This item from the Cape Argus was featured at
http://www.int.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=105&art_id=vn20050816123347922C651294#jump
. Shortage of teachers qualified to teach in African languages is a problem in
other countries as well. (Link from Google alert)... DZO
Xhosa teacher pool mooted in Western Cape
Theresa Smith
August 16 2005 at 07:13AM
Western Cape education officials are considering making Xhosa teachers available
across the province to help schools achieve a multi-lingual education system.
Education MEC Cameron Dugmore said a task team was being formed to work out the
practicalities of the language policy, which should be gazetted by the end of
the year.
"This is a firm commitment we are making in response to the minister of
education's call," Dugmore said.
One plan is to form a pool of itinerant Xhosa teachers in each magisterial
district to help schools that don't offer the language.
'It has an automatic boost for Xhosa children'
Western Cape education department senior curriculum planner Anne Schlebusch said
while it was the school governing body's duty to declare the language medium of
instruction at a school, the policy was meant to equalise the status of the
province's three official languages at schools.
"We have a legacy of having given status only to English and Afrikaans and if
something like this step actually upgrades the status of Xhosa in schools, it
has an automatic boost for Xhosa children and their parents," said Schlebusch.
Aside from practicalities such as finding appropriate textbooks and suitable
teachers, Schlebusch said two important issues had to be thrashed out.
These were supporting teachers to eventually extend mother tongue education to
Grade 6, and making a third language compulsory for three years.
Schlebusch said the importance of receiving mother tongue instruction had been
proven empirically. Children struggled initially to learn abstract concepts and
they were at a double disadvantage if it was in another language.
Does the Western Cape have enough staff who can teach in Xhosa?
"Research says a child needs five to seven years before developing academic
proficiency in a second language," she said.
She added that several township primary school teachers used Xhosa to explain
concepts to children, then switched over to English, the school's medium of
instruction.
The best way to support these teachers was to provide textbooks and support
material in Xhosa and alert them to new teaching methodologies where
necessary.
She said the issue of introducing Xhosa as a compulsory language stemmed from a
provision in the Revised National Curriculum Statement which said all pupils
had to learn an African language for at least three years by the end of Grade
9.
The Western Cape education language policy should stipulate in which grades this
would happen.
Schlebusch said the curriculum for learning a third language was already in
place, but a system would have to be worked out for children who had never been
exposed to the language to catch up to those who had.
While the move to give Xhosa equal status to English and Afrikaans in education
has been widely welcomed, the big question is whether the Western Cape has
enough teachers who can handle Xhosa as a medium of instruction.
In the past two years, not a single teacher graduating from the University of
Cape Town qualified as a Xhosa teacher. None of the teachers who graduated from
the Cape Peninsula University of Technology specialised in teaching languages
and their medium of instruction is English.
Schlebusch, however, thinks the situation is not all that dire since many
teachers have a working knowledge of Xhosa which, with sufficient retraining,
they could put to good use.
Dugmore added that one way to encourage matriculants to become Xhosa teachers
was to provide pay-back bursaries through the National Student Financial Aid
Scheme, thus guaranteeing and creating jobs.
He said the department would also, for the first time, honour the best
multilingual matriculant at the end of this year to demonstrate the importance
attached to the concept.
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o This article was originally published on page 6 of Cape Argus on
August 16, 2005
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