By: Lungisa Somtombo
“The most developed countries are the ones that use their mother tongue” these words were said by the Department of Education MEC Fundile Gade at the Language in Education Seminar held at the Mandla Makupula Leadership Institute formerly known as the Education Leadership Institute in Sterling, East London yesterday.
Emphasizing that nothing is stopping them from teaching in their own language MEC said there’s nothing in our constitution and in the policies of the education department that says we must teach in English as a first language.
“We have developed a program that ensures that mother tongue bilingual teaching gains expression in the livers and policies of education,” the MEC said.
Explaining the programme, Director of the Language in Education Policy Jeremiah Zakhele Sabata said the programme is Mother Tongue Based Bilingual Education (MTBBE) which allows learners to use their home language to learn Mathematics and Science.
Zakhele Sabata said this programme has 2014 schools and they use bilingual question papers that have questions in English and IsiXhosa. He added that learners that used bilingual question papers have outshined those learning in English.
Statutory Advisory and Protocol Services Chief Director Naledi Mbude said the MTBBE works because when children understand the language they will perform better.
“Answering in a language you do not understand means you have to understand the language first before you know the answer and it’s a lot. We want to provide them with the opportunity to understand the question and work on the question,” she said.
Further, Mbude said it is interesting to see the richness of the response from the children. They had really good marks since they did not have to struggle with language.
Mbude added that the role of home in language development is paramount.
“A child who lives in a home that values their language will be confident and will not want to fit in.”
Mbude expressed that parents have a responsibility of teaching children about the importance of their mother tongue.
Holy Cross High School pupil Liso Mtwana said they have bilingual exam question papers so that if you do not understand a question you can read it in your own language.
“It helps a lot because in most cases it is difficult to understand a question but when you read it in your home language you can understand and answer better,” she said.