Report: Tanzania Reading Recovery Activity
Executive Summary
The Reading Recovery Activity strengthened early grade reading proficiency through structured remedial instruction in Tanzania. Funded by the Hempel Foundation, the Activity was implemented from 2023 through 2025 by RTI International in partnership with the Government of Tanzania, including the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology (MoEST), the Prime Minister’s Office Regional Administration and Local Government (PMO-RALG), and regional governments.
Implementation followed a collaborative co-creation approach, with the Hempel Foundation providing funding, RTI offering material and technical assistance, and the Government of Tanzania leading implementation decisions related to class scheduling, teacher training, and ongoing support and monitoring. The Activity was implemented in Morogoro, Iringa, Ruvuma, and Mtwara Regions, covering 31 local government authorities (LGAs) in Tanzania. Over 2 years, it delivered school-based remedial instruction through catch-up classes (CUCs) to approximately 75,000 Standard 2 learners who required additional support to meet established reading proficiency benchmarks and who were separated into two cohorts, the 2024 cohort (48,820 pupils) and the 2025 cohort (31,133 pupils). Schools used government-approved and - administrated early grade group-administered learning assessments (GALAs) conducted in March 2024 and March 2025 to identify the learners for the two cohorts respectively. The Government of Tanzania conducted follow-up assessments in November 2024 and November 2025 to monitor their progress.
CUCs were delivered in schools through 45- to 60-minute sessions outside regular instructional time and centered on play-based, skill-focused literacy activities. At the start of each cohort implementation, teachers received a one-day training followed by ongoing instructional support throughout the year, including classroom observations. The Activity developed user-friendly, competence-based materials organized into three progressive levels, covering letter recognition, decoding, blending, and sentence reading.
By the end of the project, the Activity had not only achieved, but far exceeded, its original goals and targets. All participating students, not just the targeted 60%, improved their reading proficiency, effectively doubling their scores on the end-of-year GALAs compared to the beginning of the year and closing the learning gap with peers not in CUCs. Additional achievements included strengthened school and district capacity to identify learners for the CUCs and to support and monitor learning outcomes, expanded access to targeted instructional support across participating regions, and improved learner engagement through structured, play-based group work.
An external evaluation conducted October–December 2025 confirmed the outstanding success of the Activity not only in measurably improved foundational literacy skills of participating children—so much that the majority caught up to their peers—but also in qualitative aspects, such as greater student self-efficacy for reading and parental engagement.
In conclusion, the Reading Recovery Activity has demonstrated not only its viability and feasibility in the context, but also its efficacy for improving learning outcomes at scale. This report provides further detail on the design, implementation, results, drivers and barriers, and cost of the Activity as well as recommendations for continued and future implementations.