PESHAWAR: More than 97,000 children in Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province have improved their reading and numeracy skills under the ILMpact programme, officials said on Thursday.
The provincial government plans to adopt the programme’s teaching approach in its public schools.
More than 97,413 children benefited directly from the initiative, officials said.
The programme covered 320 government schools in eight districts. They included Battagram, Buner, Charsadda, Dera Ismail Khan, Mansehra, Peshawar, Shangla and Swabi.
The schools included 200 girls’ primary schools and 120 middle and high schools.
Programme data showed strong gains in basic learning skills within less than a year.
The number of children able to read an Urdu story increased by 79%. The number able to read an English sentence rose by 52%.
The number of children able to solve subtraction problems increased by 64%, officials said.
Each participating child received about 140 hours of additional learning support.
The programme used the Teaching at the Right Level (TaRL) approach. It groups children based on their learning levels rather than their age or grade.
Officials said the approach helped teachers target learning gaps in reading and mathematics.
Qaiser Alam, managing director of the Elementary and Secondary Education Foundation Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, said the programme showed the value of targeted teaching.
“ILMpact has given us a model that this province will carry forward into our own schools,” Alam said.
He said the government wanted every child to have the opportunity to develop basic reading, writing and numeracy skills.
The Government of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and the Elementary and Secondary Education Department hosted an event in Peshawar to present the programme’s results.
The event, titled “ILMpact Spotlight: Advancing Foundational Literacy & Numeracy for Every Child in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa,” also featured a panel discussion.
Participants discussed evidence-based teaching, remedial education, inclusion and child safeguarding.
They also explored ways to expand the programme across the province.
The provincial government thanked the UK Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office, the British Council, implementing partners, teachers and students for supporting the initiative.
It reaffirmed its commitment to improving foundational learning across Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
