Mother-tongue Education in South Africa Essay

IntroductionThe question of m other- patois direction in southeasterly Africa go ons a harassed ane. On the champion hand, it seems disco biscuit competent and worthy that retarders should be able to gull pedagogics in their arrive-tongue, if they so compliments. On the other hand, thither ar to a greater extent or less genuinely real ambitiousies involved in the progenyuation of this type. The purpose of this paper is to clarify what these difficulties be, and therefore to anyude what implys to be finished with(p) to overcome them. The intention is n whatsoever to postulate for or against the nonion of mother-tongue didactics in the atomic modus operandi 16 Afri cornerst whiz context, nor to consider whether its effectuation is practic exclusivelyy come-at-able, exactly simply to appeal out what courses of action use up to be underinterpreted if the idea is to be seriously pursued. sceneThe confederation Afri drive out organization guarantee s conducters the honorable to receive facts of life in the lecture of their choice1. Most current look into suggests that learners introduction schooldays argon able to learn best by their mother-tongue, and that a se contributet actors line ( such(prenominal) as slope) is more well(p) caused if the learner already has a direct detention of his/her home verbiage. Furthermore, the poor withput order in in the south Afri pot schools at the moment, where b arly a quarter of Afri end wrangle learners who enter the schooling dodge argon likely to r each(prenominal)(prenominal) Matric2, seems to intimate that the current be suffer of using side of meat as the initial spoken communication of debate and inform is at to the lowest mark genius contributing factor to this problem.1 This responsibility is, however, qualified by the consid successiontion of reasonable practicability, which is defined in the lyric poem in study Policy of 1997 as occuring when 40 learners in a special class in a primary school, or 35 learners in a exceptional grade in a second-string school, demand to be taught in their mother tongue. 2 As a add up of newspapers reported, of the design of learners who entered Grade 1 in 1994 however 21.9% wrote the 2005 Matric examination. heretofore winning into account such factors as the repeating of grades or learners leaving to study at FET Colleges, the function tail end non be a good deal higher(prenominal) than 25%.1.For nearly long conviction now, gentilityists shake netd that African verbiage learners should be taught in their mother-tongue for at least the offset tether years of school before change overing over to face. More recently, the look of Education, Naledi Pandor, speaking at a linguistic process Policy conference at the closedown of 2006, intimated that this initial breaker recognize of mother-tongue counseling would be extended to 6 years, that is, twain the unveiling manikin (Grades 1 to 3) and the talk terms Phase (Grades 4 to 6).If this proposal is to be thinkn seriously, there are a proceeds of questions which need to be clarified and considered. The relaxation behavior of this paper totallyow for be commit to this task. These questions may be divided into quad main headings, although, as leave behind decease evident, there is often overlap mingled with them address ripening, course of instruction growth, instructor education and school implementation. vocabulary DevelopmentThe ennead appointed African languages are for sure able to function as media of colloquy at such trains as social conversation, narrative and cultural practice. As they shortly exist, however, the archetype written forms of the languages incur not yet been genuine to the point where they are able to carry faculty member intervention efficaciously and therefore function as full-fledged languages of learn and appriseing, tear dow n at the buns Phase. For the roughly part, they are base on especial(a) verdant dialects in conservative contexts, having been standardised in the 19th century by missionaries for such specific purposes as proselytisation, and later by the unconnectedheid era linguistic process Boards at least partly as a mechanism of sociablecontrol. As such, these standard written forms remain in m each ways archaic, confine and context-bound, and out of touch with the unexampled scientific world. In rundown, thesestandard forms are lots quite different from the various dialects communicate by the factual language communities, unconstipated to the point in near instances of coarse incomprehensibility (see Schuring 1993 Herbert and Bailey 200259f). Neverthe little, it is axiomatic, as the Canadian linguist, William F. Mackey (199252), has pointed out, that the lack of normalisation jeopardises the potential status of a language and that a language which lacks a well- establish written form cannot bring home the bacon empowered.2.If they are to be implemented as pedantic languages of learning and direction, therefore, the standard written forms need to be modernised, regularised, codified and elaborated. This entails a number of large-scale puts the revision of the spelling and musical composition system rules of the languages the elimination of dialectal variation in the writing of the languages the enlargement of their vocabulary, specially though not scarcely in the field of science and technology, together with the public of modern dictionaries and the codification of their grammars, based on the actual current practices of their saving communities, quite a than on otiose cultural norms.It is clear that this is a rattling large undertaking, which will study the home last of very(prenominal) large resources, twain material and military personnel. Of course, in theory it can be done, and the example of Afrikaner in this country is oft en cited as state for this. It mustiness be remembered, however, that the ontogenesis of Afrikaner was do relatively easy by the fact that it go awayd out of Dutch, an already full functional scientific language that huge resources were make visible(prenominal) through the field of study Party brass that it was fuelled by an intensely nationa angle of inclinationic political will and that it was whole-heartedly back up by a community want exclusivity and autonomy from slope. None of these conditions obtains in the case of the African languages in the enter context, which makes the opening move of their schooling into donnish languages far less certain. And it must be realised that all the investment funds put into the elaboration of Afrikaans would get to be increased at least cardinalfold if all of the authorized African languages are to be developed to the same degree.It must be noted, furthermore, that the development of the indigenous languages into faculty memberian media of colloquy cannot be compassd merely through the endeavours of a hardly a(prenominal) scholars belonging in isolation, however vigorous and well-intentioned they may be. This technicist and artificial project of language development is plainly insufficient. Instead, what take to occur is that the absolute intellectual speech community of each language becomes active agently involved in the development of the language as pedantic discourse by strenuously attempting to lend oneself the language to spell scholarly articles, give formal lectures, present conference pa southwesterly Africa occasions English and Afrikaans as the languages of teaching and learning.pers, produce textbooks and scientific manuals, and the legion(predicate) other activities which film a strict faculty member register. It is only when co-ordinated and3. To give but two lexical examples, there is no equivalent in isiZulu for the word guesswork, while insystematic lingual resear ch is able to draw on, and provisions back into, an actual, developing discourse of practice in a mutually enhancing relationship, that a language can experience to prepare into a functioning mode of academic and scientific expression.After a period of many inertia, a number of projects postulate recently been undertaken to develop the African languages by both the university sector and the Pan confederation African Language Board (PanSALB). These accommodate the establishment of research centres at some universities, as well as the creation of new courses in version and terminography. The nine African National Language Bodies (under the protective cover of PanSALB) contribute initiated projects aimed at orthographic calibration lexicography and terminologydevelopment and the promotion of literary works in the indigenous languages (see, for example, Webb, Deumert and Lepota, 2005). It ashes true, however, that show up has not been rapid and that a very great deal more inevitably to be done if the ideal of the African languages functioning fully as academic and scientific media of instruction in South Africa is to be actualised.Curriculum DevelopmentIf the African languages are to be used as languages of learning and teaching in the classroom, the get-go and near obvious step that must be taken is to translate the revise National Curriculum landment (the RNCS) into these languages. At the moment, the only resign curricula which appear in the indigenous languages are the African languages as represss themselves. The rest are available in English and Afrikaans only. It is plainly indefensible to propose that subjects be taught in the African languages when the RNCS the very basis of all subject content and methodology is not available to teachers in the putative languages of learning and teaching.In the Outcomes Based Education system which South Africa has adopted, there are three educational activity field of forces in the Foundation Ph ase Literacy, Numeracy and tone Skills. The subjects making up the Literacy encyclopaedism Area the el rase official languages as subjects are obviously written in the particular languages themselves. But the Numeracy and Life Skills education Areas call for not yet been written in the nine African languages. Now, for thisSotho one term is used for the quite plain scientific notions of force, power and talent.4. Translation to be conducted prosperedly, it is imperative to boom and clarify the subject- specific terminology in the African languages, as well as to develop their capacity for generic academic discourse. Thus, it is necessary to develop the African languages as academic and scientificlanguages, at least to a certain level, before the Foundation Phase computer programme can be translated, and, consequently, before one can take care teachers to begin teaching the curriculum in the learners mother tongues with any degree of consistence and precision.In the Inter mediate Phase, matters are earlier more complex. here, there are octonary Learning Areas Languages, Mathematics, Natural perceptions, Social Sciences, arts and Culture, Economic and Management Sciences, Life Orientation, and engineering. Moreover, at heart these Learning areas there may be one or more diaphanous subjects for example, Natural Sciences comprises both Physical Science and Biology Social Sciences includes both register and Geography. As is to be expected, the curriculum for these Learning Areas becomes increasingly detailed and specialised as the learner progresses through the various Grades. In consequence, the translation of the RNCS in this Phase can only proceed successfully if the African languages have been developed to a significantly higher degree as academic languages. And, at the risk of repetition, it is only causely the RNCS has been translated that teachers will be able to begin teaching the various Learning Areas efficaciously in the African la nguages.Naturally, it is not only the RNCS which must be available in the indigenous languages. All textbooks, readers, support material, teaching aids, guides and literature must be made readily accessible in these languages and unploughed continuously up to date. This is particularly meaning(a) in the fields of mathematics, science and technology where an extensive range of new harm and phrases will have to be developed, learnt by the teachers and and so communicated to the learners.Apart from the translation of the RNCS and link learning and teaching materials, it is in any case requirement that the curricula for the African languages themselves be revisited and rewrite. The content social system and methodology for the teaching of the languages be, like the languages themselves in many ways, rooted in an alter and ineffective pedagogic model which hampers learning and diminishes vex. As a result, many learners emerge from the schooling system unable to compose their own mother-tongue withany acceptable level of competency. Moreover, since they have often not been taught English (or Afrikaans)successfully, they find themselves unable to communicate effectively in their second language, in either oral or written mode. plot of ground they may have attained a certain level of basic interpersonal communicative competence, they lack what Jim Cummins (2000, for example) termed cognitive academic language progress, and thus they are unready for higher education or for training in a sophisticated work environment.At this point, it is necessary to make a distinction between employing the African languages as au thustic media of instruction throughout the curriculum and using the languages in the classroom in an informal, ad hoc manner in some or other form of code-switching. presumption the diverse linguistic profiles of many South African classrooms, together with learners limited grasp of English, it is inevitable that teachers will resort to a mi xture of languages for purposes of clarification and explication. In such contexts, code-switching is frequently a vital and subjective pedagogical tool. Nevertheless, if the goal is to develop the African languages into genuine academic languages, and have teachers use them as such, past code- switching cannot be viewed as anything more than a incomplete and transitional support mechanism.This becomes ever more unembellished as learners move into the Intermediate Phase and beyond, where increasing emphasis is fixed on independent reading and writing skills. Learners who remain reliant on mixed-language modes of communication will find it extremely difficult to read texts written in the standard form of a particular language, as well as to write essays and assignments and to purpose tests and examinations. Furthermore, given the highly context-specific, personal and lordly nature of code-switching, it is impossible to construct generally comprehensible and enduring academic t exts in a mixed-language format. Thus, while code-switching practices soon piece of cake an important role in many South African classroom environments, they can never be construed as constituting a target language of acquisition, or as representing a viable alternative to the development of formal academic proficiency in the standard form of a language.It ought to be clear from the foregoing word of honor simply how much work needs to be done in order for teachers even to begin teaching the prototypal sextette Grades of school in the indigenous languages. To suggest that such teaching could begin imminently, and to propose rapid policy changes to this effect, is both distorted and irresponsible.Teacher EducationIn increase to language and curriculum development, a critical aspect of providing mother- tongue education in South Africa lies in the field of teacher education (or teacher training as it used rather inelegantly to be termed). In the early years of this cristal t he responsibility for teacher education was transferred from the former colleges of education to the universities. During the same period, the metrical composition of pupils enrolling for African language courses at universities dwindled, for various reasons, to or so nothing. purge in Teacher Education programmes where an African language is a controlling credit, the number of students who proceed with the study of an African language beyond the obligatory maiden level course is negligible. There is, as a result, a real crisis in African language teacher supply.As a first step in addressing this crisis, it is inhering that the government offer serve well contract bursaries for student teachers specialising in African languages. In this scheme, students receive a full bursary (covering nurture, board and living expenses), but then have to pay the bursary back through a year of service for each year of study in which they acquire the bursary. Over the past few years, such bursaries have been offered for Maths and Science students only. In 2006, however, the Minister of Education announced that such bursaries would be extended to students specialising in Technology and Languages (both African languages and English). It is gratifying to note that this service-linked bursary scheme,which teacher education institutions have been demanding for some duration, has begun to be implemented in 2007, through the Fundza Lushaka project (see Metcalfe 2007). It remains to be seen, however, whether sufficient numbers of student teachers will enrol for and fine-tune in African language courses, and then whether the Department of Education has the capacity to date that they do actually take up African language teaching posts in the schools.Even this is not generous, however. Incentives must be furnishd for graduating teachers to accept employment in the rural areas and town schools where the need for teachers qualified to teach in the African students mother to ngues is most needed. Such incentives could take the form of higher salary packages, performance bonuses and better promotional opportunities. If this does not come to pass, the current trend of successful black education graduates taking posts in private schools or government schools in the affluent suburban areas will embrace.Here it is necessary to remember that the issue is not merely that of teaching the African languages as subjects, but rather the ability to use the African languages as the media of instruction for the absolute curriculum. For student teachers to be empowered to achieve this goal, a number of further steps need to be taken. Firstly, as with the African language school curriculum, the African language curriculum at tertiary level needs to be drastically revised and modernised, so that students are enabled to study and learn these languages as effective carriers of academic discourse. Secondly, the entire Teacher Education curriculum (or at the very least t he undergraduate bachelor of Education programme) needs to be translated into each of the African languages. This would include all the official school subjects, but most especially Mathematics and the Sciences. As was noted in the first section of this paper, however, for this to be made possible the languages themselves need to be significantly developed. Thirdly, it will be necessary to entrust a very large number of new Teacher Education lecturers who are able to teach the newly translated curriculum in the ordinary of the African languages.At the moment, a very small percentage of university teacher educators are able to provide flavour tertiary tuitionthrough the African students mother tongues, and even few in the scientific subjects. Finally, for the requisite development and continuous upgrading of mother tongue tuition at tertiary level to be possible, it is necessary for high level research to be conducted. Thus, optimally, each universitys efficacy or School of Edu cation would need to attract and support top quality education researchers working specifically in the field of African languages in education, whether through research units, centres of excellence or private fellowships, grants or professorial chairs.In addition to the training of pre-service student teachers, it will also be necessary to upgrade the competence levels of teachers already in the system. Universities will have to provide a range of superfluous courses for in-service teachers so that they are able to acquire academic proficiency in the newly-developed African languages as well as raise methodological skills in utilising the languages as media of instruction in all the various Learning Areas. Such courses would, of necessity, need to be taught under active (after hours, during the vacations, or as block-release programmes) which would place an big burden on both the schools and the universities, and would again require a heavy investment on the part of the State i n terms of additional lecturing staff, tuition and transportation costs, and perhaps even brief teacher-replacements. Such courses would also by their very nature have to be faultless over an extended period of time and would thus require a sloshed commitmenton the part of both lecturers and teachers over and above the normal duties which they have to perform in an already highly pressurised work environment.As was the case with language and curriculum development, it is evident that for all of this to become possible, the State will have to make extremely heavy investments in human and material resources far beyond the provision of the limited number of student bursaries it presently offers. Whether the State budget for education can or will ever be enlarged to meet all of these triplex costs remains unclear.Implementation in the SchoolsThe fourth aspect of mother tongue education involves its actual implementation in the schools. Even assuming that at some point in the futur e the African languages have been effectively developed, that the curriculum has been efficiently translated, and that a full quota of properly train teachers is available, there is politic the question of whether schools will adopt the policy and implement it thoroughly. For this to take place, a number of stakeholders will have to be convinced of the broad benefits of mother-tongue education, not merely in a cognitive sense, but in a much larger socio-economic context. Such stakeholders include government education officials, school governing bodies, principals, teachers, and, most importantly, parents and learners.If learners and their parents do not actively lust mother- tongue instruction, then all the crusade in the world will not make the policy viable. And for this desire to be inculcated, parents and their children will have to see that mother-tongue education leads to palpable benefits in such spheres as economic empowerment, social mobility and influence, and pathway s to further academic opportunities. All of this raises questions of the instrumental value of the African languages in South African purchase order more generally which, though of interest and enormousness, lies beyond the s neck of the present paper.A more specific question associate to mother-tongue education in schools concerns the role of English. No matter how rapidly or to what degree the African languages are developed, it is safe to yield that English will continue to necessitate a role of crucial importance in South Africa for the foreseeable future. Even if the African languages are utilised as languages of learning and teaching in the first years of school, at some point there will have to be a switchto English as the medium of instruction, whether this takes place after three years, or, as is now proposed, after six years. Thus, English will have to receive systematic and sustained attention, and will have to be taughtextremely effectively as a subject during the i nitial years of schooling so that when the transition does take place (be it gradually or immediately) learners will be sufficiently competent in the language to be able to sleep together with learning through it.Indeed, even if mother-tongue education were one day to be employed right through to Matric level, learners would still need to be proficient in English for the purposes of higher education where, in a globalised academic environment, English is indispensable. At the moment, however, English is, in many cases, sternly taught in South African schools. meet as important as the production of large numbers of competent mother-tongue teachers, therefore, is the development of high quality teachers of English who can be deployed in the rural and townsfolk schools. Again, a system of service-linked, contract bursaries and incentives to work in areas of greatest need must be implemented immediately for student teachers specialising in the teaching of English. The Minister of E ducation, as mentioned previously, has included English in the list of priority subjects for student teachers, and this is to be welcomed as a long overdue mulish measure.But, as in the case of African language teaching, steps must be taken, over and above this, to ensure the upgrading of in-service teachers in terms of academic proficiency in the language, content knowledge and improved methodological practice. It is a simple truism that any educational system which prioritises the African languages at the expense of English is destined to miss at the levels both of practical verity and educational theory. As even so avid a proponent of heritage languages as Tove Skutnabb-Kangas has observed, in multilingual societies it is essential that all learners are enabled to learn enough of the power language to be able to influence the society or, especially, to acquire a common language with other subordinated groups, a shared medium of communication and abridgment (1981128).In the b est of all possible worlds, learners, especially in areas where English is rarely used, would begin their schooling in their mother-tongue and then at some point switch over to English as the medium of instruction, having acquired enough English through subject study to be able to cope with it. At the same time, they would continue to study their home languages as subjects in a model of additive bilingualism. Conversely, in areas whereEnglish is able to be used as the language of learning and teaching from the outset, it is in force(p) as important that learners acquire proficiency in at least one official African language. In schools where Afrikaans is the medium of instruction, it is not unreasonable to require that in10addition to their mother-tongue, Afrikaans-speaking learners acquire both English (as they invariably wish to do anyway) and an African language.From this it ought to be apparent that there can be no single language policy which would movement every school conte xt in South Africa. The society simply remains too disparate and differentiated for any one size fits all system to be practicable or even desirable.4 What is not unfair to expect, however, is that by the time learners leave school they will all have full academic proficiency in at least one language (for the moment this would continue to be English or Afrikaans) as well as some degree of academic proficiency in one and perhaps two other official South African languages.However, even inwardly this ideal linguistic scenario, there are some possibly unexpected and certainly wry implications. For schools seriously to implement initial mother-tongue instruction (followed later by English) means that schools would have to be divided into particular language groupings, and learners would have to attend a school offering their particular language. While this does happen informally to a certain degree, a formalised policy would in effect return South Africa (at least in the primary school s) to a kind of linguistic apartheid reminiscent of a former era. Even in the unlikely event of township schools being able to offer duplicate medium education in two or more African languages, there would still effectively exist a language apartheid between the various classes within the school. It is not clear whether the current proponents of mother-tongue education in this country have imagination through these matters with sufficient care.Finally, there remains the question of individual choice, and this brings the present discussion full circle. In any body politic parental (and learner)choice is paramount, especially when it comes to such issues as the language in which a child is to receive his or her education. It is no small matter that this right is enshrined in the Constitution. If, after all is said and done, parents continue to insist, as the majority currently does, that their children be educated inColin Baker (2006215f) provides a typology of bilingual education in which ten main models, each with multitudinous sub-varieties, are discussed. Which of these models would be best for any particular South African school is a complex matter, and is clearly best leftfield to each specific School governance Body to decide. This is borne out by the FutureFact 2006 survey, which reveals that, apart from the Afrikaans community, between 60%-67% of all other language groups feel that English is the favourite(a) language for education.Indeed, of the remain 33%-40% of the smack, less than 20% preferred mother-tongue education (at whatever level) the remainder stating no preference. In addition to this, 82% of the sample claimed to be able to read and understand English, and, again apart from theEnglish rather than their mother-tongue, then the onus rests on the State to ensure that this is provided as effectively as possible for everyone who wants it. And if this does indeed continue to be the will of the majority, then the State must take far more active and extensive steps to improve the teaching and learning of English in South African schools than has hitherto been the case. No language in education policy which is compel on the majority against its will can ever succeed, and will serve only to perpetuate the unequal and inefficient conditions which currently exist in South African education.ReferencesBaker, Colin. 2006. Foundations of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism (4th edition).Clevedon polyglot Matters.Constitution of the Republic of South Africa, Act 108 of 1996.Cummins, Jim. 2000. Language, proponent and Pedagogy Bilingual children in the crossfire.Clevedon Multilingual matters.Department of Education. 1997. Norms and Standards Regarding Language Policy Language in Education Policy. Government publish No.685, 9 May. FutureFact 2006 Survey. Languages. (Available at http// www.futurefact.co.za/ 2006 survey.html.) Herbert, Robert K. and Bailey, Richard. 2002. The Bantu Languages Sociohistorical perspectives. In Rajend Mesthrie (ed.) Language in South Africa, 449-475. Cambridge University Press. Mackey, William F. 1992. fetch Tongues, Other Tongues and Vehicular Languages.Perspectives 81 22(1)45-57 (my translation from the French).Metcalfe, Mary. 2007. In Search of Quality schooling for All. Mail & Guardian (GettingAhead) January 26 to February 14-5.Pandor, Naledi. 2006. Language Issues and Challenges (opening address at the Language Policy Implementation in HEIs Conference, Pretoria, 5 October. Available at http//www.education.gov.za/dynamic/dynamic.aspx?pageid=306&id=2290. Schuring, Gerhard K. 1993. Language and Education in South Africa a policy study.Pretoria Human Sciences look into Council.Afrikaans community, between 72%-77% of all other language groups believe that English should be the main official language of South Africa.12Skutnabb-Kangas, Tove. 1981. Bilingualism or not the Education of Minorities. Clevedon Multilingual matters. Webb, Vic, Deumert, Ana and Lepota, Biki (eds ). 2005. The Standardisation of African