Issues around the Second Language as a Language of Learning and Teaching 1 Orientation

The question of what language should be used in school as the language of learning and teaching has created a renewed awareness of the dilemmas policy-makers face when it comes to decision-making, particularly in multilingual societies. It has also created some interest among scholars concerning the effect on the academic performance of learners who use a second language as the language of learning.

2.10.2 Choice of the Language of Learning

The process of becoming educated involves the use of a particular language as the language of learning. The choice of the language itself is crucial to the fulfillment of the society’s desired goal in education. Prah (2005:21) defines the language of learning and teaching as “the language in which basic skills and knowledge are imparted to the population and the medium in which the production and reproduction of knowledge take place”.

This means that the language of learning and teaching should be an enabling tool in the teaching and learning process. It should facilitate the learning of subject content as suggested by Lemke (1990:34) in paragraph 1.1. It ought to help learners react to different facts and viewpoints in order to construct a new view of the world, including the meanings they attribute to the new concepts they are introduced to, and the values they attach to them (Namuchwa, 2007:13).

The implication of the above statement is that the language of learning and teaching should of necessity be the one which is familiar to the educator and the learner if communication has to be effective. However, it seems the policy makers in South Africa take the learners’ language ability for granted and perceive any gaps in learning to be merely a result of educators’ and

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learners’ lack of commitment by promoting English, a former colonial language as a language of learning and teaching in secondary schools, especially in rural Limpopo.

Furthermore, the language of learning should be able to fulfill the functions that researchers (Heugh, 2002:54; Pluddemann, 2002:45; Rodseth, 1987:110) propose: communion, expression, conceptualization and communication. What the above mentioned researchers refer to as communion is the social function of language. The language must allow learners to relate effectively to their educators as well as to their peers and avert what was noted in the TIMSS study (see Chapter 1). It is through this kind of interaction that mutual trust and confidence among learners are built. Trust and confidence might create security in the learning environment.

Mchazime (2001:90) asserts that “the language of learning should also enable learners to react to learning experiences both covertly and overtly. Since learning involves thinking and learning to think logically, the language of learning should enable learners to conceptualize in that language and should afford them the opportunity to receive and transmit information clearly”. In other words the language medium should give learners an opportunity to examine critically what others say and enable them to express and elaborate their point of view.

Rodseth (1987:163) argues that such a language “should be accepted by all concerned (parents, educators, learners and the society) as suitable for its assigned role and of such functional importance as worth the effort of acquiring”. He further argues that the learners should experience the language itself. In other words learners should hear the language or observe it being used in their everyday life or they themselves should use it. Lastly, Rodseth advises that the language so chosen should be teachable.

However, Rodseth (1987:163) does not seem to perceive the fact that in matters of language choice there are also political, cultural and economic considerations. Politicians sometimes have their reasons for wishing a particular language to be used and as Olshtain (2001:54) points out that “political considerations have to do with particular regime in power, and how it views the question of language in general”. Then there are cultural groups which may also put

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pressure on policy-makers. Economic considerations may be viewed from two different points, namely, the nation’s wish to be modernized through a language of wider communication such as English and the shortage of money to invest in the adoption and implementation of the chosen language. Thus Rodseth’s (1987) criteria may not be sufficient without these other factors.

The researcher is of the opinion that the question of acceptability is an attitudinal one. It is, therefore, difficult to gain acceptance of the chosen language of learning by all stakeholders. This difficulty is particularly prevalent in African countries where there are many multi-ethnic and multi-lingual societies. Policy-makers in these countries are always in a dilemma. They have to weigh the implications of choosing one language among a host of other languages.

Hence, Kelman (2001:48) advises that “in determining whether a common language would be helpful and if so, what form it ought to take, policy-makers and language planners must consider not only the potential of such a language in binding the population to the nation state, sentimentally and instrumentally, but also the sentimentally and instrumentally based resistance that the proposed policy would call forth in different subgroups within the population”. It is not surprising that Prah (2005:2) asserts: “where the language of instruction is different from the languages of mass society, those who work in the language of instruction, foreign from the languages of the masses, become culturally removed and alienated from the masses. Indeed, where the language of instruction is different from the mother tongue of the people there is almost always a history and persistence of patterns of dominance, over-lordship or colonialism”.

The above mentioned dilemma is not recognised by policy-makers only. Even the international community acknowledges the problem. Brown (2000:211) for example, observes that “the choice of the language of learning is one of the least appreciated of all the main educational problems that come before international forums”. The UNESCO (2000:25) report on education in Zambia contains an example of the way the problem has been viewed. In 1963, a UNESCO mission was sent to Zambia to advise the Zambian government on the education system to be adopted and what language policy it should follow. At that time, Zambia was preparing for its

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independence from Britain in 1964. The UNESCO report (2000:25) reiterated its long-held stance regarding mother tongue education by recommending that “A child, therefore, may have begun in his mother tongue, changed to a main official vernacular, if that is not his mother tongue, changed to English as the language of learning two years later. We [therefore] recommend that a policy decision be made to introduce English as the universal medium of instruction from the beginning of schooling”.

Since its publication of a document on mother tongue education in 1953, UNESCO’s main thrust had been to encourage mother tongue as the language of teaching and learning. For many people therefore, this recommendation came as a surprise. However surprising it may be, the recommendation does reflect some of the dilemmas and problems that confront multilingual and multi-ethnic societies in Africa. De Klerk (2002:13) rightly points that the acceptability of the language of learning has a bearing on motivation. Unfortunately, the acceptance by all concerned that he proposes is difficult to find in Africa. African governments have sometimes imposed the language of learning on the masses. One does not need to look far to find an example of the above-mentioned scenario. The attempt by the South African Government to impose Afrikaans on the Black learners is well known (Brocke-Utne, 2005:238).

However, there has always been an unfavourable perception of Africans about the mother tongue language policy put forward by Western educationists during the time of colonialism. Brocke-Utne (2005:238) observes that “the Africans suspected that the language policies were designed to keep them in their ghettos. They therefore rejected the systems supposedly tailored to their needs and demanded to be educated to exactly the same standards as the Whites were”.

The examples and arguments cited above illustrate the observation that language choice in education is a complex issue. It is therefore, not surprising that the ideal education that researchers allude to, is not attainable in many African countries.

It is within this context that Bamgbose (2005:126) argues that “whenever everything possible has been done, there will be small languages which cannot feature in formal education. There

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will also be others which can support use of initial literacy only in transition to the use of another language as medium. This is the reality in many African countries and no appeal to language rights or rhetoric can change the situation”.

Hereunder follows a review of literature relating to the language of learning and teaching Science as an international problem.