Namibia:Language policy in schools

An article seen on All Africa.com

The Education Corner

New Era (Windhoek)
NEWS
24 September 2007
Posted to the web 24 September 2007

By Toivo Mvula

The Language Policy was developed to guide Namibian schools on how national languages should be taught in schools, to promote the cultural identity of learners through the use of their mother tongue as a medium of instruction in Grades 1-3 and to ensure that English is taught as the medium of instruction from Grade 4 and upwards.

What does the Language Policy state?

The Language Policy states that schools should teach learners in Grade One to Grade Three in their mother-tongue. Grade Four is to be regarded as a transitional year where schools start to switch from mother tongue as a medium of instruction to English as a medium of instruction.

What does this mean?

This means that, as from Grade Four, the mother-tongue becomes a subject and learners will be taught in English; i.e. other subjects will be taught in English.

Is the policy being fully implemented?

No. Although the policy states that learners should be taught in their mother tongue from Grade 1 to Grade 3, this has not happened and is not being done all over the country. Many schools also do not offer Namibian indigenous languages as subjects from Grade 4 until Grade 12.

Why is a mother tongue important?

Research has shown that being taught in one’s mother tongue at an early age helps you to make sense of what you are being taught in order to help you to conceptualise better and acquire writing and reading skills which are best acquired in the early years of schooling.

Teaching mother tongue in schools also helps to promote the language and cultural identity of learners.

What about English?

English is the official language of Namibia. The Language Policy states that English should be compulsory from Grade One to Grade Twelve.

- From Grade 1 - 3 = as a subject.

- From Grade 4 - 12 = as a subject and as the medium of instruction.

The Policy also states that, ideally, learners should study at least two languages as subjects from Grade 1 to Grade 12 and one of them must be English.

- The Education Column is a column that was created by the Ministry of Education to highlight educational issues that are of concern to its stakeholders (learners, students, parents, teachers, development partners, unions, and the private and public sector). For more information, contact the Public Relations Office at Tel: 061-2933358 or 2933366.

South Africa: 8th international conference on language and development

(NB: Please respond to the conference planners via the website, NOT to Sociolingo!)

08th international conference on language and development

 Date: 1 to 3 October 2007

Venue: University of South Africa, Tshwane (Pretoria), South Africa

http://www.unisa.ac.za/default.asp?Cmd=ViewContent&ContentID=19711

 The aims are to:

* Discuss and debate matters pertaining to language, education and development;

* Identify key areas for collaborative projects and interventions;

* Constitute core teams to pursue collaborative projects;

* Develop joint working and funding proposals.

About the conference

 Language is knowledge. Language is power. Language is a key driver in development – in thesocial, cultural, educational and economic domains. Yet, despite international initiatives to address education, poverty, gender equality, disease, civil conflict and economic growth, millions of people across the globe are marginalized. They exist on the fringe of survival and are denied access to basic necessities which could obviate their suffering and bring new hope.

What role does language play in development?

 What role can language play in addressing urgent global demands? How do we reconcile language development, the hegemony of English, the formation of national identities, demands for democratization and liberalization, and the recognition of individual and cultural rights in a global context? How can language practitioners, educationalists, development specialists and the like, from across the world, collaborate to make a tangible difference to increasing access to knowledge through the development of language?

 The University of South Africa – in association with the Trustees of the Language and Development Conference Series – invite applications from governments, academics, researchers, NGOs, and activists to participate in the 8th International Conference on Language and Development from 1 to 3 October 2007.

 This International Conference will take the following form:

 * Plenary presentations;

* Individual papers addressing the key themes;

* Workshop sessions.

 

Uganda: support for Ugandan languages

Uganda’s state minister for Gender, Isanga Nakadama has advised parents to stop forcing their children to speak English.

By Risdel KasasiraThe minister who was presiding over the World Cultural Day in Kampala, says for African cultures to survive, native languages must be protected especially at family level. She says there are families where children are beaten because they speak native languages.Nakadama says this is an unfortunate situation that will kill African languages. Nakadama said Ugandan government is planning to introduce teaching of vernaculars from primary to secondary level in order to help maintain local languages in every locality.The minister of relief and disaster preparedness, Prof. Tarsis Kabwegyere proposed that the Institute of Languages at Makerere University, Uganda’s leading public university to work with the ministry of gender, labour and social development to design a national language policy.

Kabwegyere says the policy should be written in all native languages of Uganda.

Ultimate Media

Angola: debate on Angolan languages

The debate on local languages is a hot potato in Angola at the moment. Last month experts, technicians of the Culture Ministry (Mincult), university lecturers and students met for three days in order to discuss about the problem of local languages, its insertion in the education system, and their preservation. It really seems quite hopeful that things will move forward although things are hindered by the lack of legislation enabling the Vernacular Languages Institute (ILN) to be officially recognised.

See: http://allafrica.com/stories/200608281557.html

Angola: Support for the promotion of Angolan languages

During the opening of a seminar on cultural journalism this week in Luanda, Angola, the Minister of Culture, Boaventura Cardoso, gave his support for the promotion of vernacular languages as a fundamental support for cultural identity.

“It is through our vernacular languages that thousands of Angolans better express their sentiments and emotions. Thus it is with satisfaction that we notice at this seminar the presence of journalists working on our radio station, “Ngola Yetu” and the Public Television, capable of improving our languages for broadcasting,” he asserted.

He also acknowledged the existence of much prejudice with regard to the use of vernacular languages which leads us into concluding that it is important to develop an ample debate on this matters, being important to think, in a near future, of holding reflection events, with the participation of more intellectuals, experts and communities.

He also said:

“We want cultural information to be richer and richer and the various cultural and artistic expressions of Angolan artists to be appropriately promoted: To this end, we will have to revise the existing mechanisms and create new ways of cooperating and interchange among various cultural and information agents, facilitating contacts, better guiding our common action towards culture and consolidation of democracy and consequently, national unity,”

Full story at: http://allafrica.com/stories/200608220812.html

Languages of Mali

According to the Ethnologue:Languages of the World (2005) entry for Mali there are 50 languages. Of these 13 have been recognised for education and 11 are being used.

Mali: The quest for a literate environment in Mali

The Malian newspaper Les Echos reports on the workshop held in Bamako, 5-8th September on the development of a literate environment in Mali.

In order to mark International Literacy Day (September 8th), the Ministry of Education and its partners is holding a major 4 day workshop in Bamako with 102 participants from governmental departments and non-governmental organisations. The aim of the workshop is to identify and debate how to develop a literate environment in Mali and to develop integrated strategies to achieve this. The development of a literate environment is actually the second part of the 10 year plan for the development of Education in Mali (PRODEC), and is allied to the Literacy for LIFE movement of UNESCO.

I think that the problem with these sorts of initiative is that it is all very well to talk, and a lot of talking will have gone on in the workshop, but all too often that is all there is. This initiative needs to be backed by action and perhaps changes in legislation in order to really change things. The workshop raises the questions of ‘what is a literate society and what are the criteria for judging the success of becoming a literate society? These are questions that will be well-debated in the workshop.

One of the biggest problems is the lack of reading materials in Malian languages. In previous workshops and for many years materials/texts have been written, but they are still not published. This is a major area that needs to be addressed if there is going to be any real change.

Mali has gone a long way in recent years to develop education in Malian languages alongside French in the Primary sector (for the first 6 years). These young people will grow up with a different attitude to language than their parents. But if there is nothing for them to read as they are growing up they will lose the incentive to read for pleasure in their own languages. It really is imperative to address this reading desert.