Why many secondary school students struggle to read well

Last week, I spent several days in Uasin Gishu and Kakamega counties assessing my students who are currently on teaching practice. I find such visits among the most rewarding aspects of university teaching. They take us away from lecture halls and academic theories, placing us directly in the realities of Kenyan classrooms. We are able to observe how pedagogical principles are being translated into practice. They also provide an opportunity to listen to teachers, learners and school leaders to understand their lived educational experiences.

One of the schools I visited was Aligula Secondary School, a C4 school in Kakamega. I met the principal, Jessica Amboka, a dedicated educationist whose passion for her students was immediately evident.

She welcomed me warmly and invited me into a discussion with the English and Literature teachers and students. What began as a routine academic visit quickly evolved into a candid and deeply troubling conversation about a challenge that many schools face: the growing number of learners in secondary schools who cannot read fluently. The discussion was honest and uncomfortable. 

Teachers spoke of learners who struggle to read simple passages. Some hesitate over basic words, while others can decode but fail to comprehend what they read. A few avoid reading altogether due to embarrassment. Yet these are not primary school pupils; they are secondary school students expected to engage with complex texts in English, Literature, History, Geography, Biology and other subjects. This is our predicament.

I realised this was not a problem unique to Aligula Secondary School. Similar concerns have been raised across the country, echoing recent educational research. Studies by Usawa Agenda paint a worrying picture. One national assessment found that more than half of Grade Six learners in public schools could not adequately comprehend a Grade Three-level English text.

Other studies show that many children progress through the education system without acquiring foundational literacy skills. The World Bank has similarly warned of what it calls “learning poverty”—the inability to read and understand a simple text by age ten. These findings should concern us all. Reading is the foundation of all learning, and a learner in Grade 10 or Form Three who cannot read effectively faces enormous challenges.

Consider a Form Three student in a Biology lesson. Before understanding photosynthesis, they must first read and comprehend the question. The same applies in History, Geography, Agriculture, Chemistry and even Mathematics, all of which require reading and interpretation.

The question is: what went wrong? The answer lies in the early years of schooling. Somewhere between the first encounter with letters and the transition to upper primary, foundational reading skills were not fully developed. The reasons vary—absentee teachers, large classes, limited support at home, demotivated teachers, poverty, lack of books and inconsistent instruction. Whatever the causes, the outcome is clear: learners have progressed from one grade to another without mastering the most fundamental academic skill, reading.

Let us stop pretending. This is a pandemic. It calls for honesty and courage from education stakeholders. We often become obsessed with syllabus coverage. Teachers are under pressure to complete schemes of work. Schools are under pressure to produce examination results. In our rush to move forward, they leave behind the majority of learners who have not mastered the basics.It is time to ask a difficult question: what is the value of covering the syllabus if a significant number of learners cannot read the content being taught?

My advice is simple, though not easy. Where serious reading deficits exist, schools should prioritise literacy intervention programmes, as Aligula Secondary School has done. Before advancing to complex content, we must ensure learners can read fluently and understand what they read. The most important lesson a secondary school can offer is not a new topic in the syllabus, but the chance for a struggling learner to become a confident reader.

Teachers should also be alert to the possibility that some learners may have specific learning difficulties such as dyslexia. Dyslexia is not a sign of low intelligence; many highly successful individuals live with it. However, without proper identification and support, learners with dyslexia can easily be mislabelled as lazy, careless or incapable.

As I left Aligula C4 Secondary School, I carried more than notes from teaching practice. I carried a question that continues to trouble me: how many learners across Kenya sit quietly in classrooms every day, unable to read confidently yet expected to learn as though they can?

We often speak of pandemics as diseases that spread across populations, yet another is quietly unfolding in our schools, the pandemic of reading failure. Unlike a virus, it attracts little public attention and rarely makes headlines, but its effects are just as devastating, robbing young people of the very tool they need to learn and grow.
We must get serious about improving learning by returning to the beginning. Before asking children to master science, technology, literature or mathematics, we must ensure they can read.