Learning what matters in Jordan: Bridging the literacy crisis through a holistic approach to skills development

How well are education systems creating opportunities for children and young people to learn what matters? The Queen Rania Foundation (QRF) addressed this question through a qualitative study in Jordan examining the integration of holistic education principles into the country’s new Arabic Language curriculum and assessed systemic conditions supporting or constraining implementation. This exploration addresses Jordan’s pressing literacy crisis, where over half of 10-year-olds cannot read and comprehend age-appropriate Arabic texts, while serving a population where more than one-third are displaced from neighboring countries (World Bank 2019). Drawing on established frameworks for education system transformation—including the four Ps and three Cs—this study provides analytical depth for understanding transformation challenges in refugee-hosting contexts. The research employed a two-phase mixed-methods approach: curriculum analysis of grades 1, 4, and 7 Arabic materials against the Center for Curriculum Redesign’s Four-Dimensional Framework focusing on skills, character, and meta-learning dimensions) (Taylor, Black, Slesinski, and Fadel 2021), followed by four focus groups with principals and teachers and six semi-structured key informant interviews with ministry officials and education stakeholders.