UNESCO World Mother Tongue Day

By Vitalio Angula

The World Bank report of 2022/2023 paints a gloomy picture of the state of education globally describing the world as being in a ‘global learning crisis’ with only 30 percent of children being able to read and write by the age of ten.

“Only a third of ten year olds globally are estimated to be able to read and understand a simple story, the rest, around two-thirds (64%), are unable to cover this marker for reading proficiency in reading comprehension”, a UNICEF report on early childhood development reads.

Speaking at the Transforming Education Summit in New York during the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) in September 2022 UNICEF Executive Director Catherine Russell said, “under-resourced schools, underpaid and under-qualified teachers, over-crowded classrooms and archaic curricula are undermining our children’s ability to reach their full potential”.

However, another barrier to learning identified by UNICEF is the absence of mother-tongue learning at the early stages of a child’s schooling in many countries.

21 February 2024 marked UNESCO World Mother Tongue Day, under the theme: Multilingual education-a pillar of learning and intergenerational learning.

“This highlights that the mother tongue languages are vital for inclusive education and safe-guarding indigenous languages, as well as supporting learning literacy and the acquisition of additional languages”, according to UNICEF.

In Namibia, at the dawn of independence, English was adopted as the medium of instruction at all state owned schools; English was also adopted as the national language due to its neutrality with Namibia having had eleven recognized ethnic groups at independence in 1990.

Choosing one of those languages as a national language could have been detrimental to the nation building exercise of the day, however the absence of the mother tongue was detrimental to learning for indigenous Namibian learners thus in 1996 the ministry of education adopted a language policy for mother tongue learning for early education (Grades one through 3).

Education expert, Dr. Demus Makuwa says social and psychological studies prove that children conceptualise and learn things better from an early if they start learning in the language they speak at home.

Deputy Director of Formal Education, at the Ministry of Education, Arts and Culture Edda Bonn says at Junior Primary Phase (1-3) not all languages in Namibia are developed for teaching and learning but a majority are and these include, Silozi, Mbukushu, Rukwangali, One of the San languages, Otjiherero, Oshindonga, Oshikwanyama, KhoeKhoegowab, Setswana, English, German and Afrikaans.

There are plans to introduce more but these plans are hampered by a lack of resources, both human and capital.

Do Namibian children shun their mother tongue in favor of English?

When the mother tongue becomes a foreign language and when the foreign language becomes a mother tongue can be attributed to perceptions that parents have regarding the importance of English as opposed to local languages.

Dr. Makuwa says that although languages are equally important and should be on equal footing some parents and society view English as superior because it is the national language, the language of commerce and can guarantee mobility in educational and career advancement.

“Mother tongue is not a criterion for university, also when looking for employment mother tongue is not a criterion. People do not really look at whether you can speak Oshindonga fluently when assessing your employment application so consciously parents and society push children to adopt English as a first language to ensure opportunity for mobility in the advancement of their education and career,” Makuwa explained.

Touching on the importance of English as a lingua franca when children from diverse backgrounds interact with each other, Dr. Makuwa said because of the cosmopolitan characteristic in the cities children need to communicate in a language they can all understand and English is that bridge.

“So it is not necessarily that children view English as superior to other languages but because language is a medium for communication English is adopted as the lingua franca”, Makuwa further explained.

Deputy Executive Director of Formal Education at the Ministry of Education in Namibia, Ms. Bonn says that there is a tendency amongst learners to move away from home language and gravitate towards English and the ministry is trying to counteract that in line with UNESCO’s finding that multilingualism enhances learning and cognitive development.

“In Namibia we have a strong drive to get the basics right through targeted interventions like building capacity, developing a policy for language development, creating a language board and encouraging students to study linguistics”, Bonn said.

Although learning in the mother tongue is important not all mother tongues in Namibia are developed and this is where Ms. Bonn says the ministry is allocating resources to ensure that all Namibian indigenous languages are developed for teaching and learning.

Mother tongue learning is crucial for cognitive development and not only is mother tongue crucial but also a child to be multi-lingual enhances learning.

Children must be encouraged to learn as many languages as possible and not to shun some languages because they see them as inferior.

On World Mother Tongue Day 2024, the greatest success for mother tongue learning according to the author is the recognition of Namibian Sign Language as the mother tongue of the deaf up until NSSC which is school leaving level.

The adoption of Namibian Sign Language as a Mother Tongue of the deaf raises the question, should sign language be a compulsory language for all children in Namibian schools?

This would be in line with Sustainable Development Goal 4 which calls for inclusive and equitable quality education by addressing disparities in access to education; and ensuring that vulnerable populations including people with disabilities receive equal opportunities for education.

This is because Inclusive education is a foundation for building more inclusive societies, as it prepares all individuals to participate fully in their communities and economies.

Once again the question is posed, should sign language be taught to all Namibian children at school level regardless whether they are deaf, hearing impaired or not?