March 6, 2025 – From 2019 to 2024, the Global Partnership for Education (GPE) Knowledge and Innovation Exchange (KIX), a joint endeavor with the International Development Research Centre (IDRC), supported 41 applied research projects focused on key challenges facing education systems across the Global South. Eight of these projects aimed to contextualize and scale innovative approaches to strengthen inclusive early childhood education innovations in GPE partner countries, including five projects cofinanced by the LEGO Foundation.
Through a new webinar series, ECDAN, GPE, IDRC and the LEGO Foundation convened key stakeholders involved in the research to share their findings and the global goods that have been developed. This first webinar offered an overview of GPE KIX synthesis report summarising the findings of the eight completed ECE research projects, and highlighted evidence-based approaches in the following thematic areas:
• Play-based pedagogy and school readiness
• Teacher training and professional development
During this webinar, policy makers, researchers, and early childhood stakeholders learned about ‘what works’ across countries and contexts in the Africa region. Speakers included representatives from ECDAN, IDRC, GPE KIX the LEGO Foundation, the Africa Early Childhood Network (AfECN), governments and local ECD partners.
Speakers include:
- Elizabeth Gitonga, Programme Manager, AfECN
- Godfrey Ejuu, Kyambogo University
- Dr. Safina Mutumba, Ministry of Education, Uganda
- Alinafe Chibwana, Executive Director, CRECCOM, Malawi
- Given Daka, Regional ECD Coordinator, AfECN
- Lamin Jobe, Ministry of Basic and Secondary Education, the Gambia
- Abdoulie FR Jadama, University of the Gambia
- Elizabeth Lule, ECDAN
- Jill Popp, LEGO Foundation
- Joa Keis, GPE
- Tricia Wind, IDRC
- Ian Macpherson, GPE
