Burkina Agrégation Secondaire study guide
Burkina Agrégation Secondaire · Work through your exam, one topic at a time.
The Agrégation de l'Enseignement du Secondaire is Burkina Faso's highest competitive teaching credential, awarded by jury after a national concours. It is aimed at experienced secondary teachers, often already holding a licence or maîtrise and several years of classroom practice, who seek to teach at lycée level, train future teachers, or move into inspection, pedagogy and school administration. The Burkina Agrégation Secondaire study guide has 10 sections and about 2,904 words.
01General Culture and Civic Awareness
General culture questions test breadth plus judgement, not trivia recall. A candidate must be able to situate Burkina Faso in its regional and international environment: the institutions of the state (Constitution, President, National Assembly, Constitutional Council, Conseil d'État, Cour de cassation, Cour des comptes, Médiateur du Faso), the architecture of West African integration (CEDEAO/ECOWAS, UEMOA, AES), and the multilateral system (UN, UNESCO, WHO, African Union, ICC).
332 words, about 2 min02French Language and Literature
The French paper combines technical mastery of the language with literary culture. On the language side, a candidate must command grammar (agreement of the past participle, sequence of tenses, concordance des temps ), syntax (proposition subordination, propositions circonstancielles ), lexicon (synonyms, antonyms, homonyms, paronyms, niveaux de langue ), and stylistics (figures of speech: métaphore, métonymie, anaphore, chiasme, oxymore, litote, hyperbole).
292 words, about 1 min03English Language and Literature
The English paper tests advanced grammar, translation and literary culture. Grammar: tense and aspect (present perfect versus simple past, past perfect for anteriority), modals and their degrees of certainty and obligation, conditionals (including mixed and inverted forms), passive and causative constructions, reported speech with backshift, articles and countability, prepositions, phrasal verbs, and word formation.
289 words, about 1 min04Mathematics
The mathematics paper tests both technical fluency and rigour of proof. Core areas: algebra (polynomials, equations and inequalities, systems, complex numbers, sequences), analysis (limits, continuity, differentiability, integration, logarithmic and exponential functions, sequences and series), geometry (vectors, dot and cross products, plane and space geometry), and probability and statistics (combinatorics, conditional probability, binomial and normal distributions, descriptive statistics).
280 words, about 1 min05Physical and Natural Sciences
Sciences are tested across physics, chemistry and biology, with emphasis on concepts and their quantitative use. Physics: kinematics and dynamics (Newton's laws), work and energy, electricity (Ohm's law, series and parallel circuits, power), optics (reflection, refraction, lenses), and waves.
278 words, about 1 min06History and Geography
History and geography questions test chronological and spatial reasoning, not memorised lists. In history, know the precolonial kingdoms and empires of West Africa (Ghana, Mali, Songhai, Mossi kingdoms), the Atlantic slave trade, colonisation and the Scramble for Africa, the two world wars, decolonisation, the Cold War, and the construction of the Burkinabè state from 1960 through the revolutions and transitions to the present.
274 words, about 1 min07Philosophy
Philosophy questions test the ability to problematise, argue and conclude, not to recite doctrine. Candidates must know the major branches (metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, political philosophy, aesthetics, logic), the canonical problems (freedom and determinism, knowledge and opinion, truth, justice, the state, work, technology, culture, the Other), and representative thinkers with their positions: Plato, Aristotle, Descartes, Kant, Hegel, Marx, Nietzsche, Sartre, Arendt, and African philosophers such as Placide Tempels, Alexis Kagame, Kwame Gyekye, Paulin Hountondji and Henry Odera Oruka.
283 words, about 1 min08Social Sciences: Economics, Sociology and Law
This domain tests how societies produce, distribute and regulate. Economics: scarcity and choice, supply and demand, elasticity, market structures, national accounting (GDP, growth), inflation, unemployment, monetary policy, development economics and the specificities of primary-commodity economies.
278 words, about 1 min09Educational Sciences, Pedagogy and Didactics
This domain tests whether a candidate can teach, not only know. Educational sciences: learning theories (behaviourism - Pavlov, Skinner; cognitivism - Piaget's stages, Bruner; socioconstructivism - Vygotsky's zone of proximal development; humanism - Rogers), motivation, assessment, and classroom management.
274 words, about 1 min10Professional Ethics, School Administration and Education Policy
This domain tests the teacher as a public agent. Professional ethics: the obligations of the civil servant (neutrality, confidentiality, integrity, respect for the pupil, equity, non-discrimination, prohibition of corporal punishment and of harassment), professional secrecy, and the duty to report serious matters to the hierarchy.
324 words, about 2 min