REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE
2.7 MOTHER TONGUE EDUCATION BEYOND AFRICA’S BORDERS UNESCO (2007) highlights that it has been supporting 11 countries in mother tongue and
bilingual programmes. The countries include Phillipines, Cambodia, Bangladesh, Nepal, India and China among others. According to UNESCO (2007), the Asia Pacific Programme of Education for All (APPEAL) so far is showing promising results following the sterling work in the development of orthographies for the different languages and the creation of teaching and learning materials. Generally, the experiences of the countries under the programme reveal that the classes are very effective and learners are learning the required skills in their L1 (UNESCO, 2007). For the purposes of this discussion, I will discuss three success stories in mother tongue education implementation.
2.7.1 The case of Cambodia
In Cambodia, a bilingual Education Programme for Youths and Adults from members of the Bunong community has been largely successful. According to UNESCO (2007), there are approximately 19 languages and 30 to 40 minorities. The national language is Khmer and there is no clearly spelt out policy for MTE. However, UNESCO (2007) reports that the Royal Government of Cambodia fully supports those programmes that endeavour to provide MTE such as the Non-Formal Education Programmes (NFE).
According to UNESCO (2007) Cambodia’s Ministry of Education and Sport approved orthographies for quite a number of minority languages which include Brao, Tumpuen, Krung,
38 Bunong and Kavet. This means that the implementation of the bilingual education programme for youths and adults would be easy in the presence of an approved orthography of the Bunong language. In choosing the project site, two key factors were considered:
1. The availability of teachers proficient in the Bunong Language.
2. The propinquity to the provincial capital to ease monitoring and supervision (UNESCO, 2007).
With these important factors taken into consideration, the successful implementation of the project is largely guaranteed because the teachers are Bunong speaking and the project site is closer to the provincial capital which makes it easy for officials to monitor.
Another important step taken to ensure successful implementation of this project was to develop materials and the work was done by the International Cooperation Cambodia (ICC).
According to UNESCO (2007) the Bunong neighbourhoods have welcomed the idea of learning in their own language because they are realising its benefits. Understanding of concepts by the learners is now much better than when they were taught by a Khmer teacher through the Khmer language because they are taught by a Bunong teacher and the learning materials are in the Bunong Language. The teachers who are implementing this programme received training in bilingual teaching at ICC and they also received training in adult education at the Provincial Office of Education, Youth and Sport (UNESCO, 2007).
In my own analysis of the bilingual education programme for youths and adults in Cambodia, I would say the project was largely successful owing to the preparatory work done by the government before the project was rolled out. With an approved orthography, trained teachers and materials in Bunong, one would expect nothing but successful implementation of the project. This research will establish if these ideals for MTE policy implementation were addressed in the Zimbabwean context to ensure that the use of the Shangani language as the MOI would be successful.
2.7.2 The case of Phillipines
Burton (2013) remarks that, research evidence from studies carried out in the Phillipines and in other countries convinced the policymakers in the country of Phillipines that there were a lot of benefits in letting minority language children learn through their local languages. The advantages noted in these studies point to high involvement in classroom activities (Benson, 2004c) better access to education and growth of critical thinking skills (Broke-Utne, 2006) and
39 improved academic skills (Cummins, 2000). Although the Phillipines case seems to be a successful one, it faced its own challenges. For example, in a research carried out by Lartec et al (2014), the participants emphasised that they really need books written in mother tongue so as to enable them to successfully implement MTE-MLE successfully. These sentiments are consistent with Dekker et al (2008) that no teacher can teach effectively without appropriate materials.
The issue of human resources is also a major challenge in Phillipines. Lartec et al (2014) state that if the teachers are not that literate in all the different languages of their learners, thus, the production of mother tongue textbooks and dictionaries is a must in the indigenous languages.
Teachers are also experiencing difficulties in translating terms from English or Filipino to the learners’ mother tongues. In a research carried out by Burton (2013) participants indicated that they are experiencing difficulties in teaching pupils because they cannot think of the right word that is exactly the equivalent of the source language thus putting them in a situation that brings confusion to the pupils.
2.7.3 The case of China
China has, with the support of UNESCO, successfully implemented a MTE project to the minority language speakers of the Kam Language. The project is called the Kam/Mandarin Bilingual Education Pilot Project for children (UNESCO, 2007). In selecting the project site, two factors were considered:
1. The village chosen should have the same characteristics with other villages in the neighbourhood so that the project could be repeated in neighbouring villages if proven successful.
2. There was need for the community members to be in support of the idea of bilingual education in Kam and Chinese (Greary and Pan, 2003 as cited in UNESCO, 2007).
Prior to the implementation of the project, several workshops were conducted to map the way forward in the development of materials. Since educators from the national languages could not take part in the development of the materials in the Kam minority language, the Kam community leaders and Kam teachers provided their specialist information about their language and culture which then enabled the programme organisers to develop a broad range of curriculum and teaching materials for use in the pre-school (UNESCO, 2007). All these efforts later contributed to the success of the project.
40 The subjects that are taught at pre-school in the Kam language include: Math, Singing, Art and Physical Education. Since in Kam speaking homes very little of Mandarin is spoken, it was observed that Kam speaking children could understand very little if instruction was given in Mandarin in Grade 1. This led to teachers labelling these Kam speaking children as slow learners. The Kam/ Mandarin project aimed at bridging this gap where learners are made to learn via the Kam language at the same time having oral Mandarin lessons in preparation for instruction in Mandarin in Grade 1. The teachers who implemented this project underwent training before they were made to teach using the Kam Language.
Just like in the case of Cambodia, the success story of the Kam/Mandarin Bilingual Education Pilot Project for Children (UNESCO 2007) is a result of careful planning and consideration of the basics in MTE, that is, training manpower and availing resources in the Kam Language.
According to UNESCO (2007), as a result of the Kam/ Mandarin project, children’s performance in later grades proved to be far above their counterparts who did not go through the same programme. Therefore, the Kam/Mandarin project was a success because all cogs were in place before the implementation of the project.