The new English syllabus, the English teacher
OVER the past two years, the Ministry of Primary and Secondary Education has been busy ensuring that the new curriculum gets off the ground. We have now arrived at the implementation stage as the ministry has sent directives to the effect that Forms One, Three and Five students are the recipients of the new curriculum; of course, at primary level we talk of ECD, Grade One and Three.
In this write up, I specifically look at the English syllabus for the Forms One to Four that the Ministry handed out to schools recently.
Teachers are known the world over as very initiative and the current syllabus wants the teachers of English to get out of their comfort zones and make their students enjoy reading, speaking, listening and writing the language.
Importantly, ICT is very much a part and parcel of the new syllabus necessitating the teacher to acquaint herself with the new media and incorporate them into his teaching lessons.
In the preamble, the drawers of the syllabus are explicit in their exhortation that English is important in studying other learning areas. As “a tool of inclusivity,’’ the subject is important in as far as it imbues patriotism, ethical behaviour and linguistic competence to the learners hand in glove with promoting Unhu/ Ubuntu among the students.
For the teacher, it is important to prepare a scheme that develops skills such as critical thinking, problem solving, and team work among others. For example, a teacher may prepare a lesson centred on purposeful listening. Her objective could be to take dictation. The content in terms of attitudes, skills and knowledge could be on mood and tone. As a teacher, you want the students to be psyched up for the lesson and this entails giving appropriate activities and notes; that means the students have to work out the meaning from the tone and intonation of the speaker.
From the foregoing, there is need to go back to the notes we made on speaking and listening tools that we prepared or took in our college years. During the activities, we may need to use the laptop or desktop and the DVD player. As a teacher, one may use the radio cassettes to teach listening skills. That is where the teacher’s ability to be initiative comes to the fore.
The current syllabus uses the spiral method where the same concept can be taught from Form 1 up to 4. Emphasis is put on the four macro skills. The skills are speaking, listening, reading and writing. Whereas before, teachers taught for the examination, this time the syllabus wishes to produce an all round student capable of speaking, reading, listening and writing in the language.
With the project coming on board, it is no longer business as usual for teachers of English. There is a project every year which contributes towards the mark at the end of Form Four. For long, other teachers have enviously looked at practical subjects such as Building Studies that have course work.
The new syllabus has 30 percent of the course marks which contribute to the aggregate mark. Isn’t it wonderful? Some wonder if the concept can be sustainable over a long period of time. It is possible because our students have to know that coming to school every day and writing exercises and tests is extremely important. It will make students and parents work round the clock to ensure a 100 percent attendance at the school.
Debates and speeches are crucial components of speech work. We are preparing tomorrow’s lawyers from a young age. The discerning teacher uses ICT tools to shape those lawyers. Speaking and listening are skills that are not taught in isolation. Filming students as they go about their projects will enhance the love they have for the subject. Now, those smart mobile phones come in handy as students use them to engage in class room activities that need ICT tools.
Minister of Primary and Secondary Education, Dr Lazarus Dokora, must be smiling and nodding in satisfaction. This year, there would be a beeline for mobile phones as parents want to buy these gadgets that are cheaper than the conventional laptop.
Receptive vocabulary captured by reading and listening is changed to productive vocabulary encapsulated by speaking and writing. To that end, free and guided compositions are taught in the same way they were taught some time ago. Many times, teachers test students when it comes to composition writing.
They do not teach the skills of writing different genres of essays and that has a bearing at ‘O’ Level where many students fail dismally in Paper One and struggle to score a ‘C’ since they can’t productively use language to answer a specific question. Things turn out for the worse in guided writing. Owing to vocabulary poverty, students’ amplification of pegs is non-existent.
Extensive reading is encouraged. The smart teacher cannot continue to moan and groan over reading material. Newspapers are plenty and The Manica Post sells copies of newspapers per kilogramme. Schools can apply to be considered for either buying old papers in bulk or have a subscription. A period must be devoted to extensive reading.
Initially, it may appear as if extensive reading is a burden but as a teacher make it fun. For instance, she may create quiz competitions that compel them to study. She may have book reports where students write about the plot, setting, characters and themes associated with the novel. There is a clear link between extensive reading and the building of receptive and productive vocabulary.
Students are supposed to have an idea on referencing and not wait until they attend higher education; it starts at Form One level and the teacher of English’s eagle eye remains glued to what the student does. Intensive and extensive reading is juxtaposed. Those skimming, scanning, inference, synthesis and evaluation skills among others are taught alongside research skills that are components of extensive reading.
Crucially, Form One and Two have a cumulative 10 percent of the continuous assessment while Form Three and Four have the remaining 20 percent. By the time a student reaches Form Four, she must have done four projects on the macro skills. I am sure in the coming days, the ministry will have workshops sensitising teachers of English on how students go about making projects in the four microskills.
That is a grey area where teachers of English are seized with as they implement the new curriculum. Accepting change is the hallmark of a teacher. We cannot continue to be exam oriented and let our students come out of the examination room as successes but in the wider world, they can hardly handle pressure. It is a paper chase, period.
According to the syllabus, the summative assessment carries 70 percent weighting after a candidate has written two compositions-one free and a guided composition and paper two that has comprehension questions, a summary and a section B which is based on Supporting Language Structures.
Appropriate register is taught from Form One upwards, but it is no longer examined as happens now. In its place, the language structures plucked from the reading comprehension are used. This phenomenon is not new. At ZJC level, a similar way of examining was used. What does that mean for the teacher of English?
She has to teach language items in a passage context. If she is teaching the active voice or adjectival phrases, she takes the examples from the passage and the student appreciates the active voice based on contextual teaching.
Remember, the syllabus advocates the communicative and learner centred approach to teaching. If all teaching/ learning activities are based on the learner, the results will be pleasing. Language is for communication purposes. Next week, I will write on the critical approaches to the teaching of English and the arrow will hit the communicative-functional approach.
For the new syllabus (it is not really new), teachers have to brace themselves for a rigorous assessment procedure which will not disadvantage the student in any way. Students must know that they can be writers, script writers, producers and directors of films or media workers because of their apt use of vocabulary. They can be creators of employment in their own right and that is what the new syllabus entails.