Distance Learning in Crisis – Liberia and Sierra Leone (2020-2022)

The COVID-19 pandemic has created an unprecedented education crisis. With schools closed across Liberia and Sierra Leone, children are at risk of losing months of learning, and for the most vulnerable, prolonged school closures increase the risk that they may never return.

CODE’s new Distance Learning in Crisis (DLC) project is helping children continue to develop critical literacy skills while classrooms remain closed. Funded by the Government of Canada through Global Affairs Canada, the initiative will provide an accessible, low-tech approach to distance education that can reach children and families without reliable access to the internet, computers or smartphones.

Working with Farm Radio International and CODE’s long-standing local partners, the WE-CARE Foundation in Liberia and the Association of Language and Literacy Educators in Sierra Leone, CODE is bringing literacy learning directly into children’s homes through radio.

At the heart of the project is Reading on the Waves, a daily educational radio program that combines literacy instruction with locally authored stories, poems and illustrations. Children will be able to listen as teachers read stories aloud, introduce new vocabulary and guide them through activities designed to strengthen their reading and comprehension skills. Interactive call-in opportunities and mobile-based polls will help make the programs engaging and encourage children and families to participate.

To complement the broadcasts, CODE and its partners will distribute more than 60,000 family literacy kits, containing stationery supplies and specially developed reading anthologies, so children can read along with the radio lessons and continue learning at home.

Through DLC, CODE is drawing on decades of experience strengthening literacy, supporting teachers and developing culturally relevant children’s books to respond quickly to an extraordinary challenge, helping ensure that even while classrooms are closed, learning does not have to stop.