Article: Schools are plagued by language problems

Schools are plagued by language problems with at least 30 percent of Grade One pupils not being taught in their home language, it was reported on Thursday.

"When learners do not speak the language of instruction, they find learning difficult and academic achievement is undermined," a national education evaluation and development unit study found, according to a report in The Times.
 
rpm said:
"When learners do not speak the language of instruction, they find learning difficult and academic achievement is undermined,"
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I feel that this is related to the government's idiotic notion, of forcing schools to accept children that do not live within the feeder area for said school. Improve the damn public schools across all areas...
 
Learning is hard enough without having to cross the language barrier too
 
I am involved with a multi-cultural high school in Gansbaai. The school has two mother languages, Xhosa or Afrikaans and the kids are otherwise taught in English or Afrikaans. A number of our Xhosa learners are not fluent in English and therefore have problems learning.

As a new school we have established our library last year and already have over 3000 English or Afrikaans books with a number of English/Afrikaans magazine subscriptions. Obviously we are trying to include Xhosa fiction etc but are faced with the reality that there is only one Xhosa language magazine available and no major newspapers with Xhosa. I am searching the internet for Xhosa books and there are only a few books available other than dictionaries or school handbooks.

I find it extremely difficult to see a language survive in this century with so little material available and this would suggest that kids are far better off in being taught English as their first language at an age when their minds are receptive to learn languages, and by the time they enter high school they would be able to fully understand their lessons and be able to do research into a vast English database.

By the way, if anybody reading this, knows of a South African publisher of modern Xhosa fiction or Xhosa publications, please let me know. It will be really appreciated.
 
old news. What has been done to fix it? F all. Angie's panties got bigger from feeding at the ANC trough.

We have been saying this for how many years? Mother tongue education with English as a second language. ( just so that everybody has one language we all understand write read and can communicate with the world in.)

If they started 5 years ago we would have had the teachers. Now we have no text books, no teachers and the boogie man to blame.

Take of your goggles the Boogie man is the ANC.
 
Maverick Jester said:
I feel that this is related to the government's idiotic notion, of forcing schools to accept children that do not live within the feeder area for said school. Improve the damn public schools across all areas...
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+1

Build more schools, get teachers in 11 languages ... but no.
 
It's just such a bloody mission when we have 11 official languages and have to coordinate that in a country that's notorious for governmental screw ups.
 
To be fair .. apparently half the teachers were often unable to understand national tests too.

"Angie's panties got bigger from feeding at the ANC trough." .. brilliant Mila!
 
A African kid has to deal with 3 languages from the word go! Mother tongue then Afrikaans in day to day communication and English in the class room. Because English is a world language, some monkey has decided to use it in most African schools. Afrikaans is much more used but that language is not politically correct. As for the African languages, some more ANC monkeys think it is not suited to teaching. WTF The Afrikanners profit most from all this. Afrikaans classes have very little blacks and very good teachers. Keep in mind, for a teacher too it is better if he/she teaches in his/her own language. There are simply too few British people in SA to make English a general teaching language. Tell that to the ANC though.
 
intel8080 said:
A African kid has to deal with 3 languages from the word go! Mother tongue then Afrikaans in day to day communication and English in the class room. Because English is a world language, some monkey has decided to use it in most African schools. Afrikaans is much more used but that language is not politically correct. As for the African languages, some more ANC monkeys think it is not suited to teaching. WTF The Afrikanners profit most from all this. Afrikaans classes have very little blacks and very good teachers. Keep in mind, for a teacher too it is better if he/she teaches in his/her own language. There are simply too few British people in SA to make English a general teaching language. Tell that to the ANC though.
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Only the British speak English and Afrikaans is politically incorrect... profound.
 
this is what i was talking about when i said this teaching in mother tongue is another barrier in education, african written language is often different to the way you speak it. Whats next is when you get to university most courses are taught in english/afrikaans even in historically black universities because most lecturer's aquired their qualification in said language
 
iscariot said:
this is what i was talking about when i said this teaching in mother tongue is another barrier in education, african written language is often different to the way you speak it. Whats next is when you get to university most courses are taught in english/afrikaans even in historically black universities because most lecturer's aquired their qualification in said language
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If a language can not support the material needed in a good education, then perhaps it shouldn't be the language to teach in?
 
iscariot said:
this is what i was talking about when i said this teaching in mother tongue is another barrier in education, african written language is often different to the way you speak it. Whats next is when you get to university most courses are taught in english/afrikaans even in historically black universities because most lecturer's aquired their qualification in said language
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I think the plan was to give everybody mother tongue education to get them started, then have english move to be the primary language.

Any kid should have the basis of education in his own language, then move over to English that will help him with higher education.

The primary problem is that we do not have enough educators that can do this. Yes and carry on with a 3rd language like it used to be, on a level where you teach children that took afrikaans and english an african language. or if you took xhosa and english afrikaans or Zulu as an extra subject. Just enabling people in this country to understand more people around them.

Xhosa nor Zulu is going to be the primary language of education in this country for years to come. Unless we have a university that caters for a language specific. If you want to be taught in Zulu KZN will be for you. If you want afrikaans Potch. But this will be seen as some form of separation or discrimination so english will be the language we are taught in for many years to come.
 
My daughters creche and school teach solely in English.
Most of the kids are black, the only time they are allowed to speak a non english language is during breaks.
The parents think it's a good thing.
 
Mila said:
I think the plan was to give everybody mother tongue education to get them started, then have english move to be the primary language.

Any kid should have the basis of education in his own language, then move over to English that will help him with higher education.

The primary problem is that we do not have enough educators that can do this. Yes and carry on with a 3rd language like it used to be, on a level where you teach children that took afrikaans and english an african language. or if you took xhosa and english afrikaans or Zulu as an extra subject. Just enabling people in this country to understand more people around them.

Xhosa nor Zulu is going to be the primary language of education in this country for years to come. Unless we have a university that caters for a language specific. If you want to be taught in Zulu KZN will be for you. If you want afrikaans Potch. But this will be seen as some form of separation or discrimination so english will be the language we are taught in for many years to come.
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I don't think that there ever was a plan, to be honest... Just a bunch of ideals that if thrown against the wall hard enough, might stick...
 
intel8080 said:
A African kid has to deal with 3 languages from the word go! Mother tongue then Afrikaans in day to day communication and English in the class room. Because English is a world language, some monkey has decided to use it in most African schools. Afrikaans is much more used but that language is not politically correct. As for the African languages, some more ANC monkeys think it is not suited to teaching. WTF The Afrikanners profit most from all this. Afrikaans classes have very little blacks and very good teachers. Keep in mind, for a teacher too it is better if he/she teaches in his/her own language. There are simply too few British people in SA to make English a general teaching language. Tell that to the ANC though.
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I wouldn't agree with that in most township schools lessons are taught in english with african language used to better explain concepts because the very nature of the bilingual environment and languages is social settings in those communities. Often African language is spoken with english words or sentences used interchangeably. Afrikaans can't be used because the post 1994 the language was no longer the medium of instruction nor that of official government interaction with the public ie government documents/ social welfare/ id books.

Even if the public wanted to go back to using the Afrikaans the generational Gap of those who won't brought up with it as the main learning medium would be the generation who implement it. The same problem would occur as now where people are taught how to teach in english and yet are expected to teach in their mother tongue.
 
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