result of the invention of Ethiopic scripts is one of the

most effective ways by which the traditional Church education institution has been fighting

illiteracy for centuries. It has been doing this by making churches and monasteries the centers of

learning where spiritual enlightenment was going hand-in-hand with secular education in the

form of acquiring the knowledge of reading and writing.


In addition to producing the Nation’s work force for the different ministerial and

administrative positions for a very long period of time till the advent of modern education in the

Country, it also teaches important characters to children such as the discipline of hard work,

cooperation, tutoring junior children by senior students, respecting elders, love of their Country,

determinism, endurance and persistence; just to mention the few.

Moreover, those children who were attending the different levels of church education

have different uniforms made of skin of sheep, goat or cow to show their level of education. The

school uniform idea in our modern schools today must have evolved from the traditional church

education.

Success in the school is also considered to be a factor of hard work rather than nature.

Every student is advised to study hard to move from one level to the next higher level.

One of the most important contributions of traditional church education is in pedagogy.

Reading aloud and murmuring are individual learning methods. When the child reads aloud, the

teacher listens and makes immediate feedback; either praise or correction. Reading aloud and

murmuring helps students to memorize volumes of books. It is not unusual in Ethiopia to hear

utterance of a big volume of book orally by a deacon with out any mistake. These methods might

have indeed the potential of increasing memory capacity of those children passing through the

traditional system of education, which, of course, has to be verified by conducting further

research.

Another most important thinking tool that the traditional church education system

employs is the Qene. It is highly creative and requires enormous skill. It generates lively

discussion about the merits of a particular composition. It uses word-plays so that there is a

surface meaning and a hidden meaning locally called ‘Sem’ and ‘Werk’ (Wax and Gold) in a way


that is difficult to convey in translation. The analogy of wax and gold comes from the craft of the

goldsmith during the making of jewelry. The image is first formed in wax, because wax is pliable

to carve. The wax is then covered with clay or porcelain, which hardens. When the molten gold

is poured into the clay or porcelain, the wax melts away, leaving the gold, with the desired

image. Thus, encrypting a hidden message in Qene is an ancient art of creating more than one

meaning, where the apparent ‘wax’ and the hidden ‘gold’ are intertwined in the same word.

Of course, Qene is the highest level of learning in the traditional education system. It

takes many years to become a teacher in this field and a minimum of 12 years of full study is

required for those who attend this school. However, it is possible to design a Qene curriculum

that considers the age of children.

There are three major different ways of producing and interpreting Qene. One way is by

stressing on the word while pronouncing. Once a word is written in phonetic Geez, it can be

pronounced with slight variations by putting the stress on different parts of the word to produce

different sounds, thereby giving more than one meaning to one and the same word.

Let’s see a classic example of Qene that an anonymous author conveys the apparent

confusion of the Country as a result of a mere assimilation of the Western’s culture by the first

approach, stressing on a word when pronouncing.

Yeferenjun wut’et bermel ameta’chuhu

Yerasachen eka enesera eyalkuachuhu.

In the first line: ‘Yeferenjun… bermel’ tells of bringing a barrel, the work of the ‘Ferenj’

or Westerners. In the second line it further clarifies that the writer had asked not for a barrel, but

for ‘our own local clay pot’ or "enesera." That is the wax part. The gold, however, is in the word

play of: "enesera," which can have two meanings by just shifting the stress from ‘ene’ -se’ra’ or


‘en-ese-ra.’ In the Geez phonetic, both these words are written in exactly the same way, as there

is no symbol for accents to show where the stress should be. The word ‘ene-se’-ra’ means: ‘let us

make,’ which changes the entire meaning of the Qene as the ‘gold’ now expresses the desire of

the author to make or manufacture ‘our own craft,’ and not borrow from the ‘ferenj or

Westerner.’

The second way of producing and interpreting Qene is to depend on one word having, or

of being interpreted, in more than one way. This is true also for many other languages, where one

word can often have more than one meaning. In the late 60’s, Ian Smith, who had declared the

then British colony, Rhodesia, and made himself prime minister, had hanged many black people

who opposed his regime. That was when a certain Ethiopian cleric took up his Begenna (an

Ethiopian portable harp) to express the following Amharic Qene in a song, as a form of solidarity

with the people using the second type of method:

Ian SmithTeseyeme alu

KesissBe Englizu papas

Ejun zerega le-nechochu…

Meskelun le-tkurochu…

The Qene is hidden in the word "meskelun" in the fifth line, the first word. It means

cross: the cross on which Jesus was hanged, or the symbol of a cross priests usually carry, and

would often use when blessing their people. But the same word, without any change in stress,

also means: to hang with a rope.

The third technique of Qene is where two or more words may be joined to become one,

or a word may be split into two or more parts, to change the meaning. In a famous poem

rendered to Emperor Menelik II, the word ‘Ya lemtam’ is used in this technique as follows:


Bimeru’gnem erswo, bigedlu’gnem erswo

Yalemtam Menelik bye lesdebwo

The ‘Sem’ or surface meaning is in ‘Ya lemtam,’ which literally means ‘that leper,’ while

the gold is: ‘Yalem ta’m’ or ‘the sweetness of the world.’ Thus the producer of this Qene gave a

wonderful and hidden praise, while pretending to insult Emperor Menelik II on account of his

leprosy. The poem also addressed Menelik as ‘thou’ in the tone of respect.

In understanding and interpreting Qene, students should engage themselves, first looking for the

right word in the Qene (poem), which has double meaning, i.e. the ‘Sem’ and ‘Werk’. Then, they

should interpret the word and state the implication. This process requires attention and engages

children in critical thinking. Interpreting Qene helps children to learn vocabularies in context.

While children are struggling to look for a word in the Qene that holds the “Sem” and ‘Werk’,

they must try to understand every concept in the Qene by using the three techniques of producing

and interpreting Qene. This process of interpreting Qene in different ways would help children to

develop skills and knowledge of understanding and seeing issues, concepts, and things from

different angles. Children will also develop an attitude that there could be possibilities of

understanding things from divergent perspectives.

Like Qene, there is also a culture of traditional church education in producing different

colors and size of beads which specifically is used by Monks during their prey. Monks make

coils of beads and wear them piled one on top of the other, high on their neck and chest, much

like a collar. The number of beads in one coil is either 41 or 64, which has of course its own

reason in religious canon. Muslim population in Ethiopia has also such tradition of making coils

of beads. It is, therefore, possible to adapt and introduce the use of beads in preschools for young


children to learn counting, operations of addition and multiplication, categorization (categorizing

small beads and large beads, based on different colors) and for older children to understand the

basic number systems such as base-ten and place values, to understand concepts of carrying and

borrowing in arithmetic, to understand combinations of 5 and 10 and complement of numbers, to

visualize close relations between numbers and numerals and to develop children's ability of

mental calculations. The adapted coil beads may be called an Ethiopian Abacus. The adaptation

could come in different forms.

Another important characteristic of traditional church education is that it is free of charge

and, hence, opens the door of education for every child. Of course, for only religious reason, few

girls used to attend these schools in the past. It is possible to say with out exaggeration that

traditional church education is an education system for the poor children. In a situation where

children with disabilities have limited options in life (which was true in Ethiopia mainly in the

past), traditional church education accommodates these children as well. Most of the professors

(Liq) at the different levels of church education were/are individuals with disabilities.

This system of education, however, has been severely criticized by many writers as

dogmatic. Moreover, it is regarded as an education that emphasis obedience and subservience to

authority (Amare, 1967). Others also criticized it for its narrowness in encouraging personal

initiative and creativity. Research, investigation, experimentation, theorizing and speculation

have been actively discouraged in such schools (Fulass, 1974) and both the traditional church

and Quran education were institutions where knowledge can never be invalidated and criticized

(Dange, 1968).


Of course, the institutions which were running the traditional schools were religious

dominions and hence serious obedience to the master (the Liq) could be expected from students.

The absence of experimentation and theorizing commented by these critics was not actually

because the system discourages such things consciously, rather the very curriculum was not up to

and ready to accommodate these elements in those days. As mentioned earlier, there are different

subjects both secular and religious in the traditional church education system. In the case of

religious subjects, students were of course not able to comment or criticize the subject of the

study. But, this was/is not reflected when children learn numerals, astronomy or any other

secular subjects. Therefore, a criticism which makes the institutions left to a total absurdity is to

me highly exaggerated. We are also bluntly criticizing the system of education that produces

civil servants such as judges, governors, scribes, treasures, and administrators who have loyally

served their nation in the periods (Wagaw, 1979). This is not of course to say that traditional

system of education does not have limitations. Rather, there are many important elements that we

could have preserved from this system of education by improving the limitations.

There were a lot of essential qualities of the traditional system of education that we could

have preserved such as ‘a shared pursuit of virtue’, the ‘inquiry methodology of the Qene bet’, ‘a

respect to elderly’, ‘endurance and patience as means to success’, the immediate connection of

learning and doing’-you learn Zema or Qene to use it for immediate service in the church or in

the community, ‘tutoring the junior-student by advanced student’, ‘tolerance’, ‘hard work and

study as means to success in education’, ‘strong nation sentiment’, to mention the few, which all

are identities of Ethiopians.


When modern education started in Ethiopia in the 1900s, however, it was exclusively a

Western system that deracinates children from their history, culture, language, psychology,

philosophy, religion, folklores, literatures, arts and value system in general which the

indoctrination even badly starts early in childhood. All those valuable ingredients of the

traditional system of education outlined earlier did not get any place at all. There was simply a

wild rush to modernize Ethiopia, a fantasy of getting a technologically and scientifically

developed nation through a leapfrog approach. However, they did not foresee what the Western

system of education that they were introducing could bring home. I do share Professor Fikre

Tolossa’s concern that Western education has alienated us from our value system (Tolossa,

2006). The Ethiopian youth who have passed through the Western system of Education did

indeed took not the sciences and technology of the West, but their psyche, manners, cultural

orientations and life styles. A simple testimony to this assertion is to simply observe the daily

behavior of Ethiopian urban youths which abandoned their home dressing styles, hairstyles,

variety of cultural manifestations; festivals, etc. which are all doomed by their Western-engraved

psych because they are traditional, archaic, unstylish, and non-modern.

This problem of the Ethiopian youth is well felt and eloquently put by Tolossa (2006); an

Ethiopian knotted by Western Education:

(The Ethiopian youth) “has a tendency to look down upon Ethiopian things labeling them

as backward, and looks upon anything Western highly. If there is anything Ethiopian he

appreciates, it is the food-the Kitffo and DoroWot (most favorite local foods). As such, he

dreams to visit Paris and New York instead of Axum and Lalibela (historical sites in

Ethiopia). Given the choice to read between Charles Dickens and Haddis Alemayheu

(known Ethiopian Novelist), he prefers the former. He highly esteems Marx and Kant, but


is not even aware of the existence of Ethiopian philosophers such as Zär’a Ya’aqob and

Walda Heywot. If he is cultured in the Western sense, whether his appreciation and

knowledge are superficial or not, he appreciates and gives impression to know Mozart

than St. Yared. He values more the Guitar than the Kirar(local musical instrument), any

Western dance than Iskista and Dankira (local dancing styles), Western outfits than the

Shema and Ye Tibeb Libs (local dresses), beer than Tella (local beer), wine than Tedge

(local drink made of mainly honey), and whisky than Katikala (local alcoholic drink). He

is well versed in China’s, Russia’s and West Europe’s history, politics, music, languages,

literature, philosophy, etc. but very little, if any, in those of Ethiopia. He prefers to speak

in European languages than any of his native tongues. He speaks to his children and

encourages them to speak in European languages than his native languages thinking his

children will be more “civilized” if they speak [these] languages. In an extreme case of

his identity crisis, he will also give his children European than Ethiopian names”

(Emphasis added).

Ethiopians could have learnt a lot from East Asians, India, etc. about the possibility of

development without degrading and cursing one’s own culture and value system. The Japanese

still maintained their cultural tradition of praising a mother who succeeded in bringing up a child

to a level best in their current early childhood education and care programs. Ethiopia has also a

lot of useful traditional child rearing practices, folklores, games, songs, play materials, etc. in the

different communities of Ethiopia that the Country should uncover through research and could

be used as bases for early childhood care and education programs.


Some of the traditional practices in the education of young children in Ethiopia which are

potential resources in addition to the values of church education mentioned earlier include-the

availability of rich traditional stories. Story telling is one of the most valued sources of

indigenous wisdom for teaching young children how to develop their memory, how to acquire

pre-mathematical skills, for moral, social and language development, and the propagation of

Ethiopian culture. There are a number of proverbs that can be used to teach children different

useful characters such as warning, reconciliation, cooperation, charity, respect, wisdom, self-

reliance, advice, forgiveness, hospitality, patience, appreciation, persistence, solidarity, struggle,

and imitation/modeling (Demeke, 2007).

There are also many other traditional and cultural resources in the different ethnic groups

of Ethiopia that are useful in the education of young children. Identifying such indigenous

knowledge and practices can support government and other interested stakeholders’ efforts to

develop viable programs that assist communities to address the holistic development of children

more meaningfully.

The Beginning of ‘Modern’ Preschools in Ethiopia

Later in the 20th

century, the then Emperor of the Country, Menelik II1, recognized that

greatly improved education would be a major requirement for a modern Ethiopia. In line with his

aspirations, in 1908 Menelik established the first public school called Menelik II School.

Likewise, eight years prior to this first public school, the first modern preschool2 (kindergarten)

was established in Drie Dawa (a town in the eastern part of the Country) for the children of

French consultants who were helping build the first railroad in Ethiopia (Demeke, 2003).

1 Menelik II became emperor in 1889 and ruled the country until 1913.

2 In Ethiopia ‘pre-primary school’, ‘kindergarten’ and ‘preschool’ are different names for education of children

before age 7, the age for primary school entry.


Then, a number of private pre-schools attached to the then existing educational

institutions such as the English School, the German School, Lycee Gebre Mariam and the like

were started, giving services for children of the rich parents in Addis Ababa (the capital city).

But, Pre-School as a general community services began in August 1963 E.C., with few pilot

projects established in the major towns of the country under the Ministry of National Community

Development and Social Affairs. Foreign nationals mainly Swedish and American Peace Corp

Volunteers ran these Centers. When these volunteers left for their country, the program was

taken over by Women Village Level Workers who were not specifically trained for pre-school

(MNCDSA, 1972).

By the year 1972, there were more than 30 privately owned pre-schools mostly in the

Addis Ababa area; and 30 pre-schools in both rural and urban areas sponsored by the Ministry of

National Community Development and Social Affairs (MNCDSA) and headed by Village Level

Workers. In December 6, 1971 the MNCDSA established the first six months model training

course for Pre-school Workers in Addis Ababa, a response to the grave need fro trained

preschool teachers (Ibid).

Developments of similar programs were very slow compared to kindergarten

expansion in other nations during the same period of time. From 1908-1974, for example, only

77 kindergartens were established. These programs allowed space for only 7,573 out of 3.5

million children age 4-6 (National Children’s Commission, 1982a). Although the largest

populations of children live in rural areas of Ethiopia, these kindergartens were limited nearly

exclusively to urban areas of the Country and were run by missionaries, private organizations

and Ministry of National Community Development and Social Affairs. Surprisingly Ministry of

Education did not pay much attention to early childhood education during this time period, as the


government rationale was to quickly develop literate adults who could operate in the emerging

modern state.

The socialist revolution of 1966 E.C3 was a turning point in the history of early childhood

education in Ethiopia. In 1973 E.C, an independent commission called ‘Ethiopian Children’s

Commission’ was established with a task of caring and educating Ethiopian children. This

commission have accomplished many activities by organizing important seminars and

workshops such as the ‘Need of children with disability, Ethiopian Children’s need, Children’s

Books, Children’s Programs in the Media, Children’s Health in Schools, the Role of Play in

Children’s Holistic Development, and Children’s Nutrition’ among many others (Ibid).

Moreover, in 1974 E.C., for the first time in the history of the country, a manual for kindergarten

in Ethiopia was produced by the commission (National Children’s Commission, 1982b).

It was also quickly recognized at that time that the support of women would be critical to

the success of the revolution. This recognition was readily evident in a major political motto of

the time, “Revolution can't be successful without the active participation of women." In

response to this need, many childcare centers and kindergartens began to emerge. More

specifically, during this period, for the first time in the history of the Country, preschool

education became part of the national education policy. Following this, the first national

preschool curriculum was developed. Moreover, prior to the revolution, those teaching younger

children lacked specialized training except the batch of graduates of 1972 from the first six

months model-training course for Pre-school Workers in Addis Ababa. With the political

change, specialized preparation of teachers for very young children was reconsidered again after

3 E.C =Ethiopian Calendar. In Ethiopian Calendar, New Year starts in September and ends in ‘Pagume’, a five or six

days short month after August. That is why; we call Ethiopia a land of 13th

months of sunshine. Ethiopian calendar

is eight years late than the European Calendar. This year in Ethiopia, for example is year 2000 since the birth of

Christ. Ethiopia is celebrating its millennium this year.


a decade gap. In response to this, in 1986, with the support of UNICEF, Menen Preschool

Teacher Training Center was established in Addis Ababa. In addition to these major changes,

three separate departments were established within the new Ministry of Education to support (1)

the specialized training of teachers (2) curriculum and textbooks appropriate for very young

children, and (3) supervision and evaluation of preschool programs.

Along with these changes, the number of preschools and preschool children enrolled in

these programs rapidly expanded. From 1975-1990 preschools grew from 77 to 912. Further,

preschool enrollment grew from 7,573- 102,000. During this time period major changes also

emerged regarding the location of preschools. Prior to the revolution, most preschools were

located in major urban areas. In 1979, however, the National Literacy Campaign was

commissioned. One of the major purposes of this campaign was to establish pre/post natal care

programs for rural children. Through this program, for the first time in Ethiopian history,

massive formal parent education was provided. Such training emphasized the importance of

parents in the education of their children. Along with this program, in 1982 a UNICEF-

sponsored project called Integrated Family-Life Education (IFLE) was established to further

support rural efforts in early childhood education. In addition to providing advanced training for

traditional birth attendants, this project provided training for "child minders" to help out with

child rearing of infants and toddlers. With this extra support, it was believed; women would

become more substantial contributors to the expansion of the agricultural output of the Nation.

In addition to the above programs, farmers of that time were organized into Farm

Producers Cooperatives (FPC). These grass-roots organizations were able to direct their

resources to ventures supporting their operation. Thus, since women were required to contribute

to the FPC, these coops were highly supportive of rapidly emerging child care/kindergarten


program of the time. Through collaborative efforts of the National Literacy Campaign, Integrated

Family-Life Education and the local Farmer Producers Cooperatives, tremendous strides were

made in improving the care and education of very young children in Ethiopia. This progress,

however, was short-lived. With the change in government in 1991, most programs initiated in

the previous regime were halted. The established kindergartens in towns, however, have

continued to function to date, with the name “Mewale Hitsanat”, which means, Kindergarten.

In 1994, the Government of Ethiopia adopted a new Education and Training Policy.

Within the framework of the Education and Training Policy, the Government prepared specific

strategy indicative plan document called Education Sector Development Program (ESDP) to

implement the policy. The ESDP has been translated into series of national ESDPs. The First

ESDP plan document was prepared for the year 1997/98 to 2001/02 and the second ESDP was

for the year 2000/01 to 2004/05 followed by the third ESDP with the span of five years plan

from 2005/06 to 2009/10. In all the three ESDPs, pre-primary education (education for children

between ages 4 to 6) has not got special attention except a simple statement of recognition of

pre-primary education. For example, in the first ESDP document, with regard to pre-primary

education is concerned, the document suggests that even though the importance of preschool

education is believed to be tremendous, it may not be an absolute necessity for children to pass

through it as children can get the required skill and knowledge informally from their families.

In addition, the document states, in a condition where families can play such role, and in a

situation where the country wouldn't be able to accommodate all children who are ready for

school, pre-primary school is not a priority of the government under the current economic status

of the country. As a result, this program (i.e. programs for preschoolers) can be covered by

private, public, religious and other organizations for those children whose parents can afford to


send them. In the other two ESDPs as well, pre-primary education does not get the proper

attention (MOE, 2002, MOE, 2005).

Since the government involvement in the pre-primary education is only ‘to set standards

and maintain quality” (MOE, 2005, p. 14) the majority of population who lives in the rural area

and those children who are from poor families do not have access to pre-primary education. As a

result, the gross enrollment rate of pre-primary education is currently only 2.7% (MOE, 2007).

Even this small percentage accounts only for urban areas and the largest children population in

the rural areas don’t have access to pre-primary education. One can imagine the gravity of the

problem in the absence of traditional church education institutions which have been supporting

the education of many rural poor children for many years. Furthermore, the existing urban-based

modern early childhood education establishments are not also open for poor children and

children with disabilities. Most of the current preschools in the country are privately owned

followed by NGOs and religious institutions. Government run-preschools are very few. Research

also shows that the most available programs in the care and education of children are limited for

children age 4 to 6. That means there is lack of care and education for children below age 4

(Tirusew et al, 2007).

Regarding the curricula of preschools in the country, there is a huge variability among

different preschools. Most private preschools use curriculum borrowed from other countries such

as India, England and America and none of the elements of the curriculum reflects Ethiopian

culture and tradition. Almost a complete absence of culturally relevant storybooks for children in

most of the preschools seems to force these preschools to collect Indian and European books.

Some of these were even not appropriate to the age of children. English and other foreign

languages such as French, Arabic, etc. as medium of communication and instruction are also


highly favored by most parents and preschool owners. Though important to learn English as one

subject, using English as a medium of instruction and children communication tool as a school

rule in the Ethiopian soil neither benefits the kids nor the nation at all. Research has long

revealed that early childhood period is a time when children form their foundational cognitive

schemata to later development through learning mainly using story-telling, make-believe play,

and model learning methods. The language that children speak and communicate influences the

effectiveness of these methods in forming foundational cognitive schemata. Moreover, early

childhood is a period where society starts to instill cultural values to its young, which is a

modality of identity.

With regard to the teacher training programs for pre-primary education in Ethiopia, the

New Education and Training Policy does not make a special adjustment or improvement on the

quality of the training with the exception of extending the training period to one-year as of 2005

as compared to the 6-months training period during the 1970s, 80s and 90s. But, research shows

that since most of the training institutes are privately owned, the duration of the training varies

from 3 months to one-year. There are some institutions with a period of three months training;

some others six-months and only few maintain the National standard of one-year training period

(Tirussew, et al., 2007).

But, the Ministry of Education has recently acknowledged the very low preschool

enrollment ratio and felt the need to assess the general status of early childhood care and

education in Ethiopia and design mechanisms to enable the Country meet the Millennium

Development Goals of Universal Primary Education by 2015. As a result, the Ministry has

undertaken a national survey on the status of early childhood education in Ethiopia in early 2007

by contracting a research team from Addis Ababa University, in which the writer of this article


was part of the research team. Upon the recommendation of the research team, the Ministry is

now organizing a taskforce and technical committee to develop the Early Childhood Care and

Education (ECCE) Policy in the Country. It is hoped that the ECCE policy will be in place in the

middle of 2008.

In the policy, it is proposed that ECCE curriculum would be organized in three

overlapping age categories-Infancy & Toddlerhood (birth to 3years of age), Lower Kindergarten

(3 to 5 years of age), and Upper Kindergarten (5 to 6 years of age). Major activities are also

identified for each stage. Since one of the major principle of the Ethiopian proposed ECCE

policy is holistic development of the child, key stakeholders (Ministry of Education, Ministry of

Health, Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs, Ministry of Agriculture, Ministry of Women's

Affairs, NGO Forum, Religious Council and Universities) have been identified and roles and

responsibilities for each sector is outlined. These identified sectors are represented in the national

ECCE framework named-National Integrated Office for ECCE (NIO-ECCE). The NIO-ECCE

will be organized at National, Regional and Woreda (district) levels. The Ministry of Education

will take the leading role to coordinate the activities of the different ministries in the ECCE

programs of the Country.

In this proposed ECCE policy framework, a recommendation is made to study and

document the indigenous wisdoms, cultural values, good practices of traditional child rearing,

and Ethiopian philosophical tenets, and integrate with the ECCE curriculum.


Conclusion

Despite the fact that Ethiopia has a lot to share and benefit in children’s care and

educational practices; it has been unfortunately observed both in the regular discourses as well as

formal research papers which reflect in most cases the limitations of the Ethiopian culture and

tradition that overshadow the many cultural and social values and philosophical orientations the

country could offer to the world. This in turn leads most Ethiopians, like people of many other

African countries, to develop an attitude towards considering their culture and tradition as

deterrent forces of scientific and technological advancement.

One can clearly observes this attitudinal change well reflected in the educational

institutions of the country. A complete abandoning of a well flourished traditional system of

education as a result of the establishment of so-called ‘modern education’ in the 1900s is a

testimony to such assertion. Unlike the Western-oriented modern system of education which

started to prevail in the country since the 1900s, the traditional system of education was

documented to be Ethiocentric in orientation and contents.

The main subjects of traditional system of education were of course religious beliefs,

values and practices. But, there were also secular components which includes the study of

Ethiopian history and socio-political organizations. Reading and writing in Gè ez & Amharic,

simple arithmetic, music, poetry and philosophy among others were the contents which have

typical characteristics of Ethiopian culture and value system. That is why Messay (2006, p.6)

argues that since this system of education “focuses on… the use of indigenous languages and the

extensive reading of books and textbooks that are impregnated with native contents bear witness

to the fact that the subject of the study was Ethiopian, its legacies, characteristics, and history”.


However, especially in the early phases of the introduction of modern education in

Ethiopia, something Ethiopian was only the pupils. Teachers, books and the contents were not

Ethiopians. This situation still persists. A study by Bridges & Ridley (2002, p. 1) for example

documented that in the teacher training institutes they observed in Ethiopia “libraries consist

almost entirely of imported educational texts of mainly American origin and questionable

intellectual standing–and virtually nothing which reflects the realities of educational practices in

Sub-Saharan Africa-let alone the distinctive educational values and traditions of Ethiopia”.

Moreover, despite a strong criticism made against the traditional education system that

leads to abandon this system of education and replaced it with ‘modern education’, this later

system of education was not also free of such criticisms. The ‘modern education’ in Ethiopia

since its introduction in the 1900s has been constantly criticized for its poor quality characterized

by methods of instruction that emphasizes rote learning and recalls information. It has been

criticized for failing to provide students with depth of understanding, an ability to interpret and

apply information, encouraging the habit of critical thinking-reflection, the ability to form

opinions and to value the expression of diverse opinions, and the ability to apply school

knowledge to realities of personal experiences and the problems of everyday life (Amare A.,

1998; Amare & Temechegn, 2002; CYAO, 1995; Habtamu W., 2002; Seyoum T., 1996; Tekeste

N, 1990, 1996; Teshome W., 1979, 1988, 1990; World Bank, 1989).

A recent national survey of early childhood education in Ethiopia which the writer of this

article was part of the research team also showed that almost in all the sample preschools

observed in the eleven regions of the country; the play materials, dolls, story books, etc. are all

imported and none were reflecting Ethiopian cultures. Most parents of preschool children want

their kids to be fluent in foreign languages than in their local languages. Even the names of most


of the preschools are non-Ethiopian. Children know more foreign songs than local songs

(Tirusew, et.al, 2007).

It is with great dismay that I agree to disagree with those writers who indiscriminately

emphasize on the negative evaluation of the traditional system of education and their

recommendation of sidelining of traditional schools and even to the extent of throwing away this

system of education in favor of a so-called ‘modern approach’ which was put in place for a

century and detached us from our precious legacies and value systems. Had the case been

‘modern education’ an abrupt solution for our predicaments of the past, we could have preserved

our classical glories of amazing architectural and engineering design which bear Rock Hewn

Churches, and we could have the opportunity to undertake a through-time transformation and

change for better design and art. But it hasn’t been the case. Well, a number of factors could be

enumerated for this, but at least we could have understood that a mere abandonment of

traditional system of education was not a solution either.

Unlike the case in Ethiopia, however, in many parts of the world, modern child care and

education practices, patterns and beliefs are rooted in their underlining philosophical and cultural

orientations.

For example, childhood care and development in the Western world have passed through

centuries of change in western cultural, philosophical thinking about children, and scientific

progress (Berk, 2000).

Likewise, some of the fastest growing areas of Asia attribute their success in

development in general and their child care and education practices to their traditional and in

particular educational values rooted in their Confucian heritage. These Asian countries such as

South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Singapore, “…share a common ‘chop-stick’ culture of


Chinese origin, adapted to local conditions. At the heart of this Sintic heritage lies the teaching

and values of Confucius (551-479 BCE)…East Asia nations have used the best aspects of their

Confucian heritage as a filter to select portions of Western culture and technological

development and combine with their own traditions” (Vietnam Cultural Window, 2000, p.2-3).

Despite the fact that Ethiopia has a long and rich tradition of indigenous philosophy and

education that could have been a solid foundation for its development and modern education like

the case in East Asia, however, it had simply assimilated the Western system of education in

stead of integrating the important cultural and philosophical values with the new education

system.

At least to me, therefore, there seem cultural metamorphoses caused by Western-oriented

modern education and a consequent emerging confusion of the Ethiopian youth as far as identity

formation is concerned.

The country has important tradition of child care and education practices. We should

value and revitalize these assets rather than replace it with alien culture. The current arguments

in childhood care and education ranging from the philosophical and ethical to the utilitarian and

pragmatic has also favored the use of indigenous knowledge in development practices.

Philosophical and ethical arguments promote the intrinsic value of cultural diversity and

pluralism which promote the tolerance or celebration of different worldviews. In pragmatic

perspective as well, valuing indigenous knowledge is important as these skills and knowledge

helped people survive and evolve in their specific contexts for many generations.

Children’ story books should reflect Ethiopian culture and values. As I have indicated it

earlier, children need social role-models of their own kind. Fortunately Ethiopian children are

not devoid of heroes, philosophers, scientists, painters, etc. the fruit of their own soil. But, they


don’t get the opportunity in the stories they hear and read to know about their giants. But this

doesn’t to mean that Ethiopia should close its boarders to the outside World. Rather, like what

the East Asians are doing as a filter tool of their Confucian tradition to get important Western

skills and knowledge, Ethiopians should also be selective of what they are importing and

adopting by employing the tool of methodological doubting and critical investigation

recommended by the Ethiopian philosophers mentioned earlier and which has been also in

existent in the Qene school for long time.

There is also a popular believe that those children who have passed through traditional

education systems are successful in their education in the modern schools. May be, it could be

true or not. But, there is a need to conduct research about it.

The Ethiopian Qene - the ‘Wax and Gold’ could also be used as a mind-trick tool to

increase the critical thinking ability of our children. Westerns have many tools such as puzzles,

games, etc to teach children critical thinking ability. I am sure the Ethiopian Qene has that power

as well. Research is needed to study the role of Qene in increasing the skills of learning strategies

in children. There is also a possibility of using the different cultural music instruments of

Ethiopia to teach different music rhythms to children, sound patterns, mathematical concepts,

etc. The wonderful painting tradition in Ethiopia could also be used to design a program for the

children –like ‘A Painting-Hunt” project where preschools can arrange for children to visit

different cultural centers, where paintings are located.

We should, therefore, carefully and in detail study and document the Ethiopian folklores,

culture, literature, philosophy, traditional health practices, arts, crafts, music, dance, etc. and how

these could be integrated to the school curriculum starting from early childhood education.


Finally, I would like to emphasize that early childhood period is a time where it requires

a lot of efforts to build the identity of a child. This formative period needs great care and its

settings, such as classroom situation, play materials, games, story books, paintings, arts, etc

should reflect the child’s own contexts.


References

Amare A. (1998). “Teachers Perception of Educational Problems in Ethiopia”, in Amare

Asgedom et al. (Eds.), Proceedings of the National Conference on the Quality of

Primary and Secondary Education in Ethiopia, AA: Addis Ababa University Press

Amare G. (1967). “The modern Ethiopian Intelligentsia and Its evolution”. Paper prepared for

the Interdisciplinary Seminar of the Faculties of Arts and Education. H.S.I.U. 1 & 2.

Asgedom A. & Engida T. (2002). Education in Ethiopia: A Developmental Perspective.

Ethiopian Journal of Education, Xxii (2).

Anfray F., (1981). ‘The Civilisation of Aksum, from the. First to the Seventh Century’, in G.

Mokhtar (ed.).

Bahru Zewde. (2002a). A History of Modern Ethiopia 1855-1991. Second Edition. Addis Ababa

University Press.

Bahru Zewde. (2002b). Pioneers of Change in Ethiopia: The Reformist Intellectuals of the early

Twentieth Century, Eastern African Studies. . , First edition, Addis Ababa University

Press.

Berk, L.(2000). Child Development. Fifth edition, Allyn and Bacon, Boston.

Bridges & Ridley (2002). Tradition and Modernity: Educational Development and Teacher

Training in Ethiopia.

CYO (1995). Ethiopian Youth-Basic Challenges and Prospects, A survey Research, Addis

Ababa.

Demeke Gesesse (2003). History of Early Years Education in Ethiopia: Problems and Prospects

(unpublished).


Demeke Gesesse (2007). Traditional Early Intervention Practices in Ethiopia (Unpublished).

Ethiopian Orthodox Church (2007). An Exhibition of the Historical Development of Ethiopian

Orthodox Church: Ethiopian Orthodox Church: Past, Present and Future. Exhibition on

the Special Occasion of the Ethiopian Millennium Celebration. (September to

November, 2007 at the Hall of the Office of the Patriarch.

Fulass, H. (1974). ‘Knowledge and Its Attainment in the Ethiopian Context’. Ethiopian Journal

of Education vol II no 1 (pp19-24).

Gedey, B. (1983E.C). Ethiopian History. Addis Ababa.

Messay, K. (2006). The Roots and Fallouts of Haileselassie’s Educational Policy. UNESCO

Forum Occasional Paper Series Paper no.10.

Ministry of Education (2002). Education Sector Development Program II 2002-5. Addis Ababa:

Ministry of Education

Ministry of Education (2005). Education Sector Development Program III 2005/2006-

2010/2011. Addis Ababa: Ministry of Education

Ministry of Education (2007). A Keynote Address by the State Minister of General Education in

Ethiopia. In the 7th

-Annual Conference of Ethiopian Psychologists Association held on

October 27-28, 2007, Addis Ababa.

MNCDSA (1972). Preschool Workers’ Training Center in Ethiopia. Addis Ababa

National Children’s Commission (1982a). The Needs of Ethiopian Children and the Services

they Get: National Seminar Prepared by National Children’s Commission, Addis Ababa.

National Children’s Commission (1982b). Kindergarten’s Guide. Addis Ababa


Pankhurst, S. (1955). “Ethiopia: a cultural history”. London, Woodford Green: Lalibela House.

Stuart Munro-Hay (1991). Aksum: An African Civilization of Late Antiquity. Edinburgh:

University Press,

Sumner, C. (1976). “The Treatise of Zar'a Ya’aqob” in Ethiopian philosophy, vol. II, Addis

Ababa.

Sumner, C. (1985). Classical Ethiopian philosophy. Commercial printing press: Addis Ababa.

Tadesse Tamrat. (1972). Church and state in Ethiopia, 1270-1527. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

Tefera S. (1996). “Attempts at Educational Reform in Ethiopia: A Bottom-up Reform?”

Ethiopian Journal of Education, 16(1).

Tekeste N. (1990). The Crisis of Ethiopian Education: Some Implications for Nation-

Building, Sweden, Uppsala.

Tirusew, T., Teka Z., Belay T., Belay H., & Demeke G. (2007). The Status of Early Childhood

Education in Ethiopia. Sponsored by MOE.

Tolossa, F. (2006). Alienation: A Result and Impact of Western Education on Ethiopian

Intellectuals. A Conference paper presented in the conference at the University of

Dayton, Ohio.

Vietnam Cultural Window, (2000). Vietnam e-Magazine, No.28.July 2000.

Wagaw, T. (1979). “Education in Ethiopia: prospect and retrospect”. Ann Arbor: The University

of Michigan Press.

Wagaw T. (1988). “Education and Society in Contemporary Ethiopia”, in An D.

Gromyko (Ed.), Proceedings of the 9th

International Conference of Ethiopian


Studies Vol.2, Moscow: Nauka Publisher.

Wagaw T. (1990). The Development of Higher Education and Social Change: An

Ethiopian Experience, USA: Michigan State University Press.

Wondimu, H. (2002). A Study of Dropouts in Selected Primary Schools of Two Regions

in Ethiopia. Ethiopian Journal of Education, Xxii (2).

World Bank (1989. Using Examinations to Improve Education: A Study of Fourteen

African Countries, (Vol.1). Findings and Recommendations.

Historical and Philosophical Foundations of Early Childhood Education in Ethiopia

Documents