In Enhancement Programme Classes 1 The Enhancement Programme Class

The EP classes were taught after school hours, on Mondays, Wednesdays and Thursdays. On Mondays and Thursdays, the one-hour programme was divided in two parts: on Mondays, the first part was taken care of by Miss Ariana and the second was taught by Miss Veronica. On Thursdays, however, for the second part, children were under the custody of Mr Rodrigues, who took them out to do physical education. Miss Veronica taught English on Mondays, and on Wednesdays the programme was divided into three parts. The first part was usually devoted to the teaching of an Oriental/Asian language or KM; the second part was taken by Miss Ariana and the third part was taught by Mr Alain, who taught Creative Arts. Since there was no one to teach KM for the Enhancement programme during the first part, the students usually remained free and sat outside of the class on the steps. Miss Ariana looked after the rest of the subjects that were taught within the Standard Three curriculum and the lessons I observed dealt with the teaching of French and that of Health Education.

4.2.3.2 With Miss Ariana: the General Purpose teacher

The following extract details one of the first instances I observed and recorded when I started producing data within the slot allotted to Enhancement Programme. It was taken at the start of the class. Miss Ariana was teaching French through the use of a big book, called, ‘Le Bonhomme de Massepin41’. She started with a pre-reading activity tapping into the prior knowledge of the students and many of them already knew the story for having done it in KM when they were in Standard II. As usual, Stevie, who liked participating in the class, answered and added an additional information by saying that the story was in their KM textbook and he was asked by Miss Ariana to narrate to the others what he knew of the story.

Extract 4.7: PEP 24.02.2014 (l 375-387)

TEA: On regarde avec les yeux!(...)mais tu connais déjà l’histoire?(...) {we watch with the eyes!

(...) but you already know the story (…)?} SS/P: Oui!(...){yes! (…)}

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S: C’était(…) c’était dans le livre de Kréol Morisien! {it was (…) it was in the Kreol Morisien

book!}

P: (overlapping)kreol! {creole!}

TEA: allez racontes moi l’histoire Stevie!(...) {come on Stevie tell me the story! (…)}

S: il(…)il y avait une dame(…) {there (…) there was a woman (…)}

S19: Une vieille dame avec un monsieur!(...) {an old lady with a man! (...)}

TEA: Ey!assieds toi!(...)Stevie!(...){hey!sit down! (…) Stevie! (...)}

S: Il y avait une monsieur(…) {there was a man (…)}

TEA: un monsieur!(...){a man! (…)}

S: un monsieur avec les dames(…)quand le dame l’a vu de(…)on a fait (unintelligible)le petit massepin(…) il a(…) il(…) il a(…) il a courrir derrière lui(…){a man with the ladies (…) when

the lady has seen him (…) we have done a small cake (unintelligible) the small cake (…) he has (...) he (…) he has (…) he has run after him (…)}

S18: Oui! {yes!}

KEY: TEA= Teacher; SS= Other children in class; S=Stevie; P=Piper; S19=Classmate

He started narrating the story inin French, and he was helped by one of his classmates who usually participated as much as him in the classroom. Her name was Alexandra. What was interesting to note was his hesitation in telling the story although he knew it already in Creole, as could be seen in his pauses in between. He took time to come up with the appropriate sentences to narrate what he knew of the story. This was evident when he used the sentence, ‘Il y avait une monsieur…’. He was immediately corrected by Miss Ariana as he had used the wrong gendered article with the noun ‘monsieur’, which should have been the masculine gendered article. He often made such mistakes when he spoke and wrongly concorded the gender of the articles with their subject and was often corrected by Miss Ariana. He went on to do the same mistake in the next sentence, where he again wrongly concorded the noun ‘dame’ with the preceding article and the verb ‘courrir’. However, he was not stopped by Miss Ariana this time. His unease to use French to tell a story, although he had knowledge of it in Creole, was seen through the hesitating tone he adopted when trying to narrate the story. This extract can be compared to the story-telling he indulged into during the KM class when he reinvented the story of the tortoise and the hare and where he was much more eloquent than he waswa at this instance. Although he had difficulty expressing himself, he did not shift to using Creole within his repertoire though. This is because the mere presence of Miss Ariana acted as a catalyst. It is the presence of Miss Ariana which determined which linguistic resources he would call upon within his repertoire whether he addressed her or his classmates in a whole classroom interaction. It can thus be contended that Miss Ariana was associated with French whatever language practices she herself indulged into with him during their interactions.

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The fact that he associated Miss Ariana with French is quite evident in the extract that follows below and which related to an interaction during an EP lesson taught in March by Miss Ariana on Health Education. As the subject needs to be taught in English, Miss Ariana made use of English to teach them the vocabulary in relation to the topic ‘body parts’. It should be remembered that the ethos behind the Enhancement Programme was to consolidate, through the use of creative pedagogical approaches after school hours, the teaching and learning of subject matter dealt with during the day. The topic of that day was ‘body parts’ and since the teacher had already taught them this topic before during her normal class hours and in the previous EP classes, the children were expected to already know this topic and the class was conducted mostly to check the understanding of vocabulary items, the spelling of vocabulary items and word recognition.

Extract 4.8: SEP 17.03.2014 (l 360-363) TEA: kouma apel sa? {how is it called?} S2: leg!

S: c’est la jambe(…) la jambe(…){it’s the leg (…) the leg (…)}

TEA: show me your legs everybody (…) (murmurs) (…) my leg!

KEY: TEA= Teacher; S2= Other child in class; S=Stevie

Using a picture of the leg, Miss Ariana asked in Creole how this body part was called. Whilst a classmate of Stevie answered in English and said that it was a leg, Stevie answered using French in his repertoire, saying ‘c’est la jambe…’ Miss Ariana then continued her class using the answer provided to her by the classmate of Stevie and instructed the children to show their legs making use of English. As can be noted, even within the interplay of the three different languages within this interaction, Stevie opted for French when addressing Miss Ariana, as he associates her with French.

Stevie’s repertoire comprises French when Miss Ariana is present within his speech act, irrespective of whether it is during formal or informal interactiononas. In the extract below the conversation topic dealt with his proposal to bring a gingerbread man cake in class. This was done in an informal aside to Miss Ariana after she had instructed the students to draw the gingerbread. Stevie, thus, called her to tell her he would do it tomorrow and Miss Ariana misunderstood thinking he was referring to the drawing of the gingerbread when in fact Stevie was referring to the gingerbread man cake he was proposing to bring in class. In the previous EP class, he had proposed to bring such a cake to class but had not done so.

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TEA: ey! (...) ey! (...) allez à votre place! {ey! (...) ey! (...) go in your place!}

S: (overlapping)miss ariana je vais faire demain (…) {miss ariana I will do tomorrow (…)} TEA: Kifer demain? {why tomorrow?}

S: je vais faire ça demain! {I will do this tomorrow!}

TEA: Tu vas emmener ça pour nous(…) pour manger(…) (noise in the background)allez!(...) (TEA

has a conversation about the different food items the children will bring to class when they have their bring and share)dessinez un petit bonhomme de massepin! {you will bring this for us (…) to eat (…) come on! (...) draw a little cakeman!}

KEY: TEA= Teacher; S=Stevie

Moreover, it is observed that although his repertoire comprises French when he interacts with Miss Ariana in most cases, hishis repertoire also comprises English in class, mostly when Miss Ariana teaches in this language. The extract taken below was during the class when Miss Ariana was teaching the topic ‘body parts’ and she asked the children what they could do with their head. As usual, Stevie participated by offering the answer which had been rote-learned in prior classes, namely ‘I fink’. He used the sound [f] instead of [Ɵ], which is the opening sound that is normally used when pronouncing the word ‘think’.

Extract 4.10: SEP 17.03.2014 (l 269-274)