Mother tongue instruction
Mother-tongue Education in South Africa
- Andrew Foley
Introduction
The question of mother-tongue education in South Africa remains a vexed one. On the one hand, it seems reasonable and desirable that learners should be able to receive education in their mother-tongue, if they so wish. On the other hand, there are some very real difficulties involved in the implementation of this ideal. The purpose of this paper is to clarify what these difficulties are, and then to suggest what needs to be done to overcome them. The intention is neither to argue for or against the notion of mother-tongue education in the South African context, nor to consider whether its implementation is practically possible, but simply to spell out what courses of action need to be undertaken if the idea is to be seriously pursued.
Background
The South African Constitution guarantees learners the right to receive education in the language of their choice1. Most current research suggests that learners entering school are able to learn best through their mother-tongue, and that a second language (such as English) is more easily acquired if the learner already has a firm grasp of his/her home language. Furthermore, the poor throughput rates in South African schools at the moment, where barely a quarter of African language learners who enter the schooling system are likely to reach Matric2, seems to indicate that the current practice of using English as the initial language of learning and teaching is at least one contributing factor to this problem.
1 This right is, however, qualified by the consideration of reasonable practicability, which is defined in the Language in Education Policy of 1997 as occuring when 40 learners in a particular grade in a primary school, or 35 learners in a particular grade in a secondary school, demand to be taught in their mother tongue.
2 As a number of newspapers reported, of the number of learners who entered
- Andrew Foley
Introduction
The question of mother-tongue education in South Africa remains a vexed one. On the one hand, it seems reasonable and desirable that learners should be able to receive education in their mother-tongue, if they so wish. On the other hand, there are some very real difficulties involved in the implementation of this ideal. The purpose of this paper is to clarify what these difficulties are, and then to suggest what needs to be done to overcome them. The intention is neither to argue for or against the notion of mother-tongue education in the South African context, nor to consider whether its implementation is practically possible, but simply to spell out what courses of action need to be undertaken if the idea is to be seriously pursued.
Background
The South African Constitution guarantees learners the right to receive education in the language of their choice1. Most current research suggests that learners entering school are able to learn best through their mother-tongue, and that a second language (such as English) is more easily acquired if the learner already has a firm grasp of his/her home language. Furthermore, the poor throughput rates in South African schools at the moment, where barely a quarter of African language learners who enter the schooling system are likely to reach Matric2, seems to indicate that the current practice of using English as the initial language of learning and teaching is at least one contributing factor to this problem.
1 This right is, however, qualified by the consideration of reasonable practicability, which is defined in the Language in Education Policy of 1997 as occuring when 40 learners in a particular grade in a primary school, or 35 learners in a particular grade in a secondary school, demand to be taught in their mother tongue.
2 As a number of newspapers reported, of the number of learners who entered
References: Baker, Colin. 2006. Foundations of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism (4th edition). Cummins, Jim. 2000. Language, Power and Pedagogy: Bilingual children in the crossfire. Department of Education. 1997. Norms and Standards Regarding Language Policy; Language in Education Policy. Government Gazette No.685, 9 May. Mackey, William F. 1992. Mother Tongues, Other Tongues and Vehicular Languages. Metcalfe, Mary. 2007. In Search of Quality Schooling for All. Mail & Guardian (Getting Ahead) January 26 to February 1:4-5. 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. Webb, Vic, Deumert, Ana and Lepota, Biki (eds). 2005. The Standardisation of African Languages in South Africa