Focus and purpose of the study

This study explores the development of the Mauritian learners’ linguistic repertoires at lower primary level within the above-described political, sociolinguistic educational landscape. The official introduction of KM taught as an optional language within the primary curriculum opened up a gap within the current research on the linguistic educational system of Mauritius, which is yet to be explored. This study therefore sets out to fill this gap within the literature. It does so by

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looking at how the linguistic repertoire of the primary school learners is developed within the Mauritian multilingual educational system.

When I set out to undertake this study, as a lecturer teaching English at the MIE, training pre- primary, primary as well as secondary teachers, I disapproved very much of the introduction of KM within the school curriculum. What was going to be its use in a sociolinguistic context riddled with a number of issues and in an already stricken acquisition poor environment in which English was taught? I felt that this decision would add to my trainee educators’ frustration in regard to developing the adequate proficiency skills in English. As has been mentioned earlier, English is the medium of instruction of the country and all the exams, except those held in French and the Oriental/Asian languages, are conducted in English, to which situation most researchers have attributed the high failure rate of Mauritian students within the Mauritian educational system (Mahadeo, 2006; Auleear-Owodally, 2010; Sauzier-Uchida, 2009; Sonck, 2005). But, was I simply complicit in the hegemony of the colonisers’ languages and the marginalisation of local Mauritius? I came to ponder.

A look at the Primary Curriculum Framework (MOE, 2007) helps us better understand the expectations that the Mauritian educational system has from the primary student, expectations which are at times quite high. Their rationale is stated as follows:

An individual today needs to be functionally and critically literate in the English Language to be able to adapt to the exigencies of the new world order and to contribute fully to the development and progress of society. To this end, the child should be given a good grounding in the language from the earliest stages of her/his schooling so that s/he can move ahead on the path of learning. The new curriculum being proposed for the learning of English aims at developing the language competencies of the child in a progressive yet holistic manner so that s/he emerges as a competent and confident basic user of the language at the end of six years of primary schooling [my emphasis]. (p.21).

Moreover, the Mauritian learner within the primary school system is also expected to learn French. As stated in the primary curriculum,

Le français occupe une place privilégiée dans l’univers scolaire à Maurice. Il est depuis longtemps et demeure obligatoire. Durant toute la scolarité de base, depuis la première année de primaire jusqu’à la troisième année de collège. Il n’est toutefois pas la langue d’enseignement officiellement enseignée; c’est à l’anglais que revient ce rôle de première importance.18_{(p. 45).}

18 _{French enjoys a coveted position within the Mauritian educational system. Since long, it has been and still is}

compulsory within the foundation years of schooling, i.e. from the first year of primary schooling to the third year of secondary schooling. However, it is not the official medium of instruction; that feat belongs to English, which has the most important role within the educational system.

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As can be seen, almost native-like competency is expected from the Mauritian primary student at the end of only six years of schooling, in both French and English.

Having grown in an acquisition rich environment and being a proficient speaker of English, I had believed that the key to achieving proficiency in English was an acquisition-rich environment. In most of my classes or during my teaching practice visits, I was adamant about the usage of English only in the classroom, ignoring totally the local reality. Hence, I felt that maximising the input whilst keeping the languages already taught at primary level out of the English classroom was the best way to teaching English in Mauritius. Afterall, I was a product of my own linguistic theoretical prejudices which had been presented to me during my own training as teacher. My initial belief failed indeed to consider the more nuanced contextual reality as described in section 1.2 above. As I set out on this journey as linguistic ethnographer to carry out this study, I was adamant that the introduction of KM would only serve to aggravate the linguistic problem already present within the Mauritian educational system. I believed that my study would be oriented at advocating how it influenced the learning of the other core languages, English and French in a negative manner. It was only when I was prompted to delve into the current literature to understand what language meant within the conceptual frame of multilingualism that I shifted totally paradigmatically. From my readings, which will be discussed at length in Chapter Two, I started understanding that the multilingual person was not ‘a deficient monolingual’. I came to understand instead that the multilingual acquires his/her “linguistic repertoire” (explored in more depth later) in unique and complex ways. My training had underprepared me to understand this complexity.

After rewriting my proposal totally for the second time, I realised that using the case of the introduction of KM in Mauritius in 2012, in fact, opened a unique avenue to researching how a multilingual develops his/her linguistic repertoire within such a complex multilingual educational system which was very much different from the other multilingual educational systems prevalent worldwide due to contextual linguistic intricacies. Indeed, in no other place has a Creole language, which is the language of the majority of a population, been introduced as an optional language within a multilingual educational system. Moreover, most of the research on multilingualism is embedded within the research done on immigrants and heritage languages rather than in contexts which are multilingual at the onset (See Chapter Two). Although some research had already been done on the language usage within the multilingual educational system in the island, most researchers’ analytical framework featured a context where KM was included within the

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educational system only as an unofficial support language, used by teachers to teach the other core languages, English and French. Focusing on how the young primary learners aged 6-8 years old developed their linguistic repertoire within the multilingual educational system in Mauritius would give a better insight into how multilingualism developed and conceptualised at an early age by multilinguals.

1.3.2 Rationale

My study is significant for a number of reasons. Firstly, as a teacher educator responsible for training pre-primary, primary and secondary teachers, I have been inculcating certain beliefs in my students about English language teaching without really questioning adequately the motivations behind. The curriculum of Mauritius, whether primary or secondary, focuses a lot on developing native-like competency in the Mauritian student through the Communicative Language Teaching approach, which is obviously translated in my own teaching. Moreover, I am also involved in the designing of the curriculum as well as in the writing of textbooks, and my beliefs are also translated on paper in the form of the curriculum as well as textbooks. This study is an eye opener in many ways as through the reading done for the write-up of my research proposal, I have gained awareness of how much trends and research involving English language teaching have evolved globally. Language acquisition research has evolved from assessing and measuring second language competence and performance against monolingual norms to a “discourse about “models” of bilingual education” and “a discourse about linguistic competence” which emerged mainly from North America (De Angelis, 2007, p.12; Martin-Jones, 2003), from which language teaching methodologies such as Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) evolved. However, this was severely criticised as being “a new type of bias” (De Angelis, 2007, p.13) and there was a clear shift in the discourse these last few years, as has been stated above. This is personally helping me to reflect upon my own position as teacher educator and shape the development of my identity as a teacher educator.

This study has as focus the primary school learners of Mauritius who negotiate with different language systems within formal schooling. Very often, given that most of these learners do not become as proficient as monolingual speakers of the languages do, they are said to have impoverished language skills (Mahadeo, 2006; (Mahadeo, 2006; Auleear-Owodally, 2010; Sauzier-Uchida, 2009; Sonck, 2005). Based on the understanding that language is dynamic and that change and variation in a multilingual system is current, this study looks at the multilingual

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learners’’ system as a whole. Hence, this study aims at focusing on how the multilingual child actually acquires language without comparing the learner to the way a monolingual acquires language.

This study also has as ambition to add to the literature on the factors that influence the nature of the process of acquiring linguistic repertoire, within a specific multilingual backdrop which is far removed from previous research carried out (Shameem, 2002; Talebi, 2007). There has been some research (Tirvassen, 2011b) conducted in Mauritius which looks at language as being a dynamic system and acknowledges this notion; however, it should be noted that no study has been carried to explore the development of the linguistic repertoire of the learner within the multilingual educational system in Mauritius, at primary level, with KM being officially part of the school

curriculum. This study, thus, has as aim to shed light on this issue and thus fill the gap present.

It is recognised in the Education and Human Resources Strategy Plan 2008-2020 (MOE: 2008) that

(t)he assessment does not identify the quality of pupil learning, but rather the quantity of pupil learning as defined by memorisable units and, consequently, the teaching style adopted is one that matches the assessment style. Pupils’ success thus depends on the extent to which their learning styles match the teaching and assessment styles.’ (p.60).

Tirvassen (2011a) further highlights that educational linguistics research in Mauritius should look concretely at the multilingual educational system to come up with effective proposals. The findings of the study will consequently be helpful in decision-making, especially in relation to developing assessment for the multilingual learner, in developing countries (Cenoz and Jessner, 2009).