Improving The English Language
Being a former educator myself I find that, the teachers are themselves not proficient in the language. There is an uneven distribution of English Language teachers to schools. You could even come across schools with excess English Language teachers ( urban schools ) and schools without a single English Language teacher ( rural schools ) posted to the school. We know that ONE of the reasons for the poor performance in the language in rural schools is due to shortage of qualified English language teachers.
Why are the impact of the various programmes carried out not positive. Millions of Ringgit have been spent and yet results are poor. As I see it, it is due to lack of enforcement, monitoring and continuous evaluation by the responsible persons in the schools, district department and state departments. After a programme being carried out it's up to the school's administrators to make sure that the programme is a success. Without effective monitoring the maximum impact hoped would not materialised.
In order to be proficient in the language various activities can be carried out in schools as well as at home. Attitude towards the language must be positive. The most effective activity that has been used is reading. Reading books and magazines in the language is very effective. Not only it is cheap in fact sometimes free of charge. Books and magazines are available in libraries all over the country even in the rural areas. So cost is not a problem. Have a good dictionary by your side when you read. Not a bilingual dictionary please. Most of my students have mastered the language through reading. Speaking the language is also another important activity. Don't be shy to speak the language. Let it be broken. By the end of the day you will find that you are improving. Parents must play an important role in cultivating the interest in the language. Some rural parents told me that they themselves can't speak the language. Well they can learn the language together with their children. Share the learning materials your children have. Make them your tutor. In this way not only you learn the language in directly you are encouraging your children to learn the language while teaching you. You are making them revising and repeating what they have learned in school.
Get your children to speak the language within their peer group. It would be much better if they could form a small group of 4 or 5 person that speaks the language. It has been done in of my former school and it was a success.
Schools should have a Self Access Learning Center where self learning materials are kept. These materials should be easily accessed by the students especially during recess. They can use the materials provided to do self learning. They can also do self test and grade the test themselves. The score obtain for each test can be recorded in their progress record card. When they have problems during their activities they are able to consult their teachers at anytime of the day in school. I am sure the students will be better in the language if given the proper guidance and coaching. Teachers teaching the language must first solve the problem of not having interest in the language. Get the students to be interested in the language. Use your creativity in getting the students to be motivated to learn the language. Reading stories to them is another activity that I have tried in my former school. I find that it triggers the students interest to listen at first. Later they became interested to read by themselves since I did not finished the story. I stopped reading when the story becomes more interesting, thus making them eager to know more. Well I told them that they have read by themselves if they want to know more. More of these activities can be downloaded from websites in the net. So do get into the net to get more interesting activities in encouraging the learning of the language.
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