African language project a ‘challenge’
Department says it can’t afford it as a subject, nor are there enough teachers
THE WESTERN Cape Education Department doesn’t have the money or enough teachers to increase the number of schools participating in a project aimed at introducing an African language in Grade 1 at all schools from next year.
The Department of Basic Education has indicated that its Incremental Introduction of Indigenous African Languages plan would be implemented in Grade 1 “across the board” from next year, but in the Western Cape only 10 schools that have been participating in a pilot project will continue to offer it next year.
Basic Education Minister Angie Motshekga recently said schools that previously offered only English and Afrikaans would be mandated to offer an African language from Grade 1 and “continue incrementally year on year”.
Jessica Shelver, spokeswoman for Education MEC Debbie Schäfer, said that while the Western Cape supported the plan, there were challenges.
“Out of the nine provinces, the Western Cape has the largest number of schools (985) to implement the third language and will not be able to do so because of the financial challenges it poses to roll-out a project of this nature. There are also not enough teachers to teach isiXhosa from 2016 and the succeeding years.”
The pilot project in the Western Cape started last year.
“The 10 pilot schools are extremely positive about the introduction of the third language and have made the necessary adjustments to the timetable to accommodate the additional subject. These schools have only spoken of the positive gains they experienced by introducing the subject to the extent that the principals of the pilot schools once again indicated their interest to continue with the subject into Grade 3 and the new Grade 1 cohort in 2016.”
Last week, at a press conference following a meeting of the Council of Education Ministers, Motshekga encouraged South African authors, poets and universities to continue to develop local indigenous languages “by creating literature in South African local languages”.
She said the council had also noted the “misconceptions in the media” about the addition of Mandarin to the list of foreign languages offered in schools.
Motshekga said Mandarin was available to schools that wished to offer it “at an optional third language level”.
“It will have no impact on our current compulsory curriculum in which it is mandatory to take two South African languages.”