UN report recommends mother tongue for teaching early classes to boost performance

A new study has recommended use of mother tongue during teaching for at least six years of early learning to boost academic performance. The report says that teaching children in ‘a language other than their own’ negatively impacts their learning.

The policy paper dubbed ‘If you cannot understand, how can you learn,’ says learning is slow if teaching is conducted in a language other than the one used at home by the children. The report finds that international and regional learning assessments confirm that when home and school languages differ, there is an adverse impact on test scores. “In many countries, large numbers of children are taught and take tests in languages that they do not speak at home, hindering the early acquisition of critically important reading and writing skills,” reads the report. The findings are contained in the 2016 United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) Global Education Monitoring (GEM) report.

Key recommendation

Unesco released the policy paper during International Mother Language Day that was marked yesterday. The reports’ key recommendation is that education policies should recognise the importance of mother tongue learning. “A review of 40 countries’ education plans finds that only less than half of them recognise the importance of teaching children in their home language, particularly in early grades,” reads the report. It further recommends that teachers should to be trained to teach in two languages and to understand the needs of second-language learners.

“Teachers are rarely prepared for the reality of bilingual classrooms, including teaching materials and appropriate assessment strategies.” The report says the challenges are most prevalent in regions where linguistic diversity is greatest, such as in sub-Saharan Africa and Asia and the Pacific. “Their parents may lack literacy skills or familiarity with official languages used in school, which can then reinforce gaps in learning opportunities between minority and majority language groups,” says the report.  The findings of the report are set to ignite the debate on the use of mother tongue and ‘Sheng’ in Kenya’s education system.

The discussion that has since lost momentum was subject of intense analysis last year when the Ministry of Education cited use of Sheng language as main cause of poor performance in languages.

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University of Nairobi socio-linguists and communications expert, Dr Silas Oriaso, said the report is encouraging the use of a language that can make children understand what they are being taught. “For instance, parents, teachers and education officials can no longer afford to brand Sheng ‘a bad language’, as it constitutes about 80 per cent of language used among urban children in their day-to-day communication,” said Dr Oriaso.

Director of UNESCO’s GEM Report, Aaron Benavot, said language could serve as a double-edged sword.

“While it strengthens an ethnic group’s social ties and sense of belonging, it can also become a basis for their marginalisation.” Globally, the report says that 40 per cent of children do not access education in a language they understand. UNESCO Director-General Irina Bokova said it is essential to encourage use of mother language in teaching and learning, and to promote linguistic diversity.