Judolisco:
most of us r really d cause in my office for example, there are 3 igbo guys they hardly communicate in igbo... They speak pure English... I do tackle them sef...

CharleyBright:


Nope, it is not about bigger picture. There can't be a bigger picture if there is no real picture.
I rather think you fail to see the real picture here.

What is the ratio of teacher to pupils in public schools?
No less than 1: 30.

How will teaching pupils in their mother tongues be achievable under this scenario when Nigeria has over 500 languages??
Will a classroom teacher teach the pupils her own mother tongue or will she have to learn each pupils mother tongue to teach them?
Let's me realistic, it is not possible. It is a futile policy meant to serve the interest of some people who conceived it.

That China did it don't mean Nigeria should adopt it too. Nigeria is not China.
China ran and succeeded with that mother tongue educational policy simply because their native mother tongue is Mandarin. It was easy for them because they have a single language. Nigeria has diverse mother tongues. It won't work with Nigeria unless the govt intends to kill other languages and impose the 3 major languages.

blaise26abj:


Good points. I will say that all the languages are not sparsely dispersed . They are in population clusters . Getting teachers for them will be a localized affair . Of course there will be challenges . The idea is a good one .

Sagamite:


1. What is your point about ability to speak and ability to pass exams. I don't get it. Be clear.

2. How is it a problem to use local language for instruction?

3. Explain to me what is wrong in using local language to teach English, Maths & Science learnt in primary school. Go ahead.



Did you read well about the policy?

Is primary school same as secondary school?

Who told you there is a plan to use local language at secondary schools?

You have not read the policy but have come to a conclusion it was not "well thought out"?

Jesus is Lord!!! {Hands on head}

Nwakannaya1:


Primary school is not same as secondary, the foundation you need to excel in studies is laid in primary school.

If you instruct in local language in primary school and start instructing in English in secondary school, there would be a knowledge and comprehension lacuna in that child's life, this would be a result of the change in the pedagogy.

I was once a teacher in the north and I had to teach kids in secondary school in English, these were people who were taught in Hausa during their primary school. There was hardly communication, and when there's no communication learning hardly comes in. People who understood basic science taught in Hausa while in primary school can hardly understand basic science taught in English in secondary school. This is where I have my reservation for not reading the policy document, this is because there might be an arrangement to continue instructing in local languages beyond primary school which this news is not telling us. However, from what is available in this piece of news, the policy is poorly thought out, continuity and sustainability were binned.

Nwakannaya1:

On the other hand, you suggested that pupils be tested for local language proficiency through an exam. This has its loophole because for instance people who speak English every day still fail English exam, people who speak Igbo still fail Igbo exam. Somehow, the policy would be denying secondary education to many people who could speak local language.

Nwakannaya1:

Then, on a general note, when national cohesion and nation building is being pursued, there is usually serious need for language uniformity in the instruction of children, it is what they head as kids that they hold on to most. Even though they must have been taught the same thing in different languages, whenever there is need for them to meet, the difference would be conspicuous and competition for language supremacy would start creeping in.

If these do not still make sense to you, I'm afraid, no objective explanation would.

Sagamite:


Okay.

So how come Hong Kong students who are instructed in Chinese in primary and secondary school are able to do their undergrad, Masters and PhD in English then?



What kind of rubbish statement is this?

Your point is?

If someone fails an English or X language exam, i.e. a language which they speak, it is wrong to fail them?



Total Nonsense!

You just came up with a pile of colomentality excuses to justify continued having colomentality.

So Canada does not have "cohesion" and "nation building" because one half operates in French and the other English?

Belgium does not have "cohesion" and "nation building" because one half operates in French and the other Dutch?

You can only get cohesion and build a nation when you speak fone, lose your identity and you are a drastically poor imitation of another people?

Stop talking colomentality nonsense.

Children have he capacity to learn multiple languages and operate in multiple languages if they are trained in them from young.

This foolish excuses of "I don't speak my indigenous language to my kids, so as not to confuse their ablity to learn English" does not fly.

I grew up going to public school and speaking 2 languages (Yoruba and English).

I still got A* in English in exams provided by British examing board and went home to eat Eba & egusi and watch Fadeyi Oloro and Akere.

Many European kids grow up speaking 3 languages and can attend lecture in English that is not their mother tongue.

Drop your colomentality!

BigBashiru:


Sagamite earlier today you said Nigerians act like monkeys initially I was offended but after much thought I kinda agree....il open a thread about that later.....one big proof that Nigerians may be monkeys is the overly aggressive culture of always shouting at the slightest thing, rough aggressive driving not giving way to pedestrians etc

blaise26abj:

Are there non Yorubas in state house of assemblies ? Are there non Yoruba ministers in state governments ? Can you buy land and build without anyone harassing you in the south west . What kind of acceptance do you want again ? You can marry a Yoruba lady . You can run your business . You can vote. I don’t understand what you mean by “never accepted “

It is good for teaching . The research is there .

Neoteny7:


Like I said, read again. With your eyes open this time.

Judolisco:
most of us r really d cause in my office for example, there are 3 igbo guys they hardly communicate in igbo... They speak pure English... I do tackle them sef...

Sagamite:


You are the one confused!

Many of the countries you will die to japa to do exactly that or even more and still are successful and produce more useful human beings than you.

tete7000:

All your brain can think about is that everyone wants to Japa. So shallow minded and moronic of you to think people who don't agree with your inferiority complex do so because they want to japa. Òde ni ẹ... Let me help you out in my mother's language. We attended school, we were taught in English but that didn't dimindh our ability to communicate in our mothers' tongue. We speak it well, can write it fluently while at the same time appreciate the role English language plays in allowing us integrate with other people not from our local tribe. Only moronic and inferior people like you associate English language only with colonialism. Long after they conised your fore fathers, you still remained colonised in your mentality... Shior!!!

BigBashiru:


The idea is a very good one for the simple fact that we are not British subjects... we are not a british colony....we are not europeans....someone said today Canada and USA are referred to as "English speaking countries" but english is not the original language of those places. language = identity. do we really want to end up like the native north american tribes and become an "English speaking country"?

Sagamite:


Absolute fccking shame!

Except one of their parents is not Igbo.

If both are and they don't speak. The parents have failed!

You don't rob your kids of their identity.

Alvin007:

Don’t mind him. What the Minister meant by ‘mother tongue’, was also explained by the Minister. Yet, this nigga has decided to focus more on the dictionary meaning of ‘mother tongue’…just because he doesn’t wanna accept his mistake(s).
Jokes on him.

Sagamite:


You are a moooronic creeetin!

It is inferiority complex to think teaching your mother tongue in schools is useless. Yes, many countries you would kill to japa to, and whose citizens you kiss their ass when they come to Nigeria, teach their kids their mother tongue in school. The speakers of their mother tongue are less than Yoruba speakers. And I am sure if you japa to these places and your kids attend their schools and start speaking their local language fluently, you would be very proud. Black fooool!

Omugor, you are using yourself and siblings as anecdote. You are too daft to look around you and see that a large majority of middle-to-upper-class children today cannot speak indigenous languages? Colomentality reetard!

tete7000:


Was there anytime mother languages were not taught in schools, olodo?

Sagamite:


Creeetin, do you know the difference between "taught in school" and "language of instruction in school"?

And this is one of the people who says continuation of using English as language of instruction is schools helps with superior comprehension. Yet he cannot comprehend nada.

tete7000:


So when I said you have low intelligence, you can now understand. It's only when it becomes a language of instruction that the people who fail master it now can now do?

temielects:
I hate to call people foolish, but no sorry you are damn stupid

Sagamite:


You can force them in a country with different region.

If you don't like what you are fed, you move to a region that you like what is being fed.

There are parts of Italy where French is an official language. And majority are biilingual with both French and Italian. You are forced to learn French there.

Sagamite:

If you don't like what you are fed, you move to a region that you like what is being fed.
.

immortalcrown:
Instructional material and qualified teachers were never the problem. I don't know what the man means in his reference to these two factors.

Good. The problem is, how will the government ensure a child from tribe A living in tribe B gets proper lesson on tribe A language? For example, how a Yoruba kid in the North will be able to learn Yoruba language properly in the North.Having raised the problem, can you profer a solution to it? What do you suggest to the government in making sure a child learns his native language not just the language of where he is born?


ADDED:
For those claiming I didn't read the post, stop acting smart when you are highly ignorant. Because I pointed out the bigger problem, you claim I didn't see the smaller problem expressed in the post. Is this how your brain works? I read the post. I then pointed out where the major issue lies. As a matter of fact, a person's mother tongue is the language of the person's ancestors, not the language of a foreign region where the person was born and raised. The mother tongue of a Yoruba person born and raised in the North is Yoruba language, not Hausa language. The keyword in the meaning of "mother tongue" is "native". Is a child born by a Yoruba couple in the North a native of Hausa? Stop fooling yourselves.

You are the one who doesn't understand my comment. The post talks about the dominant language in the children's region of residence. I commented about the children's ancestral language, which is the biggest challenge in this regard. If you don't lack common sense, you would have known that what the government tackles here is not the actual problem. This is why the government always goes a million miles in misleading you before you realize you are misled. Have you ever seen a child of tribe A raised in tribe B and the child knows tribe A language more than he or she knows tribe B language? Even if you have seen a child like that, the case is very rare, it is less than 5%. Most of the tribe A children raised in tribe B even know tribe B language more than they know the tribe A language.

Almost every child grows to naturally understand the dominant language of his or her region of residence. Every Igbo kid raised in the North is even better in Hausa language than in Igbo language. Every Yoruba kid raised in the North is good in Hausa language, or even better in Hausa language than in Yoruba language. So, has the mother tongue of a place of residence ever been a serious problem for any kid? The serious challenge kids have is being fluent in the dominant language in their place of residence while knowing just little or nothing about the dominant language of their ancestral (native) tribe. The bigger problem I pointed is absolutely in line with the smaller problem expressed in this post. So, why are people replying me as if my comment is off-point or illogical? Tụfịakwa!

tete7000:

All your brain can think about is that everyone wants to Japa. So shallow minded and moronic of you to think people who don't agree with your inferiority complex do so because they want to japa. Òde ni ẹ... Let me help you out in my mother's language. We attended school, we were taught in English but that didn't dimindh our ability to communicate in our mothers' tongue. We speak it well, can write it fluently while at the same time appreciate the role English language plays in allowing us integrate with other people not from our local tribe. Only moronic and inferior people like you associate English language only with colonialism. Long after they conised your fore fathers, you still remained colonised in your mentality... Shior!!!

Armaggedon:
Like the example you gave, Majority of Nigerians are bilingual too with their mother tongue and lingual franca. what you can't do is to force another indigenous language (a third language) on someone in the name of education. If you don't get it, i can't help you again.

Armaggedon:

Again you are wrong. No one has right to move anyone away from any part of the country. Provided we are still one country, every body has the right to leave anywhere he wishes and be taught in his language. If this fact unsettles any one, he should fight to have his own country and win the power to impose your language on foreigners.

tymicjay77:
Wrong Policy at wrong time.... The phenomenon happening in Northern part of the country will spread soonest. The best and easiest time to learn is when you are still young. If your mother tongue and host community language is being spoken at home what is the essence of taking it to school?. This so call policy makers are taking their children abroad for better learning but they are planning and making policy that will crumble the masses children so they will not be able to compete with their children that have study abroad.
Imagine a mathematics teacher teaching a class with Igbo language only for the student to now go outside the country for competition and the level ground is English, how will the student Excel. Or you are teaching an English subject using hausa, how will the students familiarize themselves with what you are teaching them .
That policy can only work well in a country that is self reliance (technological wise, innovation, academically) .if you are copying India, a lot of academical books are written in their native language so they have the innovation and technology already... Maybe they should first start by making sure Instructional materials are ready and available before making such policy otherwise they are only making students lazy more. Now that most graduate can hardly write or speak correctly written sentence without error. Imagine what it will now become in few years to come when this policy would have done so much damages

This policy will only be good if the instructional
materials are also available in all mother tongues. So there wouldn't be need to read with language A and learn with language B.
Do we have any mathematics or chemistry or physics text book written in any Nigerian mother tongues yet so why passing such policy.
Is only in Nigeria we make silly policy without doing the necessary steps first, all this country we intend to copy have this text written in their langues so English language is just an alternative to them but us here in Nigeria, English language is not an alternative is a compulsory because a lot is written in english

Sagamite:


Okay.

So how come Hong Kong students who are instructed in Chinese in primary and secondary school are able to do their undergrad, Masters and PhD in English then?



What kind of rubbish statement is this?

Your point is?

If someone fails an English or X language exam, i.e. a language which they speak, it is wrong to fail them?



Total Nonsense!

You just came up with a pile of colomentality excuses to justify continued having colomentality.

So Canada does not have "cohesion" and "nation building" because one half operates in French and the other English?

Belgium does not have "cohesion" and "nation building" because one half operates in French and the other Dutch?

You can only get cohesion and build a nation when you speak fone, lose your identity and you are a drastically poor imitation of another people?

Stop talking colomentality nonsense.

Children have he capacity to learn multiple languages and operate in multiple languages if they are trained in them from young.

This foolish excuses of "I don't speak my indigenous language to my kids, so as not to confuse their ablity to learn English" does not fly.

I grew up going to public school and speaking 2 languages (Yoruba and English).

I still got A* in English in exams provided by a British examing board (not WAEC or NECO o) and went home to eat Eba & egusi and watch Fadeyi Oloro and Akere after the exams.

Many European kids grow up speaking 3 languages and can attend lectures in English, which is not their mother tongue. They would even pass an English test at a higher rate than those of you from an English speaking country like Nigeria (even if the population set is restricted to only those who grew up in VI, Ikoyi, Ikeja and Lekki).

Drop your colomentality!

Sagamite:


Stop talking crap!

Many middle & upper class Nigerian kids today are not multilingual, and the language they are letting go is their mother tongue.

That is not the case in the countries I mentioned. If their is a language they are not learning, it would not be their mother tongue because they value themselves.

If you don't want to learn the language of your host community and your host community has said it is compulsory every one that lives their learn it, you know what you can do?

Get the fucccck out. You fuuuck off out of that place, no one is forcing you.

You don't go and live in Dubai and say they should not force your kids to learn Arabic. If you don't like it, you ............sweetly fuuuck off!

You can fuuuck off to anywhere you want to learn the language. You don't tell them not to set the rules that best suits their needs because of your outsider ass.

No one is forcing you, you are free to leave.



No one is forcing you to move away. It is you choice.

But you cannot go to another region and demand they follow your wish and desires. If you don't like their ways, don't live there.

I cannot go and live in Sokoto and then tell them that on Friday afternoons they make dumb and unnecessary noise, they need to stop because I like my low noise life.

It is up to majority of them to decide what kind of reasonable rules they want in their society that is aligned to the constitution. If I don't like it, I fcccck off and go live somewhere else!

If you are in Germany, you will not whine they are imposing their language on you and say "it is not international enough".

And cut the "official" crap. Official does not impose on a people a denial of their right to promote, protect and sustain their language. If you don't like yours, that is your problem. If you don't like theirs, fccck you! Stay in your village.

Sagamite:


Sorry. Wrong!

In India, each state/region has its own set of official languages as well. So Hindi is not the only local official langauge of communication in India.

Babinski:


According to Article 343 of the Indian Constitution, India has no National Language as per the Constitution but has English and Hindi as the official languages.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Languages_of_India

Armaggedon:
It's obvious you are having a meltdown. You do not know the difference between many and most just as you don't know the different between being a citizen and being a foreigner, as you keep giving senseless example of another country.

BTW, nobody is fu cking off. You have no choice but to live with your fellow citizen without imposing a new identity on them. If you don't like it, go hang!

Nwakannaya1:


It is either you lack the capacity to comprehend the discourse or you have consciously chosen to argue blindly. I believe the former is more likely to be the case.

Language of instruction is different from languages being taught. You can be taught many languages but the language of instruction for all non-language subjects is always one.

In all the places you cited, there is consistency in the language of instruction throughout different levels of education. Anyone can go and earn other degrees in any language of instruction they choose. Nigerians are even earning PhD using different foreign languages.

Your statement with regard to national cohesion is borne out of sheer ignorance. Nation building in a country with little or no language difference is not the same as a country where you have over 200 languages.

If you like continue basking in undue ignorance