Learners can choose indigenous languages in 2016

Friday, September 18, 2015

Pretoria - Schools will be required to include indigenous languages in their curriculums from next year on, Basic Education Minister Angie Motshekga said on Friday.

Speaking to the media after a regular meeting with the Council of Education Ministers, Minister Motshekga said the meeting received a progress report on the Incremental Introduction of Indigenous African Languages that will be implemented in Grade 1 across the board from next year.

This means that schools that previously only offered English and Afrikaans will now be mandated to offer an African Language from Grade 1 and continue incrementally year-on-year.

“This is an exciting and important development as far as languages are concerned,” Minister Motshekga said.

She encouraged all South African authors, poets and universities to continue to develop the country’s local indigenous African languages by creating literature in South African local languages.

The Minister said there has been misconceptions formed over the addition of Mandarin to the list of the other 15 additional foreign language options.

She said the introduction of Mandarin, which has been met with criticism from various sectors of the community, is no different from other foreign languages that are currently on offer in the country.

“This forms part of a country to country agreement, like those we have with other countries.”

To date the foreign languages most extensively offered in South African schools are German followed by French and other languages such as Portuguese, Urdu, Tamil and Arabic.

These languages, she said, are also on offer at the same level as Mandarin, adding that there was “nothing special about Mandarin”.

“To reiterate, Mandarin is now available to schools that wish to offer it at an optional third language level. It will have no impact on our current compulsory curriculum in which it is mandatory to take two South African languages.”

Competency tests for principals

Other changes on the cards include the implementation of competency tests for the appointment of principals as of January 2016 in all provinces.

Draft guidelines on new measures for the appointment of principals, which include a component on competency assessments has been developed, Minister Motshekga said, adding that a draft framework containing areas for assessing principals’ competency has been completed.

The Western Cape has a functional competency assessment programme running in the Premier’s Office, while Gauteng has developed a competency assessment programme and has taken principals and deputy principals through the programme.

“We are confident these measures will improve leadership in schools and improve the accountability of principals,” said Minister Motshekga.

Bullying, violence in schools

Regarding bullying and violence in schools, she announced that a Lekgotla to discuss and find ways for dealing with violence in schools will be convened on a date yet to be announced.

“The age cohort of some learners was also raised as a contributing factor and it was discussed that the rollout of different streams of education especially the vocational stream should be prioritised to prevent learners staying in school long after the appropriate age if they are not coping with the academic stream,” she said.

Already the department has signed a protocol with the South African Police Service (SAPS) whereby every police station would adopt a school. – SAnews.gov.za