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LITERACY INSTRUCTION IN AN EXAMINATION-ORIENTED ENVIRONMENT:
PERCEPTIONS OF SECONDARY SCHOOL TEACHERS IN BOTSWANA

By

Annah Anikie Molosiwa

A DISSERTATION

Submitted to
Michigan State University
In partial fulﬁllment of the requirements
For the degree of

DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
Department of Teacher Education

2007

LITERACY INSTRUCTION IN AN EXAMINATION-ORIENTED ENVIRONMENT:

PERCEPTIONS OF SECONDARY SCHOOL TEACHERS IN BOTSWANA

By

Annah Anikie Molosiwa

Botswana has set for itself goals towards having an educated and informed nation
by the year 2016 (Republic of Botswana, 1997). To a large extent, the attainment of this
goal entails concerns about literacy. Botswana’s education system follows a national
curriculum, with close prescriptions of content, modes of teaching and forms of
assessment mandated by the Ministry of Education. The purpose of this study was
therefore to uncover, interpret and illustrate the meanings teachers in secondary schools
associate with literacy teaching and learning given the constraints of these planned school
policies and curricula.

The study followed a qualitative approach, using ethnographic techniques to
gather and analyze data. Data sources included a survey questionnaire, interview
transcripts ﬁom audio-taped interviews, ofﬁcial documents, teacher documents and
ethnographic ﬁeld notes. An open-ended survey questionnaire was administered to 30
teachers of English and Setswana in selected senior secondary schools. Based on the
teachers’ willingness to volunteer and share information, 5 teachers who were a subset of
those who completed the survey questionnaire were selected to be key informants.

The study was informed by both sociocultural and postcolonial theoretical
frameworks. The sociocultural theory views literacy as a social practice. It assumes that

people formulate ideas, beliefs and conceptualizations from experiences they have had

within a sociocultural context. The postcolonial theory was employed to illustrate how
the teaching of Setswana is embedded within and shaped by colonial discourse.

The data revealed that although policies have been developed about the teaching
and learning of literacy that are aimed at moving the country into the 21St century, they
have not translated into practice. This is due to a number of factors: societal and
institutional constraints, inadequate teacher preparation, lack of a culture of reading and
lack of teachers’ professional development. The ﬁndings have implications at both
teacher education and policy formulation levels. Teacher education institutions have the
major responsibility of equipping teachers with pedagogical content knowledge. It is
mainly through skillful teachers that the school curricula can be planned accordingly and
implemented effectively. Since assessment indicates what type of knowing is valued, the

study sheds light on ways in which examinations constrain the teaching of literacy.

Copynghtby
ANNAH ANIKIE MOLOSIWA

2007

Dedication

To my late parents, Jonas and Menete Handenge Besson, who instilled in me the
value of education and thus gave me a vision. Your memories are here to stay.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I have several people and institutions to which I am indebted for their guidance
and support towards the successful completion of this dissertation.

I sincerely thank my dissertation committee members: Dr John Jack Schwille
(committee chair), who played a key role in guiding me throughout the course work and
even introduced me to some of the committee members. Dr Patricia Edwards, my mentor
and friend, opened her doors to me when I needed a professor to work with in order to
expand my knowledge about literacy research and general scholarship in a US institution.
She did not only open her ofﬁce door, but opened her home as well to my kids and I. Dr
Steven Weiland, thank you for introducing me to the range of qualitative research studies.
Dr Anne Haas Dyson (the dissertation director), is a remarkable scholar. I am grateful for
her patience, advice, and ability to challenge and expand my thinking.

I thank the seminar group of TB 991 under the guidance of Dr Dyson. This group
encouraged collaboration, pushed for deep thinking and sharp defense of one’s ideas, and
honored a diversity of backgrounds and expertise. I also thank all the teachers who
participated in this study. Without their contribution the study could not have been
possible.

It is impossible to mention by names all friends who supported me in this
dissertation study. However, I owe special thanks to: Eureka, Nametso and Mr. J .0.
Awino for making their ofﬁces available to me during the data collection period. I do

thank my brother in-law Lesego and nephew Thuso, for managing our property while we

vi

were away. Thank you Dudu, sister-in law, for your ﬁiendship, and offering me your
vehicle during the data collection period.

Thank you very much Epi for your time and assistance during my dissertation
defense. You did regard me a big sister, and treated my kids as your younger sisters.
Albertus Dixie, our brother and friend, thank you for being always available whenever
we needed your help either as the “Detroit driver” or technician. Lesiba and Letta, you
were great neighbors and made me feel like the real “ausi Annah”. We felt at home with
you through that Sepedi/Setswana communication. The same to you Rachel and
Nomalanga, I appreciate the ﬁiendship. I also thank all our friends in Spartan village and
around, including the community at Trinity church for making our stay at MSU
pleasurable.

I am eternally grateful to my family, my wonderful daughters; Gao, Juris “Tosho”
and Gontse, you were my pillars throughout my studies. You showed me how to balance
parenting and intellectual pursuit. You understood when I couldn’t meet your needs and
expectations. My husband, Emmanuel, thank you indeed for your unconditional love,
patience, and long distance support as we were far apart from each other, pursuing our
dreams. My siblings: Tshegang, Simon, Epe and Mittah, thank you for always being there
for us especially when times are hard. Our late parents could not be asking for more.

I am deeply indebted to Fulbright Fellowship, Margaret McNamara Memorial
Fund, and Delta Kappa Gamma World Fellowship for funding my doctoral studies. Last
but not least, I do thank the University of Botswana for granting me study leave to pursue

my studies and for the funding they provided.

vii

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Chapter 1: Introduction ....................................................................... 1
Statement of Purpose ...................................................................................... 9
Signiﬁcance of Study ............................................................... 10
Overview of Chapters ................................................................ 12
Deﬁnition of Terms ................................................................... 14

Chapter 2: The Context ............................................................... 16
Geography and Language ............................................................ 16
Economic Situation ................................................................. .18
Pre-colonial Education .............................................................. .19
Colonial Education ..................................................................... 21
Language in Education Policy ....................................................... 22
Education Reform Policies ......................................................... 26
Continuing Legacy of English ....................................................... 30
History of Teacher Education in Botswana ........................................ 33
Summary .............................................................................. 36

Chapter 3: Literature Review ............................................................ 38
Theoretical Frameworks ............................................................ 39
Postcolonial Theory and Literacy Learning ...................................... 39
Sociocultural Theory of Learning and Literacy ................................. 42
Critical Pedagogy .................................................................... 45
Literacy Studies and Reports: Local and International... 46
Literacy in Botswana ................................................................. 46
Language of instruction and Literacy ............................................. 52
Culturally Relevant Pedagogy ..................................................... 55
International Research on Literacy ................................................ 57
Teacher Preparation Survey Reports .............................................. 61
Deﬁnitions of Literacy ............................................................. 65
Summary ............................................................................ 69

Chapter 4: Methodology ................................................................... 71
Research Design ...................................................................... 73
Site and Participants ................................................................. 73
Gaining Access ...................................................................... 75
Data collection Procedures .......................................................... 77
Interview Data ........................................................................ 77
Field Notes ............................................................................. 78

Data Analysis Procedures ........................................................... 8O
Researcher Role ...................................................................... 81

viii

Chapter 5: Ofﬁcial Perspectives of Literacy Teaching and Learning. . .....86

The Senior Secondary Setswana Teaching Syllabus ...................... 88
The Senior Secondary Setswana Assessment Syllabus .................... 93
Other Ofﬁcial Pronouncements on Literacy ................................. 95
Textbooks and their Selection Procedures .................................. 97
Code Switching ................................................................ 100
Summary ........................................................................ 103
Chapter 6: Teachers’ Interpretation and Enactment of Policy ............. 104
Key informants: ....................................................................... 105
Mrs Pako ........................................................................ 105
Mrs Wesi ........................................................................ 108
Ms Barne ....................................................................... l 10
Ms Lorato ....................................................................... 113
Ms Kabelo ..................................................................... 1 14
Summary ....................................................................... 1 17
Key issues ............................................................................... l 18
Negative attitude toward Setswana as a school subject .................. 118
Hegemony of English ........................................................ 120
School Literacy versus Cultural Literacy .................................. 123
The Neglect of Culture ....................................................... 125
Curriculum Responsiveness to Diverse Learners ......................... 127
Examination-driven Teaching .............................................. 129
Lack of Teachers’ Professional Development ............................ 133
Textbooks and other Teaching Resources ................................. 137
Scheme Books/Record of Work done ..................................... 139
Examination Reports ......................................................... 143
Summary ....................................................................... 148
Chapter 7: Conclusions, Recommendations and Implications .............. 151
Findings of the Study ................................................................... 152
Institutional and Social Discourses as Constraints to Literacy Teaching and
Learning ................................................................................. 154
Inadequate Teacher Preparation and Lack of Professional
Development ........................................................................... l 57
Lack of Reading Culture in Botswana Society ...................................... 159
Recommendations for Teacher Education .......................................... 161
Recommendations for Policy ......................................................... 163
Limitations of the Study ............................................................... 166
Implications for Further Research ..................................................... 167
Conclusion ................................................................................ 168

ix

APPENDICES: ........................................................................... l 70

A Unexamined Topics ................................................... 170
B Survey Questionnaire .................................................. 172
C Interview Protocol ...................................................... 174
D Consent Letter .......................................................... 176
E Specimen Setswana Mid-Year Exam Form 5 ...................... 178
F Specimen Setswana Mid-Year Exam Form 4 ...................... 184
G Specimen Setswana Final Year Exam Form 5 ..................... 189
REFERENCES ........................................................................ 206

Table 1

Table 2

Table 3

Table 4

Table 5

Table 6

Table 7

Table 8

Table 9

LIST OF TABLES

IRA Principles on Adolescent Literacy ......................................... 8

Three Planes of Sociocultural Contexts of Learning ......................... 44
Domains of Reading and Writing ............................................. 126
Sample Setswana Scheme of Work ........................................... 140
Sample Setswana Scheme of Work ........................................... 141
Sample Setswana Scheme of Work ........................................... 141
Sample English Scheme of Work ............................................. 142
Sample English Scheme of Work ............................................. 142
Unexamined Topics ............................................................. 171

xi

Chapter One

Introduction

“Adolescents entering the adult world in the 21st century will read and write more than
at any other time in human history. They will need advanced levels of literacy to perform
their jobs, run their households, act as citizens, and conduct their personal lives. They
will need literacy to cope with the ﬂood of information they will ﬁnd everywhere they
turn. They will need literacy to feed their imaginations so they can create the world of the
future. In a complex and sometimes even dangerous world, their ability to read will be
crucial. Continual instruction beyond the early grades is needed” (Moore, Bean,
Birayshaw, & Rycik, 1999, p.99)

In recent years, there has been a great concern from the general public and
teaching profession about falling standards of literacy among secondary school graduates
in Botswana. Colleges are concerned that secondary school graduates come ill-prepared
for college level writing and reading. Several studies and survey reports have also
revealed that many secondary school students in Botswana schools have not yet
developed the more sophisticated reading and writing skills expected by their teachers
and mandated by the curriculum and national examinations (Secondary school
Examination Reports, e.g. 2002; 2003; 2004; 2005; Mooko, 1996; Besson, 1990). These
studies and reports indicate that when students are asked to demonstrate the analytical
reasoning skills such as interpreting, recognizing intent of the author, and drawing
conclusions, they are unable to do so. There is evidence that secondary schools do not

give consideration to supporting the literacy development of their students. This study

therefore focuses on how literacy teachers of secondary schools in Botswana perceive
literacy teaching and learning.

The inadequate literacy skills are attributed mainly to lack of appropriate
instruction in school due to insufﬁcient language education offered prospective teachers
at pre-service level. It has also been noted that the teaching of reading is a neglected area
in Botswana secondary schools (Mpotokwane, 1986). This is exacerbated by the fact that
literacy is acquired through an environment that is oriented towards preparing students to
recall information for examinations. Literacy is not accorded the seriousness it deserves
but just seen as accessing information needed to pass examinations. Teaching to the
examinations tends to encourage rote—memorization without necessarily imparting
literacy skills to students. Deﬁning learning through test scores is seen as limiting for
several reasons; learning is restricted by narrowing the curriculum and pedagogy and
reducing teacher motivation (Darling-Hammond, 1994), it brings up questions of
inequitable access and opportunity to learn, it denies the variability in prior learning
experiences among students of different backgrounds, and, also fails to appraise the
quality of thinking that produced a particular grade, or students own views concerned
with whether or not they have learned (N ieto, 1999). Research has also indicated that
students bring with them rich and varied language and literacy practices that often go
unnoticed in classrooms (Dyson, 2005; Heath, 1983; Mahiri, 2004). This goes without
saying that examination driven pedagogies exclude such wealth of experiences and
teachers too fail to recognize alternative and expanded genres of language and patterns of

learning especially for ethnic minority students.

Anecdotal data also indicates that language teachers continue to use the
“traditional” approach (i.e. structural) in teaching literacy even though the curriculum has
shifted to the communicative one. Whereas the structural approach views language as a
system of structurally related elements for the transmission of meaning, the
communicative approach views language as a vehicle for the expression of functional
meaning. It emphasizes the semantic and communicative dimensions of language in
different social contexts, more than the grammatical elements (Richards & Rodgers,
1986). In the traditional approach of teaching language, the emphasis is on students
learning language through its structures as opposed to the subconscious absorbing of
language through use of the language. The use of this approach inhibits teachers’ efforts
to develop in students the ability to solve problems, be critical thinkers or life-long
learners as envisioned in policy documents (Republic of Botswana, 2002, 1997, 1994).
In a country that uses education for its socio-economic development, it is vital to equip
youth who are informed, engaged, and critical citizens in the new millennium (Bloom, in
Suarez—Orozco & Qin-Hilliard, 2004).

Until 1996, the University of Cambridge Local Examinations Syndicate (UCLES)
administered Botswana’s secondary school examinations externally. This board
determined the overall standards of what is to be learned in school. It controlled the
curricula, examinations and certiﬁcation of students. The curriculum for each subject was
a series of topics to be learned at a given level, followed by an outline of the structure of
the examination papers; their breadth and depth and allocation of marks. There were no
aims and objectives for content to be learned. The best that teachers made out of such a

curriculum was to align their teaching with the expectations of the examining body and

drill students to pass the examinations. In that regard, students were not provided with a
meaningful education.

The current teaching approaches are also attributed to the kind of education
introduced by missionaries in Botswana It is argued that the missionaries in general took
little interest in education beyond preaching the gospel and the elements of literacy
(Parsons in Crowder, 1985). Emphasis was on reading, writing and scriptures. Tabulawa
(1997) contends that religious knowledge was viewed as objective, factual and
unchanging. He argues that in such circumstances it was difﬁcult for one to think of any
other pedagogical style that would have best suited the teaching and learning of religious
facts other than the transmission-reception pedagogical style. Tabulawa concludes that
this authoritarian pedagogical style is what, perhaps, most saliently characterizes
schooling in Botswana that has now almost acquired the status of an educational
tradition. I concur with Tabulwa’s view. I underwent the authoritarian style of education
as a student during my secondary school days and later on carried it over as a teacher.
Our classrooms were teacher-centered and the teachers were regarded as the “fountains of
knowledge” pouring knowledge into students’ heads. We were taught grammar in
isolation without any relation to how it features in everyday communication. We were
expected to memorize deﬁnitions of grammatical aspects such as Nouns, Pronouns,
Adjectives, etc. Our teachers had the tendency to provide notes on the chalkboard, which
we copied down into our notebooks (regardless of what the topic would be). In literature
classrooms we were given the opportunity to say our views but the teacher always

provided the ﬁnal answer (the correct answer; the ultimate truth) that is acceptable in

examinations. As illustrated by the literature review in chapter three, most teachers in
Botswana have adopted the authoritarian kind of teaching as the norm.

Luke (1997) asserts that teaching practices may be inﬂuenced by the kind of
education teachers underwent during their pre-service. He cautions against the danger of
teachers reproducing programs and approaches based on how they learnt literacy as best
for all children, and the values and attitudes they had towards literacy and book culture as
the ‘norm’ against which they can judge and assess students. The danger of using such
benchmarks, Luke argues, is that, during the many years that might have elapsed, the life
experiences and cultural backgrounds of the students might have changed. The teacher
being the key in shaping literacy, literate culture and the child, it is imperative that s/he
knows more about literacy in contemporary society.

Although reasons such as the UCLES curriculum or teachers’ educational
experiences might have inﬂuenced to a large extent the current teaching approaches,
students’ poor literacy skills cannot be attributed to only these. There is also need to look
into the larger historical, political and sociocultural contexts of the education system.
Historically, the curriculum has excluded ethnic minority students as far as language in
education policy goes. Many students come to school with diverse linguistic backgrounds
and experiences that are not part of the ofﬁcial school knowledge. They attain literacy in
English and Setswana which are not their home languages. Like the rest of Aﬁican
countries colonized by Britain, Botswana chose English as the medium of instruction in
school and the ofﬁcial language. The reality that the country needs English for
international relations was wrongly translated into giving it absolute priority over the

national language, Setswana, while other local languages were completely neglected.

The cultural linguistic diversity of the students is mentioned in the curriculum but
teacher preparation does not seem to address issues of multiculturalism especially in
Setswana courses. Setswana teachers are prepared as if the society is monocultural. This
monocultural notion of teacher education is evident in many ways. I recall an informal
discussion I once had with a curriculum development ofﬁcer about the bias of some
Setswana examination questions towards ethnic minority students. I had pointed out some
weaknesses in a junior secondary school leaving examination that ethnic minority
students might have had difﬁculty in responding to certain questions because of the
unfamiliar vocabulary that was used. The ofﬁcer disagreed with my view and insisted
that;

“This was a Setswana examination, not Setswana as a second language

examination. All students have been studying this syllabus and are expected

to know the vocabulary used. Until such time there is a Setswana as a second

language syllabus, there is nothing we can do about students to whom

Setswana is a second language”.

The above words were ironically an admission on the part of the oﬁicer that the
curriculum did not make provision for linguistic minority students. Other evidence one
could cite is from incidents that occur in Setswana classrooms. In many classrooms and
schools across the country, it is common to hear teachers or mainstream students uttering
remarks such as these to ethnic minority students: “That’s the Sesarwa way, or the
Sekgalagadi way, say it in Setswana, “that’s not Setswana but Kalanga pronunciation”

(Sesarwa, Sekgalagadi and Kalanga are some of the minority languages of Botswana).

This kind of derogatory language is so embedded in everyday discourse not only in
Setswana classrooms but also in different social gatherings. Ethnic minorities in
Botswana have for a long time been regarded as inferior and this surfaces more in school
settings. Teaching practices are therefore historically grounded and inﬂuenced by policy.

In 1993, the entire education system was reviewed. The review was called for on
the basis that there was need to develop a system that would see the country into the
twenty ﬁrst century (Republic of Botswana, 1993). Revised National Policy on Education
(RNPE) recommended that the curricula be revised and that examinations should also be
localized. Through consultation and collaboration with UCLES, localization came into
effect in 1996. In the teaching of language, the major changes that came with the
localization of curricula and examinations were the layout of the syllabi and change in
teaching approaches. The teaching methodology shifted from the structural approach to
the communicative one. The Examinations, Research and Testing Division (ERTD) of
the Ministry of Education now administer the examinations. However, it does not appear
that the revisions yielded the desired result, hence this dissertation. More details about the
locally controlled examinations system will be discussed in chapter six.

Literacy demands of secondary school students need to be an educational priority
more than before. Progression rates from junior secondary to senior secondary school in
Botswana have increased from 51.13% in 2005 to 61.27% in 2006 (Republic of
Botswana, 2006). This has been due to strategies such as the expansion of some senior
secondary schools and the double shift system that is being piloted in some schools. The
increase in quantity has not been received well by some people on the grounds that less

skilled students are being admitted into senior schools for political gain by the

government. The increase in quantity (of students proceeding to senior secondary school)

without compromising quality suggests that teachers should be well equipped with

pedagogical knowledge to meet the literacy needs of the students. On realization that

middle and secondary school curriculums sometimes emphasize content learning so much

that literacy development is ignored, the Commission on Adolescent Literacy of the

International Reading Association (IRA) developed seven principles for supporting

adolescents’ literacy growth. These are as follows:

Table 1. Seven Principles of International Reading Association’s Position Statement on
Adolescent Literacy

 

 

1.

Adolescents deserve access to a wide variety of reading material that they can and
want to read

Adolescents deserve instruction that builds both the skill and desire to read
increasingly complex materials.

Adolescents deserve assessment that shows them their strengths as well as their
needs and that guides their teachers to design instruction that will best help them
grow as readers.

Adolescents deserve expert teachers who model and provide explicit instruction in
reading comprehension and study strategies across the curriculum.

Adolescents deserve reading specialists who assist individual students having
difficulty learning how to read.

Adolescents deserve teachers who understand the complexities of individual
adolescent readers, respect their differences, and respond to their characteristics.
Adolescents deserve homes, communities, and a nation that will support their
efforts to achieve advanced levels of literacy and provide the support necessary

for them to succeed.

 

Source: Position Statement on Adolescent Literacy, International Reading Association,
1999. (Mm/beading.org/positiong/adol lithtrll)

 

Statement of Purpose

The purpose of this study is to uncover, interpret and illustrate the meanings
teachers in Botswana secondary schools associate with literacy teaching and learning
given the constraints of planned secondary school policies and curricula by the Ministry
of Education. When there is conﬂict between teachers’ espoused beliefs and perceived
external requirements, their actual teaching practices are likely to be swayed by the latter
(Wells, 2000). Furthermore, to make any reforms in literacy teaching and learning there
is need to examine more closely what meaning teachers give to the acts of reading and
writing. The study is grounded in the notion that the way in which literacy is taught, the
professional judgment made and actions related to curriculum decisions are determined
largely by how teachers conceptualize it, how they themselves experienced it as well as
their beliefs and philosophies. I aim to explore the theoretical knowledge base teachers
have about literacy and how their literacy experiences and beliefs shape their teaching
practices.
The main research questions that guided my study are as follows:
1. In what ways does the postcolonial experience of Botswana play out in teachers’
understanding of literacy teaching and learning?
2. What are particular meanings teachers associate with literacy teaching and learning

given the structural constraints of the mandated curriculum and national examinations?

Signiﬁcance of the Study

While research in literacy education has not been explored adequately in
Botswana and in the region, there exists even less information regarding teachers’
perceptions of literacy and how these shape their classroom practices. Teachers embody
values, attitudes and ways of being and thinking that inﬂuence what goes on in their
classrooms. An awareness of teacher perceptions is essential if there is an attempt to
change and improve any education system. In this study I adopt the deﬁnition by
Tabachnick & Zeichner (1984) for the term “teacher perspectives”. According to them,
“perspectives ” are "a reﬂective, socially deﬁned interpretation of experience that serves
as a basis for subsequent action . . . a combination of beliefs, intentions, interpretations,
and behavior that interact continually.” (Clark & Peterson, 1986, p.287). Welcoming the
voices of teachers beyond their classroom doors is an essential step toward creating
positive enduring change in education. Historically, teachers’ educational involvement
has been limited to classrooms. Curriculum decisions, accountability measures, and
disciplinary measures have all been removed from the hands of teachers (Apple, 1983).
Change won’t happen by telling teachers what to do in their classrooms. It is important
that their voices and experiences are invited, and their professional knowledge be used to
create and respond to particular contextualized learning situations in their classrooms.
Discovering the underlying assumptions, theories, beliefs and understandings individual
teachers have about literacy and literacy pedagogy will provide insights that would
enable better decision-making for both curricula planning and presenting literacy lessons.

Even though Botswana has been using national examinations as a key device for

establishing and maintaining educational standards, not much research has been carried

10

out to ﬁnd out what inﬂuence such examinations might have on literacy instruction and
learning. This study could contribute in that regard though it was conducted at a very
small scale. Furthermore, the fact that all public schools operate under similar conditions
by following standardized curricula that are centrally controlled, the ﬁndings of this study
could be applicable to other secondary schools in the country.

This study is also a move to initiate debate and to enable teacher educators to
rethink literacy education in Botswana’s institutions. Teacher education institutions have
the major responsibility of equipping teachers with pedagogical content knowledge. It is
mainly through skillful teachers that the school curricula can be planned accordingly and
implemented effectively. In a multicultural set up like that of Botswana, it is difﬁcult, and
not even desirable to come up with generic methods that teachers can be trained to follow
religiously in all schools.

Many studies have examined teacher-student relationships in Botswana
classrooms without speciﬁcally looking at why Setswana teachers adhere to certain
practices. Among the many subjects taught in school, Setswana is the only subject taught
through the local medium. With the belief that students would grasp English better by
communicating through it, they are prohibited from communicating in Setswana around
the school premises. This suggests that Setswana teachers could be working under certain
constraints by teaching a subject that has little recognition as compared to other school
subjects. This study therefore attempts to bring forth such constraints by exploring the
perspectives held by Setswana teachers about literacy teaching and learning. Grossman
and Stodolsky (1994) argue that secondary school teachers’ instructional practices and

perspectives on teaching and curriculum are framed by the particular school subjects they

11

teach; subject matter serves as a ﬁlter through which teachers plan their work, create
associations, respond to policy initiatives, and interact with students.

Understanding teachers’ thought processes or perceptions about their subject or
curriculum, and their experiences with students may contribute towards better teacher
education programs and teachers’ professional development. Goodson (2003) sums it all
when he states that understanding teacher agency is a vital part of educational research

that should not be ignored.

Overview of Chapters

The next chapter, chapter two is the description of the context of the study. The
geographical, historical, political and economic context in which the study is located is
described. This chapter explores the language and literacy contexts of Botswana
historically and today. It explains how the colonial experience continues to shape and
deﬁne postcolonial problems and practices in Botswana. This is evident in the role
assigned English as the medium of instruction in schools and as the ofﬁcial language over
local languages. A general background of the education system and teacher education
programs is given as well as post independence education reform policies. The chapter
attempts to answer questions such as: What were the goals and objectives of these
policies? What recommendations did the reforms pass regarding language in education
policy and the teaching of local languages in particular? What reform efforts have been
undertaken to improve standards, testing and accountability efforts?

Chapter three discusses the literacy literature relevant to the study. The theoretical

ﬁameworks within which the study is situated are ﬁrst reviewed. These are the

12

sociocultural, the postcolonial and critical theories. The chapter also reviews deﬁnitions
of literacy according to ideological perspectives of different scholars; speciﬁcally;
functional literacy, cultural literacy, progressive literacy and critical literacy ideologies.
These deﬁnitions have ﬁgured in different ways into literacy instruction in Botswana.
The chapter then reviews literacy research in Botswana and other Aﬁican countries. This
is followed by literacy reports from both developed and developing countries in various
parts of the world. The review of literature is aimed at providing the foundation for the
study and to guide its methodology and formulation of theory.

Chapter four is a narrative description of the methodological procedures and
research design of the study. It gives an explanation of how entry was gained into the
research site, how the participants for the study were selected, how data were collected
and analyzed.

Chapter ﬁve presents an analysis of other data sources such as the syllabi and
textbooks to give the official perspective of what literacy teaching and learning should
entail at secondary school level in Botswana It seeks to answer the question; how does
the national curriculum deﬁne literacy? Or, what is the official perspective of literacy
teaching and learning in secondary school classrooms?

Chapter six is the presentation and analysis of the data provided by the ﬁve key
informants of the study. Background of each informant is given with a focus on how they
acquired literacy in their childhood. This background is linked to their perceptions and
current practices of literacy teaching and learning. The chapter seeks to answer questions
such as: What do teachers understand by the notion of literacy? What is their perception

of the curriculum’s responsiveness to the needs of linguistically diverse learners in

13

schools? Teacher documents such as their record books (scheme books) and examination
reports are also analyzed to gain an insight into how teachers interpret and enact the
ofﬁcial perspectives in their teaching.

Chapter seven is a synthesis of the ﬁndings of the study, literature review and
theoretical frameworks that were used to guide the study. It reassesses the major research
questions in relation to the theoretical frameworks. It also outlines the limitations of the
study, implications for practice and further research. It examines prospects for improving

teacher education programs and literacy teaching in Botswana secondary schools.

Definition of Terms
The following is a list of terms that may not be clear to some readers because of
the contexts in which they are used. The study is about education issues in Botswana
written in a US institution hence the need to deﬁne some unfamiliar terms although they

are also clariﬁed in the dissertation when they appear for the ﬁrst time.

Botswana — the name of the country

Setswana — the national language of Botswana

Batswana — the people of Botswana in plural terms

Motswana — singular form for a person of Botswana

Primary School — Elementary school, from 1St through 7th grade
Junior Secondary School — Middle school, 8th through 10th grade

Senior Secondary School — High school, 11th and 12th grades.

14

Vision 2016 —- a document that outlines the long-term vision for the year 2016 when
Botswana will have been an independent nation for 50 years. It identiﬁes the major

challenges that will need to be met and proposes a set of strategies that will meet them.

Literacy — in this study it means more than the basic ability to read and write, but the
ability to be engaged in analysis, interpretation, problem-solving, critical thinking, self-
reﬂection and cross-cultural understanding leading to a broader and better perception of

the world.

15

Chapter Two

The Context
This chapter is the description of the context of the study. In it, I describe the
geographical, historical, political and economic situation in which the study is located,
both historically and today. I provide as well a general background of the education
system and, also, the history of teacher education. In addition, I describe the official
policy of language in education and then the post independence education reform

policies.

Geography and Language

Botswana is a landlocked, semi-arid country of 582, 000 square kilometers, about
the same size as Kenya and France. It is located in the interior of Southern Aﬁica and is
bordered by Zambia, Zimbabwe, Namibia and South Aﬁica. Botswana attained self-
govemance in 1965, alter 80 years as a British Protectorate and became independent on
September 30, 1966. It is a non-racial country that maintains freedom of speech, freedom
of the press and freedom of association, and affords all citizens equal rights. All these are
enshrined in the country’s Constitution.

Botswana is a multilingual state with an estimated number of at least 25
languages. Research has not ascertained the exact number of languages in the country
because of the blurred distinction between a language and a dialect (Batibo & Smieja,

2000). Setswana is demographically the most dominant language in the country. It is

16

spoken by at least 80% of a population of 1,680, 863 (Republic of Botswana, 2001) either
as mother tongue or as a second language. Setswana is the medium of instruction during
the ﬁrst two years at primary school and is offered as a compulsory school subject at both
primary and secondary school levels. English is the medium of instruction for all subjects
at primary and secondary school levels except for Setswana

Whereas these projections denote that indigenous languages are multifarious, the
language in education policy has always favored English to the detriment of Setswana
and extinction of other local languages. During the colonial era, English was the ofﬁcial
language of administration (Janson & Tsonope, 1991). After independence, there were no
signiﬁcant changes in the country’s language policy. This is attributed to the fact that the
British and other Europeans occupied a large number of key positions in government. It
follows therefore that the main language of administration was English.

There seems to be some inconsistencies in the way language policy is stated in
official documents. These inconsistencies are statements such as: “The ofﬁcial language
of the country is English; the national language is Setswana” (Republic of Botswana,
1985, p.2), and, “the ofﬁcial languages are Setswana and English, the latter being the
main language in Government” (1997, p.10). Practically, English is the language of
government and administration, science and technology, education, and international
relations. In 1988, it was agreed in principle that Setswana be used in conducting official
business, but this decision has not been fully implemented. Only a few instances can be
cited where Setswana is used in ofﬁcial domains. Although English is a foreign language,
it continues to enjoy a prestigious status over Setswana, which is a national language.

Setswana is also spoken in some parts of neighboring Namibia and South Africa.

17

Economic Situation

Botswana’s economy has undergone an almost total evolutionary structural
transformation. At independence, Botswana was dependent mainly on agriculture for a
livelihood. Since then, the country has recorded remarkable social and economic
transformation, with the discovery and production of minerals, resulting in both growth
and change in the structure of the economy. Most notably, the economy has grown
rapidly due to the exploitation of minerals, particularly diamonds at Orapa and Jwaneng.
Other minerals such as coal from Morupule copper and nickel from Selebi-Phikwe and
soda ash from Sua Pans have greatly contributed to the transformation of Botswana’s
economic landscape. Coincidentally, the same period met with an increase in the demand
for Botswana’s beef in the European Economic Market resulting in the expansion of the
cattle industry. The favorable market prices for Botswana beef and minerals translated
into a rapid increase in both export earnings and government revenues. This was further
supported by many years of political stability, 3 sound public policy making machinery,
thrifty economic management policies and a strong measure of national unity ﬁee of
destructive tribal and cultural divisions enabled the country to amass large foreign
exchange reserves and to increase the Gross Domestic Product (Republic of Botswana,
2003). Botswana has thus graduated from the group of the poorest to the lower middle-
income countries.

In the past two decades, Botswana has exhibited relatively sound public sector

management. The government has used its foreign exchange and cash reserves to offset

18

the cyclical short—term economic ﬂuctuations. The accumulation of foreign reserves has
also enabled Botswana to liberalize her exchange controls. In addition, Botswana has
evolved a system of national development plans based on the overall national objectives
and an estimated budget authorized by parliament. This has been further developed into
systems for economic planning and budget controls ensuring that development projects
are selected on the strength of their economic and social returns and not solely on their
face validity. The major challenge to the growing economy is the spread of HIV/AIDS.
Botswana is one of the most affected countries in Aﬁica by this disease. The government
has therefore taken considerable efforts to ﬁght the situation. This includes: provision of
anti-retroviral drugs; the prevention of transfer of the virus from mother to child; care of
HIV/AIDS orphans; introduction of home-based care for terminally ill patients; the
inclusion of HIV /AIDS in primary and secondary school curricula and other public
awareness campaigns. A large proportion of the national budget is therefore allocated to
the Ministry of Health while the demand to increase quantity and quality of education is
also at stake.

Before discussing the key issues such as education reform policies and language
in education policy, which are essential for this study, I give the background of the pre-
colonial and colonial education systems. The aim is to help the readers have a sense of
the forms of literacy practices that existed before the prevailing practices in the post-

colonial era.

Pre— colonial Education

During the pre-colonial era, Botswana had some traditional form of education,

described as “part of a whole system of beliefs, or religion, as well as a means of

19

socializing children into the accepted norms of society” (Parsons in Crowder, 1984, p.
22). Parsons classiﬁes traditional education into three categories: informal, formal and
vocational education. There was informal education in the home, which was mainly
parenting, and included relations among siblings, with special emphasis on the aged as
repositories of wisdom.

Formal education was characterized by bojale and bogwera; adolescent initiation
schools for females and males, respectively. In bojale, young female adults were
formally taught matters concerning womanhood, sex, and behavior towards men,
domestic and agricultural activities. Bogwera was formal instruction for young male
adults where they were circumcised and taught skills such as kaross sewing for shields
and clothing, and modeling cattle in clay to reinforce practical knowledge of livestock.
They were trained to be responsible men, warriors and fathers. Whereas women qualiﬁed
for motherhood and marriage after bojale, bogwera did not qualify men for marriage until
after they had proved themselves as herders, hunters and ﬁghters. Vocational education
consisted of part-tirne individual apprenticeships in trades such as medicine, mining and
smelting. Also, skills in agricultural and hunting techniques were imparted. The above
kind of education was not unique to Botswana but similar in most pre-colonial Aﬁican
societies. F afunwa (1982) asserts that:

African education emphasized social responsibility, job orientation, political
participation and spiritual and moral values. Children learnt by doing, that is
to say, children and adolescents were engaged in participatory education
through ceremonies, rituals, imitation, recitation and demonstration. They
were involved in practical farming, ﬁshing, weaving, cooking, carving,
knitting .. . intellectual training included the study of local history, legends,

the environment, poetry, reasoning, riddles, proverbs, story-telling and

20

story-relays. Education in Old Aﬁica was an integrated experience. It
combined physical training with character-building and manual activity
with intellectual training. At the end of each stage, demarcated wither
by age-level or years of exposure, the child was given a practical test
relevant to his experience and level of development and in terms of the
job to be done. This was a continuous assessment which eventually

culminated in a ‘passing out’ ceremony or initiation into adulthood’ (p.14).

With the advent of colonialism, African education system, which was modeled on the
cultural traditions and history of its people was dismantled and replaced by western
education which was different from the local one. In the Aﬁican education system, the
whole community participated in the learning process, children learnt by observing and

imitating adults. The next section discusses western education.

Colonial Education

Western education in Botswana was introduced around 1847 by David
Livingstone, a missionary of the London Missionary society. This education replaced
“traditional” or “heathen” pre-colonial education (Parsons in Crowder, 1984, p. 22). The
churches ﬁnanced education and were therefore in full control of the curriculum and its
content. The curriculum consisted of Christian scriptures. A translation of the New
Testament into Setswana came into being in 1840. The translation for the rest of the Bible
was completed by 1857. Robert Moffat, a leader of the missionaries, provided the ﬁrst
translation of Setswana into the Roman alphabet and translated the Bible into written

Setswana.

21

In 1860, a school was established at Shoshong (then Bangwato capital) where
children were taught reading, writing, arithmetic and scripture in Setswana. The main
emphasis was to instill in the students obedience and discipline. Traditional pedagogy
focused on lecture and memorization, using oral transrrrission as the main vehicle through
which learning occurs. Education prior to the missionaries was oral. Print literacy began
with the missionaries. Printed texts began with the translated Bible, and the reading of the
Bible was the result of the Christian mission activity in Botswana. By the time schools
were introduced, the majority of families had only the Bible and the church hymn-book
(that for the London Missionary Society) in their homes. Consequently, many children
who started school during the early years of independence came from homes in which

very little reading and writing occurred except for the reading of the Bible.

Language in Education Policy

Language policy has been a contested terrain in Botswana since colonialism. It
has always been central to educational policy. The country shares the experience of
foreign rule with the rest of the African continent. Educational achievements were very
modest during the colonial period (1885-1965). The British did not do much to improve
the social and economic infrastructure of the country. Until the 1940’s only primary
education up to Standard 6 (equivalent of US 6th grade) was provided (T lou & Campbell,
1984). A small minority was able to advance their education beyond primary school
level. These citizens had to further their schooling in neighboring South Aﬁica, as there
were no secondary schools in Botswana until the 1950’s. The 1950’s saw the expansion

of secondary education within the protectorate after the apartheid government in South

22

Aﬁica introduced Bantu education. In Bantu education, black people were offered
inferior education designed to provide them with skills to serve their own people in the
homelands or to work in laboring jobs under whites. They were also forced to learn
through the medium of Aﬁikaanse (the language of their oppressors). As part of the
reaction against apartheid, Botswana took the decision to increase the use of English in
primary education and also make it the main language of instruction in the secondary
school system (Janson & Tsonope, 1991).

At independence (1966), under the leadership of Sir Seretse Kharna, unity of all
ethnic groups in the country was emphasized. Local languages other than Setswana that
were taught in schools before independence were banned from use in education, the
media and the judiciary. The ﬁrst President informed the nation that his party stood for a
gradual but sure evolution of a nation state “to which tribal groups will, while in
existence, take secondary place” (Carter and Morgan, 1980, quoted in Nyati-Rarnahobo,
2000). This sentiment of a uniﬁed nation state where all the different ethnic groups are
regarded as Batswana and therefore only Setswana [among the local languages] taught in
schools has prevailed since Seretse’s death.

At independence, Setswana was accepted as the medium of instruction for the
ﬁrst 2 to 3 years at primary school level. The transition to the medium of English varied
according to the language competence of the teacher, and it was not uncommon to ﬁnd
some instruction through Setswana even in Standard 7 (Republic of Botswana, 1977).
From Standard 4 onwards; however, English was the official medium of instruction
while Setswana was offered only as a subject. Actual classroom practices indicated that

teachers actually code-switched between Setswana and English throughout the primary

23

school (Republic of Botswana, 1977). Anecdotal data also indicated that in various parts
of the country, code switching occurred not only into Setswana but also into other native
languages of the students whenever the teacher happened to be a member of the
community in which he or she was teaching. Some commonly cited examples of teachers
who code switched between Setswana and the children’s home languages were the
Kalanga speaking teachers in North East district and Afrikaans speaking teachers in
Southern Kgalagadi district.

To upgrade the quality of teachers, more efforts and resources were allocated
towards the improvement of the teaching of English as the medium of instruction.
English was also allocated more periods on the school tirne-table than Setswana (NCE,
1977). Thus English gained more prominence than the national language in the
curriculum. Given the circumstances, it is difficult to imagine how Botswana could attain
the cultural transmission goal of education. If children are not taught in their primary
discourses, the local cultural values and forms of knowledge are being ignored. Since
language and culture are interwoven, by learning through a second language, children
acquire the culture of that language and lose their own. Based on this correlation between
language and culture, Luke (1994) asserts that literacy and education are means for
access to cultural knowledge and social power. To become literate, children must master
conventionalized linguistic and symbolic codes for constructing and deconstructing
meanings with and around written texts.

During the 1980’s some Ikalanga speaking students at the University of Botswana
started an organization to promote their language and culture. Many people felt

uncomfortable about the formation of the Ikalanga organization, especially those who

24

belonged to the mainstream Setswana speaking groups. It was then that in 1989, the
second President, Sir Keturnile Masire pleaded with the nation “not to spoil the prevailing
peace and unity in the country by ﬁghting for ethnic language groupings to take
precedence over Setswana, and that tribes insisting that their languages become media of
instruction within their respective areas would break up the nation” (Botswana Daily
News, June 30, 1989, No. 123:1 quoted in Nyati-Ramahobo, 2000). This illustrates the
powerful position Setswana has been accorded over other local languages since Seretse
engineered it. Yet instead of taking advantage of this position of Setswana in the
language planning process, language policy makers relegated Setswana use to a language
that “uniﬁes” the different ethnic groups in the country, without attaching any socio-
economic value to it, thus making it subsidiary to English.

The reality that the country needs English for international relations was wrongly
translated into giving it absolute priority over the national language. The distinction
between studying English as a subject and studying through its medium was never made.
It was assumed that by learning through the medium of English, Batswana children
would acquire the language better. The policy instituted subtractive bilingualism instead
of additive bilingualism. In additive bilingualism, a second language and culture do not
displace the ﬁrst language, and this has been associated with educational advantages and
enhanced metalinguistic development (Cummings, 1981, 2000, Genesee, Paradis and
Crago, 2004). Contrary to this, subtractive bilingualism occurs when the acquisition of a
second language and culture take place at the expense of the ﬁrst language. This has been
associated with disabling educational settings for language minority speakers

(Cummings, 1989, 2000). Research by the international Institute for Educational

25

 

Planning of UNESCO (2003) in Paris found that “using the language understood by
learners as the medium of instruction not only builds trust, initiative, and participation in
the learning process but also promotes participatory teaching methods.” Furthermore, it
found out that “encouraging the use of an [ethnic] language as the medium of instruction
stimulates the production of school and cultural materials in that language broadens the
body of knowledge, and facilitates learners’ integration into social and cultural life”.
Decision concerning language of instruction and the level at which the changeover from
Setswana to English should take place is critical especially for ethnic minority children
who have to battle between their home languages and Setswana, and then between

Setswana and English.

Education Reform Policies

Over the past decade, Botswana has made considerable efforts to review its socio
economic development policies and re-align its planning accordingly. A task force
known as the National Commission on Education (NCE) was appointed in 1977 to
conduct a review of the education system, its goals and major problems, and submit
recommendations for improvement. This commission objected to the introduction of
English as the medium of instruction ﬁ'om Standard 3 on the grounds that it was too early
and also that the amount of class time allocated to English discriminated against the
national language. This was reinforced by the exclusion of the Setswana grade fiom the
aggregate scores qualifying the candidates for secondary school selection; even if they
scored a failing grade in Setswana, they could still be admitted to secondary school so

long as they performed well in English. As a result, students were not motivated to take

26

Setswana seriously as a school subject and therefore performed poorly in it (Martin,
1990). Many students failed to attain competent levels of literacy in the national
language. Also, the commission’s survey showed that many students expressed
preference for English over Setswana (Republic of Botswana, 1977).

The commission noted that there was great educational advantage in learning
literacy and other skills through the national language ﬁrst, and thoroughly mastering
that language before moving on to another. It then recommended that Setswana should
be the medium of instruction fi'om 1St to the 4th grade. There was no mention of other
languages children speak in their homes; thus neglecting other local languages. It then
proposed that, instead of drilling students to pass examinations, the main objective of
teaching Setswana should be the establishment of operational literacy, so that students
could communicate effectively in the national language. The examination should be
changed correspondingly. The commission called for more written materials to support
the teaching of Setswana and recommended the use of Setswana as the medium of
instruction for the ﬁrst 4 years of the primary course, with the transition to English taking
place in Standard 5, by which time children have become fully literate in Setswana.
Other recommendations that passed were: a) giving Setswana more time on the school
timetable, b) to give it the same status accorded to English as an examination subject in
the Primary School Leaving Exarrrination and in the selection process for secondary
school (ibid, 1977, p.77).

In 1993, the government of Botswana set up another commission to review the
entire educational system. The review was called for on the basis that time had lapsed

since the last commission and that there was need to conduct another review to develop a

27

 

 

 

system that would see the country into the twenty ﬁrst century (Republic of Botswana,
1993). The commission's 1994 report, the Revised National Commission on Education
(RNPE), reversed the 1977 recommendation of using Setswana as the medium of
instruction for the ﬁrst 4 years of education. It recommended that; “English should be
used as the medium of instruction ﬁ'om grade 2 as soon as practicable” (Republic of
Botswana, 1994). The recommendation was adopted on the observation that children
performed poorly in English because they do not get used to using English early enough
in the process, yet they are required to write examinations in it. Regardless of the fact
that Setswana is a second language to some children, and a compulsory school subject to
all nationals, a proposal by some parents that children in primary schools should be
taught in the language dominant in the area where the school is located, with the
introduction of English and Setswana gradually, was rejected when the ﬁnal
recommendations were passed. The commission argued that the proposal might put
pressure on schools to offer the various languages spoken in the country, “whereas the
schools may lack the capacity to do so and the education system would not be able to
support such a development. Further, it is contrary to national language policy.” (ibid,
p.85) Despite all the recommendations, language in education policy has accorded less
value to the local languages in preference for English. Thus an education system that was
meant to carry the country into the 21St centruy placed less emphasis on its local
languages.

The recommendations pertaining to Setswana were directed towards teachers and
teacher educators. It was recommended that teachers should be exposed to as many

language teaching methods as possible so as to provide a variety for them and the

28

learners, “with emphasis on communicative approaches, and therefore make Setswana
more interesting as a subject” (ibid, 1994). Some local languages are endangered because
they are neglected by the language policy. Recognition of other local languages comes
up in the country’s long-term vision for the year 2016: “Education must be used to enrich
Botswana’s cultural diversity. All of the nation’s languages must be taught to a high
standard at primary, secondary and tertiary level.” (Republic of Botswana, 1977, p.31).
This statement does not specify the ways and means to train teachers of the other
indigenous languages. This aim is far ﬁ'om being achieved. Practically no provision has
been made to introduce other local languages in schools. This is a political strategy
employed to comfort people. No ofﬁcial attempt at implementation has been made. The
only third language that has always been offered in schools is French, another foreign
language.

Given the fact that University of Botswana’s Department of Aﬁican Languages
and Literature teaches Setswana courses (Setswana as a subject) through the medium of
English, the RNPE recommended that it (the department of Aﬁ'ican Languages and
Literature) should play a leading role in guiding academic presentations in Setswana and
cooperate with the Faculty of Education in promoting the teaching of Setswana. The
Department of Curriculum Development in the Ministry of Education did implement the
recommendation by the 1994 RNPE that in order to improve the status of Setswana,
emphasis should be on the communicative approach. The current Setswana curricula for
both junior and senior secondary schools that were implemented in 1996 are based on the
communicative approach. Issues about the curriculum currently in use are discussed

more elaborately in chapter six.

29

Continuing Legacy of English

It is almost 10 years since the 1994 RNPE made some sound recommendations
about Setswana in an effort to promote it, yet its status is still very low as compared to
that of English. The government and the media communicate with Batswana more in
English than in Setswana. This is prevalent in parliamentary debates, government
documents and in the media. It is very common for a government official to address
people in English when they tour villages to inform people about certain policies or get
their views before implementing them. Although such officials do have some people
translate for them into Setswana, such practice is uncalled for especially if the villagers
are predominantly Setswana speakers. Government newspapers and magazines are
written in English. An alarming example of a magazine written in English is the
“Agrinews”. This is a magazine produced by the Ministry of Agriculture that deals with
issues about crops and farming, issues that directly affect farmers in Botswana. Most
farmers are at the grassroots level with little or no formal education at all. Whether the
aim is to educate the farmers, or seek their views about agriculture, they are denied the
information and as such, it is therefore not easy for them to make any contribution.
Another example is that of the “Botswana Daily News”, a government’s daily newspaper
that is distributed at no charge. More than 90% of the news is written in English and the
only news in Setswana appeared in English on the previous day (see the news clip

attached at the end of this section). Vision 2016 states that the country’s different

30

languages and cultural traditions will be recognized, supported and strengthened within
the education system and that, “no Motswana will be disadvantaged in the education
system as a result of a mother tongue that differs from the country’s two official
languages” (Republic of Botswana, 1994, p.5). This goal calls for the revision of the
language in education policy so as to incorporate other indigenous languages.

Several studies have revealed that as a result of the status accorded English and
Setswana as the only languages recognized ofﬁcially, other local languages are going
through a process of language shift and death (Molosiwa, 2000; Chebanne &
Nthapelelng, 2000). These studies examined language shift tendencies and linguistic
affinity of the Ovaherero and Khoe speakers (in Botswana) respectively. They found out
that the attitude of the minority speakers to Setswana was positive. They viewed
Setswana “as a means of accessing knowledge in books, a tool that can be used to
negotiate deals, communicate ideas, etc. with the dominant Tswana groups” (Chebanne &
Nthapelelng, 2000, p.89). They also expressed that the use of Setswana solves the
linguistic and social barriers that exist between the different ethnic groups in the country.
The interviewees for both groups reported that they would like their children to be ﬂuent
in Setswana and English. The shift towards Setswana language by the minority groups
goes with shift towards its culture and loss of their own cultures and languages. The
groups expressed that they have already lost their traditional practices in terms of
religion, attire, food, marriage and some cultural rituals performed when children reach
puberty. Their children are also now adopting Setswana as the medium of communication
at both home and school, abandoning their mother tongue. The ﬁndings of these studies

denote complex power relations in Botswana society (Apple, 2003; 1998; 1993).

31

Apple (1993) argues that literacy has a political function and “should be seen as a crucial
means to gain power and control over our entire lives” (p.44).
The following news clip from the Botswana Daily News captures the continuing legacy

of English in postcolonial Botswana:

No immediate plans to translate Constitution Skelemani
09 June, 2006

GABORONE - Presidential affairs and public administration minister Phandu Skelemani
says there are no immediate plans to translate the Constitution and other statutes into
Setswana.

Skelemani said at Ntlo ya Dikgosi that it was nonetheless desirable to do so as it would
enhance access to the legislation if it was made available in Setswana for the beneﬁt of
those who did not understand the English language, let alone the Iegalese that was often
used in the drafting of legislation

There are however certain practical considerations that would have to be dealt with
particularly regarding the selection of the statutes to be translated given that it would be
a mammoth task and costly too to translate the entire statute book into Setswana. he said.

The issue of the authenticity would also need to be addressed particularly in the likely
event of a discrepancy between the Setswana version and the oﬂicial English version
Skelemani said these were however, mere modalities that should not stood in the way of
making Setswana translations of certain legislation in the foreseeable future.

The translation of the Constitution into Setswana would obviously deserve to be accorded
the highest priority, he said Skelemani was answering a question ﬁom Kgosi Freda
Mosojane of North East who had asked the minister whether there were plans to translate
the Constitution and other statutes into Setswana

The answer prompted Kgosi Lotlaamoreng II of Barolong to comment, saying what was
happening in Botswana leﬁ much to be desired. He said he wondered why aﬁer 40 years
of independence Botswana did not have a constitution written in Setswana when it took
two years for South Africa aﬁer independence to translate its constitution to 1 I oﬂicial
languages. Kgosi Oarabile Kalaben asked the minister to ensure that it was translated
into all languages spoken in Botswana BOPA

32

History of Teacher Education in Botswana

Teacher education has expanded qualitatively and quantitatively in Botswana
since independence in 1966. Before independence, most teachers were unqualiﬁed. The
highest qualiﬁcation held was the Standard 6 Primary School Certiﬁcate. The few trained
teachers obtained their teacher certiﬁcation at Tiger Kloof in South Africa. Teacher
training institutions in Botswana were established only during the 1940’s. Initially, these
institutions offered a two-year training course leading to the Primary Teachers’
Certiﬁcate (PTC). Admission to the program was dependent upon students having
successfully obtained their Primary School Leaving Certiﬁcate. Around 1945, the
structure of the PTC was extended to 3 years to bring it to a level of the ‘Native Primary’
course that was offered in neighboring South Africa. During the late 1950’s, another two-
year comse, the Primary Higher (PH) was introduced alongside the three-year one. This
course was pursued by those students who held a junior secondary school certiﬁcate and
were to teach upper classes of the primary school; standards four, ﬁve, and six. Those
who were admitted at the training colleges had to have taught for two years prior to
admission. Prospective teachers had the exposure of real classrooms and background of
remote areas. The education review commission realized that the approach to raise
teacher morale was by raising the quality of new entrants to the profession; improving
conditions of service for teachers; and thirdly, by providing proper professional support.

In this regard, the certiﬁcate program was abolished and a three-year Diploma in Primary

33

Education program was introduced. Those who held the PTC qualiﬁcation had to upgrade
their qualiﬁcation through distance education to obtain the three-year Diploma.

Currently, teachers are trained at three different levels. There are colleges of
education that offer a Diploma (equivalent to US Associate degree) in Primary Education
and those that offer a Diploma in secondary education. The duration of teacher
preparation for both these programs is three years. The only institution that awards a
degree in teacher education is the University of Botswana. Teacher preparation at the
university lasts for 5 years. Students spend the ﬁrst 4 years in the Faculty of Humanities
studying content in different subject matter and are awarded a Bachelors degree; they
then spend another year in the Faculty of Education to study education courses and are
attached in schools for a period of 7 weeks as student teachers for ﬁeld experience. At the
end of this program students are awarded a Postgraduate degree in Education. Contrary
to the university program, student teachers at colleges of education are attached in
schools for two full semesters for ﬁeld experience. They spend one semester in schools
during their second year of study and another semester in their third year of study. This
means that these students gain more ﬁeld experience than their counterparts at the
university. All teacher education programs are made up of three major components to be
learned by the student teacher, namely: theories of teaching and learning, teaching subject
content and teaching practice.

With regards to literacy education, a lot is taken for gamed at the university and
its affiliated colleges that offer a Diploma in secondary education. There are no lecturers
who can claim to be literacy specialists (or speciﬁcally reading specialists). Emphasis is

on teaching teachers how to teach literature and language (Grammar). Matters pertaining

34

to literacy education are treated seriously only at elementary teacher education level.
Through my experience as a teacher and a teacher educator in Botswana, I have realized

that topics that are covered in the Setswana education courses are:

Communicative approaches to the teaching of grammar, basic language skills of
reading, writing, speaking and listening.

- The teaching of literature.

Selection and evaluation of language and literature teaching materials.

Remedial teaching and mixed ability teaching.

- Preparation of schemes of work and lesson plans.
These topics are based on content taught at the junior and senior secondary schools.
Emphasis is on giving teachers skills to handle the school syllabi. Botswana is a
multilingual and therefore multicultural nation like most African countries but issues of
multiculturalism are neglected in teacher education programs.

In reviewing education research in Botswana during the period 1986 to 1991,
Nyati-Ramahobo and Prophet found that large sections of the teacher education process
had not been addressed. These were areas such as the pre-service teacher education
curriculum, the effectiveness of the commitment to teaching practice, in—service teacher
education, the teacher educators themselves, questions of coordination between the
various teacher training institutions and the Department of Teacher Education. Chapman
& Snyder (1989) did some classroom based observations to correlate effective teacher
behaviors in the classroom with the level of teacher training. They concluded that levels
of training appeared to have little impact on teaching behaviors and ultimately student

achievement. This view is challenged in another study by Mannathoko (1998) who

35

laments that in Botswana, too much of the relevant knowledge and research is invisible to
teachers. She blames research institutions and policy makers for not having strategies in
place to make research accessible to teachers. It could be concluded that many education
reform proposals do not move beyond political rhetoric to effect real changes in the
education system.

The context described above clearly indicates that Setswana and English occupy
unequal status as school subjects in postcolonial Botswana. The current language
education programs at teacher education level do not adequately address issues of
educating culturally and linguistically diverse learners. It is with this understanding that
this study sought to explore how teachers perceive literacy instruction and learning. The
implementation of education reform policies requires skilled teachers and availability of
resources. Decisions concerning language of instruction and the level at which the
changeover from Setswana to English should take place has to be looked into. Education

reform that imparts life long survival skills is necessary for youth.

Summary
Pre-colonial education in Botswana was based on the society’s cultural practices
and beliefs. Children had to undergo some apprenticeship learning as a way of being
socialized into the accepted norms of the society. Western education did not build on the
traditional forms of learning but replaced it completely. The adoption of English as the
official language and medium of instruction in schools is an illustration of how the
colonial experience continues to shape and deﬁne postcolonial practices in former

colonies. During the colonial times, English was given more prominence over local

36

languages, a practice which still continues today as illustrated by Setswana being limited
to initial literacy at primary schools and as a subject at primary and secondary school
levels only, with no economic value attached to it. Even though policy documents pay
lip service to the fact that the country is multilingual and multicultural, practical steps to
address this issue have still to be taken. These are: the implementation of
recommendations such as; the introduction of local languages other than Setswana in
schools, improvement of language teaching methods at teacher training institutions, and
instruction of Setswana through its medium at the University of Botswana. With the
current state of affairs, the education system will continue to serve certain students while
excluding others.

The chapter that follows is a review of literature related to the study. I review
literacy research in Botswana and other countries, the theoretical ﬁameworks within
which the study is situated, and the deﬁnitions of literacy according to ideological

perspectives of different scholars.

37

Chapter Three
Literature Review

Botswana has set for itself goals towards having an educated and informed nation
by the year 2016 (Republic of Botswana, 1997). The major way in which this goal would
be attained is through the implementation of the secondary school curricula that were
reformed in 1998. These curricula aim to equip students with attitudes, values and skills
required for economic development in a rapidly changing society (Republic of Botswana,
2002). Discussions about competent work force or productivity entail concerns about
literacy. This chapter therefore reviews research on literacy education that young people
already possess or are in need of developing in order to be competent in the world of
work as well as be responsible citizens. In the 21St century, students need to acquire
knowledge, attitudes and skills to ﬁmction within their cultural communities as well as
participate effectively in the shared national culture (Banks, 2003).

The chapter begins by reviewing the theoretical ﬁ'ameworks within which the
study is situated. The next section is a review of literacy reports from both developed and.
developing countries in various parts of the world. Finally, literature on the deﬁnitions of
literacy according to the ideological perspectives of different scholars is reviewed. The
review of literature is aimed at providing the foundation for the study and to guide its
methodology and formulation of theory.

The main research questions and sub questions this study sought to answer are:

1. In what ways does the postcolonial experience of Botswana play out in teachers’

understanding of literacy teaching and learning?

38

2. What are particular meanings teachers associate with literacy teaching and learning
given the structural constraints of the mandated curriculum and national examinations?

a) How does the national (Setswana or English) curriculum deﬁne literacy?

b) What is it that teachers understand the curriculum to be telling them to do?

0) What are teachers’ perspectives on the curriculum’s responsiveness to the needs of the
linguistically and culturally diverse students in schools?

(1) How does the teacher make sense of and come to understand students’ familiar literacy

experiences?

Theoretical Framework
This study is grounded on both sociocultural and postcolonial theoretical
frameworks. While the sociocultural theory assumes that people formulate ideas, beliefs,
and conceptualizations from the experiences they have had within a sociocultural context,
post-colonialism deals with the effects of colonization on cultures and societies

(Ashcroft, Griffiths & Tifﬁn, 2000).

Postcolonial Theory

Since this study is about teachers’ perceptions of literacy teaching and learning, I
employ the postcolonial theory to illustrate how the teaching of Setswana is embedded
within and shaped by colonial discourse. Among other issues, postcolonial theory seeks
to answer questions such as how the experience of colonization affected those who were
colonized, what traces colonial education has left in former colonies, and how the

colonial education and language inﬂuenced the culture and identity of the colonized

39

(Achebe, 1994; Mazrui & Mazrui, 1998; Thiongo, 1981; 1986; 1993; 2000). Ashcroft,
Griffiths and Tiffin (1995) also posit that:

the most formidable ally of economic and political control had

long been the business of ‘knowing’ other peoples because this
‘knowing’ underpinned imperial dominance and became the mode
by which they were increasingly persuaded to know themselves

[. . .] A consequence of this process of knowing became the export
to the colonies European language, literature and learning as part
of a civilizing mission which involved the suppression of a vast
wealth of indigenous cultures beneath the weight of imperial control

(Ashcroft, Grifﬁths & Tiffin, 1995, p.1).

The most important issue critiqued by postcolonial writers and theorists that is relevant to
this study is the effect of the language of the colonizers on the language of instruction in
Botswana schools. The ideological colonization of Botswana is prevalent in language
education policy. Western form of education has persisted in the postcolonial era. In the
postcolonial period, many governments have used education as a means of forging
national unity through curricula interventions, language policies, ceremonial activities
and suchlike. According to Pennycook (1995), the spread of English, partly through
education, has had contradictory effects. On the one hand, it has contributed to western
hegemony. On the other hand this phenomenon can act counter-hegemonically as
counter-hegemonic discourses can be ‘formed in English’ and that access to English can
mean access to global networks.

In Botswana, English is accorded more prominence over local languages in all

aspects of life. The government and the media communicate with Batswana more in

40

English than in Setswana. The University of Botswana teaches Setswana courses through
the medium of English. Setswana teachers too are prepared through the medium of
English. It is only the Diploma (equivalent to USA Associate degree) awarding Colleges
of Education that educate Setswana teachers through its medium. The ofﬁcial curricula
documents that have to deal with the teaching of Setswana in schools are written in
English. Teachers are expected to read them in English, translate their understanding into
Setswana, and prepare their lessons in Setswana through which they teach. English is the
medium of instruction for almost all school subjects offered at both primary and
secondary schools except for Setswana as a subject. This dominance of English
demonstrates the notion of knowledge and power relationships (Popkewitz, 2000)
between the colonized and the colonizer.

Said (1978) demonstrates the ideology of colonial power over the colonized by
analyzing the concept of Orientalism as it was produced and circulated in Europe.
According to Said, representation of the Orient in European literary texts and other
writings contributed to a dichotomy between Europe and its ‘others’, a dichotomy which
was central to the creation of European culture as well as to the maintenance and
extension of European hegemony over its colonies. It has been argued that Said’s use of
culture and knowledge to interrogate colonial power inaugurated colonial discourse
studies (Loomba, 2005). Discourse analysis allows us to see how power works through
language, literature, culture and the institutions which regulate our daily lives.

The contradiction between teacher education practices and actual school practices
is a cause for concern. This contradiction illustrates that in education, Botswana is still

bondage to colonial powers. It is with these kinds of practices in mind that Thiongo

41

(1986) describes the English language as a “cultural born ” that continues a process of
erasing memories of pre-colonial cultures and history and as a way of installing the
dominance of new, more insidious forms of colonialism. Not only does colonial
education eventually create a sense of wanting to disassociate with native heritage, but it
also affects the individual and the sense of self-conﬁdence. Ngugi wa Thiongo (2000)

states that:

Colonial alienation takes two interlinked forms: an active (or passive)
distancing of oneself from the reality around; and an active (or passive)
identiﬁcation with that which is most external to one’s environment. It
starts with a deliberate disassociation of the language of conceptualization,
of thinking, of formal education, of mental development, from the language
of daily interaction in the home and in the community. It is like separating
the mind from the body so that they are occupying two unrelated linguistic
spheres in the same person. On a larger scale it is like producing a society of

bodiless heads and headless bodies (p. 535-536).

Undoubtedly, the high status accorded English over Setswana and other local
languages disadvantages the learners as illustrated by research studies conducted in some

Botswana classrooms.

Sociocultural Theory

The sociocultural theory views literacy as a social practice (Street, 2001, 1996,
1995, 1993, 1984; Gee, 1996; Barton, 1994; Barton & Hamilton, 1998; Hymes, 1994;
Heath, 1983, 1982). According to the proponents of this theory, language and literacy

education are more than decoding and encoding of text; but rather they are the means of

42

participating in culturally valued activities. Through participating in these activities,
students develop in interaction with others contextualized literate skills such as
abstraction, reﬂection, analysis, interpretation, cross-cultural understanding, problem-
solving and critical thinking. The privileging of one form of literacy (academic literacy)
over multiple other forms (e. g., computer, visual, graphic, and scientiﬁc literacies) has
been criticized for ignoring the fact that different texts and social contexts (reading for
whom, with what purpose) require different reading skills (Barton, Hamilton, & Ivanic,
2000; Gee, 1996; Street, 1995). Acquiring these abilities would empower students to
participate in public, commrmity and economic life. Theorists of New Literacy Studies
argue that literacy practices are constructed within a social context, that literacy acts vary
depending on who engages in them and under what circumstances (Street, 1993). The
concept of “multiple” literacies is useful in marking differences between school literacy
and other literacy practices.

Scholars such as Lave (1988), Lave & Wenger (1991) and Rogoff (1990) have
demonstrated that learning through interaction in activity is not unique to children but is
also an integral part of formal and informal adult learning throughout the world.
Learning, whether by children or adults, is not an isolated act of cognition, but rather a
process of gaining entry to a discourse of practitioners through apprenticeship assistance
from peers and teachers.

Rogoff (1990, 1995) relates sociocultural theory to three planes on which human
development occurs; the personal, interpersonal and cultural planes. The personal plane
includes cognition, emotion, behavior, values and beliefs. The interpersonal plane

encompasses the mutual involvement of individual people with others in their social

43

spheres. The community or cultural plane refers to inﬂuences ﬁ'orn the home and family.
It also includes “funds of knowledge” (Gonzalez, 1995; M011, et al, 1992) that children,
particularly ethnic minority children have that are usually not part of the official school
knowledge. By “ﬁrnds of knowledge” is meant skills, abilities, ideas and practices
essential to a household’s functioning and well-being. It is assumed that all households
are rich in sociocultural resources and thus have unique ways of shaping the minds of
their members. In most cases children are made to depend on the teacher for all learning
as if they have nothing or little to offer. Gee (2000) echoes this notion by stating that
“school-based, specialist, academic, and public-sphere forms of language often require us
to exit our life world ...” (p. 66). He argues that in the process of being exposed to
specialist domains, minority and poor children are denied the value of their life worlds
and their communities in reference to those of the advantaged children. In order for
families to utilize their cultural and linguistic resources to contribute to their children’s
education, Rogoff is advocating for the inclusion of the cultural plane in the instructional

practices. Her contribution to sociocultural theory could be illustrated as follows:

Table 2: Three Planes of Sociocultural Contexts of learning

 

 

 

Three planes Elements typical of each plane

Personal plane Cognition, emotion, behavior, values,
beliefs.

Interpersonal plane Mutual involvement of people with others

in social spheres; social interactions;
collective activity.

 

 

Community or cultural plane Home, community, cultural and societal
inﬂuences; economic; political, cultural,
social context.

 

 

Adapted from Rogoﬂﬂ 990, I 995)

44

 

The above three planes reﬂect the different dimensions of the processes of learning which
need to inform the school curricula and instructional practices. The concept of literacy as
a social practice has also been declared by the international agency, UNESCO. In the
United Nations Literacy Day (UN LD) 2003-2012 goals, UNESCO states that “literacy is
about more than reading and writing - it is about how we communicate in society. It is

about social practices and relationships, about knowledge, language and culture”.

Critical Pedagogy

The study also draws from the framework of critical pedagogy (Freire 1970;
1985; Giroux 1988; Cummins 1989). The critical pedagogy ﬁarnework builds on the
perspective of Freire (1970) who criticized the "banking concept" of education in which
students are considered to be empty containers or vessels into which the teacher, as the
agent of the culture, deposits knowledge and information into the learner. Freire believes
that in a banking model of education, students do not ﬁrnction critically, but instead, have
information imposed on them ﬁom the outside This model of education restricts students
to receiving, ﬁling, and storing the information deposited by the teacher, and in the end it
is "the people themselves who are ﬁled away through the lack of creativity" (p. 53).
F reire contrasts this concept with a liberatory pedagogy based on dialogue and problem-
solving in which, "teachers and students (leadership and people), co-intent on reality, are
both Subjects, not only in the task of unveiling that reality, and therefore by coming to
know it critically, but in the task of re-creating that knowledge." (p. 51).

Critical pedagogy affirms the mutual and coequal roles of teachers and learners.

The experiences of learners’ lives are placed at the center of the curriculum. Critical

45

 

-—-.——..- _-_ -—

 

pedagogy enables learners to reﬂect on their own experiences historically. Freire (1970)
states that students must be taught to read the word and the world. Reading the word
requires basic knowledge and skills of literacy but reading the world require students to
question the assumptions of institutionalized knowledge and to use knowledge to take
action that will make the world more just in which to live and work (Banks, 2003; 2004).
In summary, the theoretical ﬁ'ameworks discussed above are consistent with
current views about literacy teaching and learning. Understanding literacy as a social
practice means that reading and writing can only be understood in the context of the
social, cultural, economic, historical practices of which they are a part. Effective
instruction needs to build on elements of both formal and informal literacies. It has to
take into account students’ interests and needs while at the same time attending to the
challenges of living in an information-based economy during a time when standards have
been raised signiﬁcantly for literacy achievement. This suggests the need to rethink how
students’ out of school experiences could be integrated with the habits of literacy learning

and teaching that the schools value.

Literacy Studies and Reports: Local and International

Literacy in Botswana

Much of the past research in Botswana schools has focused on what teachers do in
the classrooms (instructional practices) while a few studies have mainly examined the
interactions between teachers and students in primary and junior secondary schools, the

language of instruction and instructional resources. Although these studies do not make

46

reference to the perceptions behind particular teaching approaches, 1 reviewed them as
the basis of my study since instructional practices and resources do reveal something
about teachers’ perceptions and their interpretation of the curriculum. The review
attempts to establish the kinds of literacy teaching methods and resources that are
employed in Botswana classrooms and also to ﬁnd out how teachers deal with the
contextual and institutional constraints.

In a study on “Classroom practices and the discourse of classroom interaction in
Botswana primary schools”, Arthur (1998) observed that teaching was authoritative and
the curriculum was prescriptive in nature, failing to reﬂect the “nonstandar ” home and
community backgrounds of many students as well as that of many teachers. In Arthur’s
words, “individual and cultural difference is devalued, and conformity to an approved
‘national’ identity is encourag ” (p.10). He also argued that teacher identity in Botswana
was shaped in teacher training institutions. According to him, teachers inherited
prescriptive-teacher dominated classroom practices at teacher training institutions from
their tutors. The tutors talked about leamer-centered approaches but neither practiced
them nor modeled them.

The authoritative nature of teaching was also revealed in Rowell’s study (1991).
Rowell studied the day-to-day patterns of events and interactions for students and
teachers in two Botswana junior secondary schools located in selected villages. Data
were collected through classroom observations, interviews with students, teachers and
administrators, students’ written and printed texts. The study revealed that most students
were not given opportunities to articulate their thinking or interpret what they were

learning; classrooms were dominated by teacher talk. Furthermore, Rowell found that the

47

content of lessons was invariably what had been laid out in textbook exercises,
worksheets, workbooks or teacher guides. To be considered good students, when
questions were asked, students provided teacher—designated answers that they had
memorized. Rowell remarks;

The students in this study appeared to be aiming for

reproducing or replicating information and there was

very little opportunity offered to them for representing

what they had learned, not as a product but as a process (p.22).

In that regard, Rowell concluded that, in Botswana schools, learning comes to be seen as
the acquisition of someone else’s knowledge, which is out there, detached ﬁom the
learner. Her analysis of the teachers was that most of them saw their task as transmitting
the information required to assist the students to pass the examinations. In this regard,
learning was seen as the means of accessing information needed to pass the examinations.
Rowell also observed that the English language presented a challenge for students and
teachers alike. Teachers did admonish students for not conversing in English during or
between lessons, yet they (teachers) did not communicate among themselves in English
in the staffrooms. The incompetency of teachers in English was evident in the fact that
many of them were unable to provide well constructed explanations in their lessons.
Rowell found it disturbing that despite communication problems in classrooms, there was
no discussion either about the difﬁculties facing teachers working in a second or third
language, nor about the adequacy of teachers’ written or spoken English. The

contribution of this study to literacy education is that awareness of the ways in which

48

people come to learn is crucial. An approach such as the transmission of information to
teaching does not afford students opportunities to think for themselves, but encourage
them to depend on other people’s knowledge.

Raising similar views as in Rowell’s study, Sunal (1998) contends that instruction
in sub-Saharan countries is often authoritarian and places students in passive roles where
recall of information is the expected result of student learning. She attributes this kind of
teaching strategy to lack of appropriate training on the part of the teachers. She also
reports that students are given very few tests and no continuous assessment. Lack of
continuous assessment is seen as an inheritance ﬁ'om the European colonial traditions
where assessment is focused on end of year examinations.

Based on interview studies conducted among ethnic minority groups of the
Basarwa, Hays (2002) and Polelo (2003) revealed that many ethnic minority students in
primary schools in remote areas dropped out of school in Botswana because of the
insensitivity of the school culture and curriculum to their (the minorities) culture and
learning styles. Hays contended that children performed badly in examinations and
dropped out of school because they were:

Taught foreign systems of knowledge in a language or language

variety other than their own, by teachers from cultures that are different

from, and dominant to their own, and who use instruction and disciplinary

styles that do not match that of the students’ home life (Hays, 2002, p. 1).

49

Both Hays and Polelo cited other factors as being those that included negative relations
between teachers and students or between students and their peers, language difﬁculties
and ethnic intolerance.

Chapman and Snyder (1989) conducted classroom-based observations to correlate
effective teacher behaviors in the classroom with the level of teacher training. They
concluded that levels of training appeared to have little impact on teaching behaviors and
ultimately student achievement. Their studies revealed issues similar to those that came
up in a govemment-funded consultancy on ‘Primary Schooling for Remote Area
Dwellers” conducted by Tabachnick in Botswana in 1980. This consultancy identiﬁed the
need to devise instructional materials that are suitable for remote area dweller children.
This was recommended on the basis that circumstances of living, of culture, of economic
and social mobility were different for those children than for most Batswana. In his
report, Tabachnick cited lack of appropriate teaching materials as obstructive to the
learning of the remote area children. He argued that in remote areas, there was less access
to and less variety of informal learning opportunities through mass media, interchange of
news and ideas. He recommended that an important part of the curriculum for remote
area schools should be an emphasis on activities in the classroom, which use out of
school experiences of students.

In another study, J ankie (2000) investigated how far community practices and
knowledge were incorporated in Setswana classrooms. This was a yearlong qualitative
study in one secondary school. J ankie found out that teaching was geared towards
examinations, with heavy reliance on textbooks, most of which were far removed from

the experiences of the students. She argues that teachers can play a role by reshaping their

50

pedagogies to create classroom contexts that will nurture academic success for all
students. This, according to her, can be achieved through recognition of community
knowledge and worldviews as well as students’ personal experiences as a form of
valuable currency in Setswana classrooms.

The only study in the region that directly investigated teachers’ conceptions of
literacy was that which was conducted by Natsa (1994) in Zimbabwe. Among the
frndings, Natsa’s study revealed that; the national examinations inﬂuenced what teachers
taught and the breadth and depth of content coverage. He observed that “those aspects of
literacy which did not often come in public examinations, such as debates and other oral
communication skills were rarely emphasized in their literacy instruction” (p.123). Natsa
fru'ther noted that the examination questions limited teachers’ conceptualization of
reading and writing. Reading appeared to be a process of getting meaning from print.
Students were discouraged ﬁ'om using their prior knowledge to make sense of a written
text for fear of misreading questions that were asked. Many of the ﬁndings in this study
concur with observations made in the aforementioned studies conducted in Botswana.
This is no surprise as Zimbabwe and Botswana are neighboring countries and were both
former British colonies. Many of the teachers interviewed in Natsa’s study were not able
to deﬁne what reading was. Their responses suggested that there was no academic or
professional discourse going on in schools about the meanings and processes of reading
and writing. Based on his data, Natsa concluded that there was no evidence that reading
was deﬁned as a process of constructing meaning through interaction among the readers’

existing knowledge. Having had similar experiences as Natsa’s informants, his study has

51

partly provoked me to frnd out about teachers’ perceptions of literacy teaching and
learning in Botswana’s education system.

It is interesting to note that during the time Natsa conducted his study,
Zimbabwe’s curricula and examinations were still controlled by the examinations board
(U CLES) in United Kingdom, while Botswana localized its curricula and examinations in
1998. It is evident that the colonial inﬂuence is still prevalent in the education system of
the former colonies. Parry (2003) laments that in most Aﬁican countries; the curricula are
dominated by externally administered examinations; and the head teachers locally
dominate schools, while within the classroom, the teacher is the “rmdisputed authority”.
In this regard:

Literacy is seen as a set of practices, imposed by authority, that
have no intrinsic interest for learners; reading is just part of a series
of hoops that learners must jump through before attaining a job and

beginning real life (ibid, p.741).

Language of Instruction and Literacy

Some African scholars have argued that all the most developed nations use their
native languages as mediums of instruction; while the least developed nations use
languages other than their own native ones. Prah & King (1999) in particular, observed
that classiﬁcation of the world’s nations along development scale correlates fairly with
the use of native languages:

. . . successful societies of Asia and Europe are societies that use

their own languages. The fact that English is a universal language

52

does not mean that Danish people, who are more than ﬁve million
use English; the Dutch who are no more than ﬁfteen million do not

use English or French .. . the Malaysians who got their independence
within six months of Ghana’s independence, today use Bahasa on a

wide scale (p.12).

The use of former colonizer’s languages as mediums of instruction in most Aﬁican
countries has also been seen as hampering children’s cognitive development (Silue,
1999), and a psychological disjunction between the school context and the social
background of the children (Fereira, 1994). Silue’s view is that tying up literacy to
foreign languages implicitly leads Aﬁicans to view it as something external to their
social praxis just as the foreign medium used to teach it. She argues that:

In the general context of learning, on using a language other

than their mother tongue, children’s ﬁ'agile and still emerging

cognitive capacities are forced and routed through a completely

different linguistic and conceptual ﬁarnework (p.66).

The fear that learning in local languages may jeopardize students’ competence in
English is unfounded. Experimental studies in other countries have established that
children who learn in local languages perform better than those who learn in languages
foreign to them. One such example is the Iliolo experiment (Bamgbose, 1976) in Nigeria.
Some children were instructed in the local vernacular of Hiligaynon in the ﬁrst two

grades of primary education while others were instructed in English. At the end of the

53

second year, the local vernacular was found to be a much more effective medium of
instruction than English. At the end of the third year, the experimental group continued to
perform better than the control group. The experiment demonstrated that instruction in
mother tongue is superior to that in English. Unfortunately, details about how those
children were tested are not given so these studies still leave us with some questions.

In another experiment, also carried out in Nigeria, children who studied in Yoruba
for 6 years while learning English as a second language performed better than those who
learned directly in English (Chumbow, 1998 and Bamgbose, 2005). This experiment was
known as the Ife experiment. Children who studied in Yoruba to present themselves in an
English Language examination outclassed those children who studied the same subjects —
biology, mathematics —in the school system in English (Chumbow, 1998). Another
experiment mentioned by Chumbow is that conducted in the Philippines in which some
students were taught in English and others in Filipino in the mother tongue. The children
who were taught in the indigenous language performed considerably better than those
who were taught in English.

Instruction in mother tongue seems to be yielding positive results for children in
various parts of the world. In Botkyrka, Sweden, Hagman and Lahdenpera (in Skutnabb-
Kangas & Cummins, 1988) provide evidence from a program in mother tongue
instruction that was introduced in 1971 for Finnish immigrant children in 1“t grade. By
1973, the program was extended to Finnish pupils in lower secondary education (6th to -
9th grades). A follow-up study was conducted in 1984 to ﬁnd out the progress of Finnish
students who had completed 9th grade. It was revealed that many Finnish students who

had applied for lower secondary education had been admitted. The number of Finnish

54

students who had applied for programs leading to university was also higher than for the
students from the other classes. Hagrnan and Lahdenpera argue, “minority children’s
languages and cultures can be given in every country the same status which Botkyrka has
given to them” (1988, p.335).

The above literature demonstrates that the prevailing literacy practices in
Botswana classrooms are due to some institutional constraints and teachers’ lack of
professional development. Knowledge is treated as neutral and given. In an era that
demands advanced levels of literacy for secondary school graduates for further studies, to
function efﬁciently in the work place or for good citizenship, students are trained to
depend on the teacher. Their experiences outside of school are not considered and since
language goes with culture, this makes matters worse for ethnic minorities whose
languages are not taught in school. The colonial imbalance in power relations between
cultures continues to exist in postcolonial Botswana. Although the researchers employed
ethnographic research methods such as observations and interviews on teaching
practices, there still remain questions about how teachers perceive literacy teaching and
learning, what meanings they make of literacy teaching. These are the issues that I hope

to address in this study. The section that follows discusses literature on culturally

relevant pedagogy.

Culturally Relevant Pedagogy
In order to take advantage of students’ diverse cultural language practices,
literature on teaching practices in remote area schools of Botswana calls for culturally

relevant teaching pedagogies. Culturally relevant pedagogy has been described by a

55

number of researchers as an effective means of meeting the academic and social needs of
culturally diverse students (Gay, 2000; Howard, 2001; Ladson-Billings, 1994). Gay
(2000) asserts that culturally relevant pedagogy uses:

the cultural knowledge, prior experiences, frames of reference,

and performance styles of ethnically diverse students to make

learning more relevant to and effective [for students].... It teaches

to and through strengths of these students. It is culturally validating

and affirming (p. 29).

Culturally relevant teaching rejects the deﬁcit-based thinking about culturally
diverse students. Ladson-Billings (1994) has argued that one of the central principles of
culturally relevant pedagogy is an authentic belief that students from culturally diverse
and low-income backgrounds are capable learners. She maintains that if students are
treated competently they will ultimately demonstrate high degrees of competence. To -
become culturally relevant, teachers need to engage in honest, critical reﬂection that
challenges them to see how their positionality inﬂuences their students in either positive
or negative ways. Gay (2000) maintains that one of the most frmdamental features of
culturally responsive teaching is the power of caring. She states that caring is frequently
manifested through teacher attitudes, expectations and behaviors. Bruner (1996) states
that “education is not simply a technical business of managed information processing,
nor even simply a matter of applying learning theories to the classroom or using the

results of subject-centered achievement testing. It is a complex pursuit of ﬁtting a culture

56

to the needs of its members and of ﬁtting its members and their ways of knowing to the

needs of the culture” (p.43).

International Research on Literacy

Middle school Survey Reports

To ﬁnd out how the teaching and learning of literacy in Botswana compares with
that in other countries, I reviewed literacy survey reports submitted to the International
Reading Association (IRA) in 2005 from various countries. Since my interest is in
adolescent literacy, I selected surveys that reported about middle school literacy in the
absence of reports on secondary school literacy. International Research Correspondents
(IRCs) were requested to contact 20 to 25 qualiﬁed individuals in their respective regions
and poll those individuals about 8 issues related to middle school literacy. The poll
comprised the following items, with each item followed by a Likert scale (not at all,
little, much, very much) and a request to explain the response.

1. To what extent are middle school students (grades 5—8) engaged with literacy in
your region of the world?

2. Do language differences inﬂuence middle school students' involvement with
literacy in your region?

3. Does assessment play a role in how much middle school students are engaged
with reading?

4. Do schools in your region use out-of-school interests to engage middle school

students with literacy in school?

57

5. Do electronic media inﬂuence middle school students' engagement with
literacy?

6. Do teachers in your region of the world use new technologies to engage middle
school students in literacy?

7. Does gender inﬂuence middle school students' engagement with literacy in your
region?

8. In your region, does socioeconomic class inﬂuence middle school students'

engagement with literacy?

From the responses received, the most often common identiﬁed issue was that there
was disengagement with literacy among middle school children (grades 5-8).
International research correspondents Marta Infante of Chile and Melina Porto of
Argentina reported that literacy engagement by middle school students occurred mostly
in school settings, in the form of required activities, rather than outside academic settings
or for pleasure. Gearing instructional materials to students’ interests was seen as
motivational in involving students in academic activities. Although seldom utilized, it
was done mainly through writing autobiographies and keeping student journals. The use
of assessments, having a concrete audience for their writing, and students’ desire for
good grades were also commonly identiﬁed as motivating factors for student success.
The respondents did not see language differences as being a substantial barrier to literacy
practices, as both Chile and Argentina are largely monolingual, with most students
speaking Spanish.

The South African report compiled by Mastin Prinsloo, the international

correspondent, stated that middle school students were not very engaged with traditional

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school literacies but preferred the more attractive alternatives offered by television
programs, computer games, and the lntemet. Assessments were described as motivation
for some students' limited literacy engagement, although it was also noted that a high
level of literacy was not required to pass those tests. A number of schools reported that
they used students' out-of-school interests for instructional purposes. This was mainly
through the use of newspapers, true-life stories about popular ﬁgures such as
skateboarders, and, where available, the Internet. Many respondents described language
differences as inﬂuential; they noted that Afrikaans and Xhosa-speaking students
frequently struggled in the English-speaking schools they attended. Some respondents
indicated that socioeconomic class was very inﬂuential on literacy practices in that there
was lack of access to resources such as computers and texts in economically poor areas.
The international correspondents Robyn Gail Cox, Maya K. David, and Anita Y.K.
Poon submitted reports that were compilations of 42 responses from questionnaires ﬁom
four countries, Singapore, Malaysia, Brunei, and Hong Kong. A common thread through
many of their reports was the strong presence of government initiatives behind academic
programs. Curricula were described as being geared toward preparing students to perform
well on national examinations, and some respondents noted that the large role of
assessment might have a negative effect on students’ out-of-school literacy practices.
Many commented on their difﬁculty gauging students’ engagement in literacy practices
because of an abundance of teaching responsibilities. Some respondents also observed
that second language learners from the many different dialect and language communities
within these countries often struggle in terms of academic achievement because of the

reliance on ofﬁcial national languages in the curriculum. Out-of-school interests were not

59

seen as inﬂuential on instruction mainly due to the constraints of the curriculum, as
respondents reported having little time for much variation.

Respondents from Hong Kong and Malaysia described after-school programs that
attempt to build on students' interests to motivate reluctant learners. Many of them noted
that students were very interested in new technologies, especially those that involved the
intemet, computer game playing, and supplemental academic activities available online.
The respondents from Malaysia and Brunei reported that these resources were as yet not
widely available in their countries, while those fi'om Hong Kong noted the difficulty in
adding anything to an already packed curriculum. Like the situation in South Africa,
socioeconomic class was identiﬁed as a major inﬂuence on students' literacy engagement
by most respondents, with the more affluent having more access to books and academic
coaching and being described as more engaged with literacy.

The international research correspondent Meeli Pandis gathered 16 responses from
Estonia and the United Kingdom from a range of groups. Middle school students were
commonly reported as being engaged in literacy practices, with an identiﬁed pattern of
moving away from traditional print-based literacy toward more interactions with
electronic media, particularly in their out-of-school activities. Incorporating new
technologies with in-school activities via electronic communication, searching the
intemet, and using electronic white boards or computer programs such as Microsoft’s
Power Point were identiﬁed as being effective alternatives to pen-and-paper activities.
Responses from both Estonia and the United Kingdom generally indicated an advantage
to using students’ out-of-school interests in shaping instruction, but most respondents

reported little evidence of this being done in classrooms, either due to a lack of attention

60

to students’ interests, as reported by the UK correspondents, or larger workloads, as
reported by Estonian teachers.

Comparing responses across the different regions, certain common themes about
literacy engagement at the middle school level emerged. These were issues such as:
inﬂuence of new technologies on students’ engagement with literacy which, however,
were depended on social class; economic differences led to a lack of access to a variety of
scholastic resources. The use of out-of-school interests was also recognized as being part
of effective instruction even though they were not often incorporated in instruction.
Whereas the reports ﬁom South America and Europe indicated that second language
learners were just as likely as native speakers to engage in literacy practices during
middle school years, that was not the case with learners from Paciﬁc Asia and South
Africa. The countries where responses were gathered in the former were monolingual
whereas the latter comprised of learners from different language groups. Paciﬁc Asia and
South Aﬁica therefore reported a large number of learning difﬁculties since the official

languages in the curriculum were different from learners’ home languages.

Teacher Preparation Survey Reports

In order to get an insight into how other countries prepare their teachers I looked at
survey reports submitted to the International Reading Association (IRA) in 2006 from
selected countries that mentioned issues about literacy and teacher preparation. The
international research correspondents were requested to send informed individuals in
their regions a common questionnaire consisting of 10 items related to the issue of

teacher preparation. The ﬁrst 8 items were rated with a 4-point Likert scale (not at all,

61

little, much, very much), whereas the ﬁnal two questions were open-ended. The 10 items

were as follows:

1. Do teachers report feeling adequately prepared to teach reading and writing?

2. To what extent is teacher preparation in your region nationally regulated?

3. Are beginning teachers supported in their efforts to become successful teachers of reading and
writing?

4. Are there professional development opportunities for working teachers?

5. Are teachers taught speciﬁc methods to teach reading and writing (as opposed to being taught
general methods of instruction)?

6. Can teachers obtain special teaching certiﬁcations in the area of reading or writing?

7. What do you think should be the focus of literacy-teacher education in your region?

8. What do you think should be the focus of literacy-teacher education in your region?

9. Do you ﬁnd the existing teacher-preparation system in your region adequate?

10. Brieﬂy describe the process of becoming a teacher in your region. For example, are there

requirements such as (a) choosing a speciﬁc grade level? (b) being bilingual? (c) taking speciﬁc

tests? (d) completing a speciﬁc academic/training program?

The Australian correspondent reported that there were no reading or writing support
teachers and so there was no formal specialist certiﬁcation in reading or writing, but
teachers can achieve a measure of specialization after teaching for several years and then
completing postgraduate degrees. The school administrators believed that teachers were
not generally well prepared to teach reading and writing skills, university academics
believed that university programs provided a diverse and adequate foundation for
teaching. The correspondent noted that the administrators who responded to this
questionnaire reported that support systems and professional learning programs are

provided for beginning teachers in their schools. However, the university-based

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academics indicated that Australian graduates tend to receive little systematic support and
professional learning experiences once they leave university, although the state
Departments of Education occasionally offer mandatory professional development for
public school teachers. The respondents also recounted that students in elementary
programs believed they were better prepared than those in secondary programs. Special
programs, such as French immersion and English as a second language, are provided, but
with varying levels of preparation.

From Chile, Marta Infante reported that in general, Chilean teachers felt adequately
prepared to teach literacy skills. Many (55%) stated that teachers were taught speciﬁc
methods to teach reading and writing. However, a substantial group (30% of respondents)
also noted that teachers were not equipped with all the theoretical and practical resources
needed to address problems in learning to read acquisition. The respondents reported that
the improvement of students' reading comprehension should be a major focus of
contemporary teacher training, as evidenced by low national testing in this area. The
maj ority of respondents (74%) emphasized that teachers have opportunities to obtain
special teaching certiﬁcations in reading and writing at various universities, but they
indicated a need for more ﬁnancial support to be made available for in—service teachers to
obtain these certiﬁcations.

In Hong Kong, more than 60% of the respondents felt that teachers are not
adequately prepared to teach reading and writing, a view that was particularly strong
among the experienced teachers. Furthermore, 60% of respondents indicated that little
support was provided for beginning teachers in their efforts to become successful

teachers of reading and writing. Respondents in Hong Kong suggested that literacy-

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teacher education should focus on second-language acquisition, applied linguistics,
reading psychology, critical thinking, and reading motivation. Respondents also
advocated the use of practical examples of literacy teaching and learning in teacher-
preparation and professional development programs.

In Estonia, no additional certification in the area of reading and writing is offered
but reading and writing strategies are taught to classroom, mother tongue, and literature
teachers in the course of their preservice training; however, this instruction is not required
for teachers of other subject areas. In general, preparation for classroom, literacy, and
literature teachers is reported to be adequate, but concerns are raised regarding literacy
instruction for subject area teachers. This concern is especially notable as assessments
point to deﬁciencies in literacy acquisition in school students, especially among
adolescents.

The international reports on teacher preparation indicate that in many countries,
teachers are not adequately prepared to teach reading and writing. It is also evident that
novice teachers are not given the support they need in exception of Australia where some
form of professional development and mentorship are in place. From the selected reports,
it is also apparent that literacy education in teacher preparation, especially at secondary
school level is still lacking in many countries.

The next section outlines the deﬁnitions of literacy according to ideological
perspectives of different scholars. This is done in order to ﬁnd out the ideology guiding
the literacy curriculum and teaching practices currently in place in Botswana secondary

schools.

Deﬁnitions of Literacy

Conceptions of literacy differ according to ideological perspectives of scholars.
Cadiero-Kaplan (2004) distinguishes between four common ideologies of literacy that
inform curriculum and pedagogy: functional literacy, cultural literacy, progressive
literacy and critical literacy. She postulates that since the 1800’s, each ideology of
literacy has both inﬂuenced the English curricula and has been the fuel for educational
and political debates regarding deﬁnitions of what it means to be a literate person in
school and society.

Functional literacy ideology is reﬂected in a curriculum that teaches students the
skills deemed necessary to participate in school and society successﬁrlly. A functionally
literate person is the one who has the ability to read and write in order to perform tasks
such as ﬁlling in job application forms, writing checks and reading signs. The premise of
such instruction is that, through the use of basal readers and accompanying skills, books
and drill worksheets, students acquire skills of decoding words and analyzing text by
answering speciﬁc reading comprehension questions orally and in writing. The shortfall
of this kind of literacy, Cadiero-Kaplan argues, is that, skills are decontexualized, require
one speciﬁc answer or response, and do not consider the language and /or culture of the
students. She contends that this kind of curricula is mostly tailored for ethnic minority
students in the United States. The literature reviewed earlier in this chapter about
schooling in a global view and particularly in Botswana conﬁrms Cadiero-Kaplan’s view
that the curricula tailored around frmctional literacy do not accommodate the languages
and/ or cultures of ethnic minority students. Teaching is driven by the curricula which are

geared towards preparing students for speciﬁc skills so that they perform well in national

65

examinations. Such kind of practice, according to the literature, has led to limited literacy
engagement for many students.

Cultural literacy ideology focuses on the teaching of core cultural beliefs,
morality, and common values, with a curriculum that includes the classics or ‘Great
Books’. E.D. Hirsch introduced this curriculum in 1987. The ideology driving this
curriculum is that all learners share common background knowledge in order to
understand discourse and text. This implies that children from low-socio-economic
classes and/or ethnically diverse groups have to be taught the cultural knowledge already
possessed by their peers ﬁ'om mainstream speaking group (which is the one recognized
by the school). The type of curricultun prescribed by Hirsch and his followers is
criticized on the basis that it is not only geared toward those who already have power, but
ﬁmctions to reinforce existing lines of economic and social privilege (Provenzo, 2005).
Hirsch’s model of cultural literacy is based on accumulating a speciﬁc store of
information. He believes that all communities are founded on speciﬁc shared
information. He maintains; “the basic goal of education in a human community is
acculturation, the transmission to children of the speciﬁc information shared by the adults
of the group or polis” (1984). This transmission model of education can be equated with
Freire’s notion of a “banking concept” of education. Provenzo argues that an educated
citizenry located in a rapidly changing culture like the American one needs not only to
accumulate cultural facts, but cultural meaning as well if they are to understand critical
aspects of contemporary issues. And for the purposes of this study, I would add that, an
educated citizenry located in a multilingual society like that of Botswana needs to

understand and appreciate the diverse nature of the society of which they are a part.

66

Education must develop moral and social values, cultural identity and self-esteem,
citizenship and democracy (Republic of Botswana, 1993).

The critical literacy ideology emphasizes the ability to understand and act against
social relations of oppression. It entails an understanding of the relationship between
language and power together with a practical knowledge of how to use language for self-
realization, social critique, and cultural transformation (Knoblauch & Brannon, 1993).
Critical literacy is “linked to notions of self- and social empowerment as well as to the
processes of democratization” (Aronowitz & Giroux, 1985, p.132). It functions “to help
students and others understand what this society has made of them ...and what it is they
no longer want to be, as well as what it is they need to appropriate critically in order to
become knowledgeable about the world in which they live” (ibid, p.132). It argues that
those with power are able to deﬁne knowledge. Critical literacy suggest the need to teach
youth to read with a critical eye toward how writers, illustrators, and the like represent
people and their ideas, in short, how individuals who create texts make those texts work.
At the same time, it suggests teaching adolescents that all texts, including their textbooks,
routinely promote or silence particular views. In this ideology, the goals for literacy
should be to empower people to criticize and change political and economic oppression.
Critical literacy demands not only knowledge of alternative vocabularies, as well as the
history of ideas and conﬂicts, but also a clear knowledge of theory that will allow the
framing and interpretation of facts. This is rooted in Freire’s notion of “reading the word
and the world”. Freire argues that:

If the texts generally offered students once hid much more

than they revealed of reality, now literacy as an act of

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knowledge, as a creative act and as a political act, is an
effort to read the world and the word. Now it is no longer
possible to have the text without context (Freire & Macedo,
1987, p.43).

Freire critiques the existing approaches to literacy as ignoring the learners’
linguistic and communicative skills, and their creative capacities which they bring to
school. Critical pedagogy therefore calls for a political reading or interpretation of the
world so as to transform the oppressive relations which constitute the world. This
contrasts the curriculum of cultural literacy, which is also linked to positions of power. It
attempts to make certain core knowledge legitimate and is viewed by its critics as serving
to maintain the status quo. Looking back at the reviewed literature on literacy globally,
none of the reviewed schooling situation included this deﬁnition of literacy. This could
probably be the case because the questionnaire asked speciﬁcally about the engagement
of middle school students with literacy. It was only the report ﬁom Hong Kong that
stated that literacy teacher education should focus on critical literacy among others.

In contrast to ﬁmctional and cultural literacy ideologies, the progressive literacy is
based on the democratic ideas postulated by John Dewey (1916) that include the free
interchange of ideas between students and educators and the notion of a student-centered
curriculum. This literacy ideology requires students and teachers to engage in the process
of learning to read and write based on themes and topics that are of interest to students,
and with the vocabulary related to their lives. The progressive ideology is seen in the
whole-language curriculum that is derived from constructivist and cognitive views of

learning and is reﬂected in the use of writer’s workshops, literature response journals,

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and literature circles. Under constructivism, social discourse is part of learning, and most
important, it views students as agents over their learning. In Cadiero-Kaplan’s analysis,
the disadvantage of progressive ideology is that it is not transforrnative because it
potentially ignores students’ lived experiences, histories, languages, and discourse
communities: their cultural capital. As already explained under ‘functional literacy’
ideology, this ﬁgures too into the reviewed schooling situation globally including

Botswana.

Summary

The foregoing review of literature indicates that Botswana and other countries
have adopted an oversimpliﬁed view of literacy. The concept of literacy has been
conﬁned to something that can be taught with skill-and-drill exercises and measured by
standardized tests. Although efforts have been made to reform the curricula since
independence, classroom research has indicated that actual teaching methods still follow
the colonial model that was based on missionary education. That model emphasized rote
learning, disregarding the learners’ experiences and did not instill in them critical and
creative thinking abilities. There is need to incorporate modern pedagogies in order to
achieve the educational aims and aspirations of the country. The multiple perspectives of
literacy provide a broader and richer view of what it means to be literate. Basic level
literacy is insufficient in today’s world where both reading and writing tasks required of
adolescents are continuing to increase in complexity and difficulty. Effective instruction
builds on elements of both formal and informal literacies. It does so by taking into

account students’ interests and needs while at the same time attending to the challenges

69

of living in an information—based economy. This echoes Brozo and Simpson’s (1995)
assertion that “the potential power of literacy as a tool for social, political, and economic
transformation is largely ignored in secondary schools” (p.16). The colonial legacy still
guides literacy teaching.

Based on the literature, it could be concluded that the conceptions guiding literacy
teaching in Botswana schools are the functional and cultural literacy ideologies. All
schools follow the mandated curriculum by the Ministry of Education; read the same
prescribed books and write the same examinations. For each grade level, there is some
core knowledge that all students should be taught. If teachers are to prepare students for
the 21St century, they need to have a deeper knowledge base and expertise in the teaching
of literacy. As I will establish in the next chapter, the curriculum was revised to move
toward progressive and critical literacy pedagogies but this seems not to be the practice in
schools currently.

The next chapter is the description of the methods that were used to collect data
for the study, including an explanation of my professional affiliation to the ﬁeld of

literacy education and my role as a researcher.

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Chapter Four
Methodology

The prupose of this study was to uncover, interpret and illustrate the meanings
teachers in Botswana secondary schools associate with literacy teaching and learning
given the postcolonial history of the country and the structural constraints of planned
secondary school policies and mandated curricula by the Ministry of Education. My aim
was to investigate how institutional and state policies that shape standards and
assessments inﬂuence and constrain the teaching of literacy at senior secondary school
level.

To understand teachers’ perceptions of literacy teaching and learning, the study
was conducted from both sociocultural and a postcolonial framework. The sociocultural
framework assumes that reality must be described from the perspective of the participants
in a culture (Berger & Luckman, 1967). People formulate ideas, beliefs, and
conceptualizations fi'om the experiences they have had within a sociocultural context. A
postcolonial perspective helps us understand and examine the structural biases inherent in
the education system that denigrate local culture and practices. It also offers us new ways
of thinking about diversity and language. Postcolonial theorists identify knowledge and
power as ‘two individual foundations of imperial authority’ (Ashcroft, Griffiths & Tifﬁn,

1995).

71

The main research questions and sub-questions that guided my study were as follows:

1. In what ways does the postcolonial experience of Botswana play out in teachers’
understanding of literacy teaching and learning?

2. What are particular meanings teachers associate with literacy teaching and
learning, given the structural constraints of the mandated curriculum and national
examinations?

a) How does the national (Setswana or English) curriculum deﬁne literacy?

b) What is it that teachers understand the curriculum to be telling them to do?

c) What are teachers’ perspectives on the curriculum’s responsiveness to the needs of

the linguistically and culturally diverse students in schools?

(1) How does the teacher make sense of and come to understand students’ familiar

literacy experiences?

This chapter is a description of the research methods and the design of the study. I
describe the research site and participants of the study. I then explain how I gained access
into the focal school, how I collected data and analyzed it. Finally, I discuss my role as a

researcher for this study in relation to the participants.

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Research Design

Site and Participants

The study was conducted among several English and Setswana teachers in some
senior secondary schools in the South central region in Botswana. A total of 30 teachers
agreed to participate in the study: 19 Setswana teachers and 11 teachers of English. An
open-ended survey questionnaire aimed at getting their perceptions of literacy was given
to these teachers (a copy is in the Appendix). Based on the criteria of internal sampling
(Bogdan & Biklen, 2003) and the teachers’ willingness to volunteer to share information,
I selected 5 teachers who were a subset of those who completed the survey questionnaire
to be key informants. The 5 teachers were selected ﬁ'om a total of 13 Setswana teachers
at the focal school. All the key informants were female since there were no male teachers
of Setswana at that school during the time the study was conducted. One teacher had a
Masters degree qualiﬁcation while all the remaining 4 had Bachelors’ degrees. The
teaching experiences of these teachers ranged between 7 and 25 years. All the focal

informants belonged to the mainstream Setswana speaking ethnic groups.

In selecting key informants, I gave priority to teachers who started teaching prior
to the curriculum reform in 1996. The aim was to get views of these teachers about the
old syllabus (that administered by the University of Cambridge) as compared to the new

one administered locally.

The focal school, which I give the pseudonym “Duma”, is a large public

secondary school situated in a low-income area of a big city. The student population at

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the time this study was conducted was approximately 1, 300, with 100 teachers. The
location of Duma does not however imply that it is different from other schools in the
country in terms of funding and resources. The government in Botswana equally funds all
schools. The schools are strategically located in different areas of the city to cater for

junior secondary schools in their neighborhoods.

Like all schools in the cities, students of Duma school are of mixed ethnic and
linguistic backgrounds. The school is in a major city which many Batswana do not claim
as their home. People came here for jobs and economic opportunities and still have great
attachment to their towns and villages of origin to which they go for weddings, funerals,
holidays and other communal activities. The main language of commrmication between
the different ethnic groups is Setswana, the national language, while some people would

speak a different language in their homes.

Duma senior secondary school is located between low-income government
housing and the poorest township in the city. The township is inhabited by mostly the
unemployed and low-income earners. Although unemployed, the majority of the residents
of this township are engaged in a myriad of economic activities. They sell fi'uits and

vegetables, prepare food and homemade beer for sale, and ﬁx cars and appliances.

All senior schools enroll Form 4 and Form 5 students (US equivalent of 11th and
12th grades). The Department of Secondary Education is in charge of allocating students
to senior schools after they pass the junior certiﬁcate examinations. Although schools do
not choose which students to admit, there are special cases whereby parents can negotiate

with principals to have their children admitted in a school (mostly for reasons like close

74

proximity of the school ﬁom the child’s home in case the child was admitted in a far
away school). Among the 6 senior schools in the south central region, I selected Duma
because it has been ranked among the top schools that produce “good” Setswana results
since the early 1990’s while I was one of the senior examiners for Setswana national
examinations. I also knew a few teachers there and had anticipated that it would not be
difﬁcult for me to negotiate collecting data there given the short notice I gave the school.
It took me a while to inform the school of my intentions because the letter permitting me

to conduct the study was delayed at the Ministry of Education.

Gaining Access

I telephoned Duma school a week before data collection and talked to the senior
Setswana teacher (whom I knew before) to brief her about my intentions to conduct my
study at their school. She alerted me to how uncooperative teachers at their school were
to researchers in general. She however raised my hopes when she mentioned that the
school principal discussed this issue in a staff meeting a few days ago since some
researchers from the local university had complained to her. On a Monday morning I
visited the school to make an appointment with the principal so as to introduce my study.
Fortunately the principal was one of my colleagues at the university during our
undergraduate days. She welcomed me and also informed me that she had had complaints
from researchers who had wanted to collect data at her school that her staff was not
cooperative, and that she had addressed this issue in a staff meeting recently and hoped
the situation would change. She then telephoned the Head of the Setswana Department

that she was referring me to.

75

On my arrival in the Setswana staff room I saw a number of familiar faces;
teachers who were my former students at the university and a few I had worked with
when I was a senior examiner for Setswana national examinations. All 13 of these
teachers agreed to participate in my study by signing consent forms. I also did ﬁnd few of
my former students in the English staffroom although I did not know the majority of the
teachers. Unlike with the Setswana staff, here the Head of the Department waited for
recess time when all teachers were present and asked me to address them formally about
my study. All teachers agreed to participate in my study by signing the consent forms and
I gave them the questionnaires. Out of 15 teachers who took the questionnaire, only 3
teachers returned them. The rest kept on postponing returning them until my study period
was over and I had to leave the school.

The Setswana staffroom was a small crowded room with desks squeezed next to
each other and books all over, on desks and underneath them. There was one computer by
the comer of the room that I never saw anybody touch throughout the period I spent at
the school. To my amazement, I later learnt that this staffroom was shared by the 11
Setswana teachers (including the Head of the Department) and 5 teachers of Religious
Education. The other 2 Setswana teachers had separate offices as they served in other
positions in the school. One was the Head of the Humanities subjects and the other one
was Head of Guidance and Counseling.

The English staffroom too was crowded and was the same size as that shared by
the Setswana and Religious Education staff. The only difference was that it housed only
English teachers who were approximately twenty in number. To my judgment, this

staffroom had more books and materials like newspapers compared to the other one. It

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had a lot of shelves built on the walls that I did not see in the other Setswana room. I also
noticed one computer on one side of the room that seemed to have been frmctioning since

once in a while I would see that the screen was on.

Data Collection Procedures

The study followed a qualitative approach, using ethnographic techniques to
gather and analyze data (Emerson, Fretz & Shaw, 1995; Bogdan & Bilden, 2003). Data
sources included a survey questionnaire, interview transcripts from audio-taped
interviews, official documents, teacher documents, samples of work given to students,
and ethnographic ﬁeld notes taken during both formal and informal conversations with

teachers. The study lasted for a period of 10 weeks.

Interview data

I conducted in-depth interviews with ﬁve teachers individually about their
personal literacy histories and professional experiences. The purpose of the interviews
was to ﬁnd out how teachers perceive literacy and how this influences their teaching
practices. This enabled me to gain an insight into teachers’ understandings of curriculum
content, aims and objectives, as well as their views about prescribed textbooks and other
instructional materials, ﬁnd out their views about the quality of pre-service language
education courses, and to get their views about how they address issues of diversity. I
also tried to learn about their childhood literacy practices as a way to construct a learning

history that could be constructed with their perceptions of their current teaching context.

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The interviews were conversational with open-ended questions, allowing the
teachers to speak at length so as to avoid a dialogue with them. I also conducted group
interviews with teachers on general issues pertaining to the curriculum. The main reason
for conducting group interviews was that some teachers preferred them to individual
ones. Interview questions are included in the Appendix section. The questions covered
these themes: teachers’ conceptions of literacy, literacy as deﬁned by the national
curriculum, teacher agency in relation to the cuniculum, curriculum responsiveness to the
needs of linguistically and cultrnally diverse learners, recommendations for teacher
education programs.

I conducted 2 focused group interviews and 2 individual interviews (total of 10
individual interviews). I used the combined approaches of the informal conversational
interview and the general interview guide (Patton, 2002) to interview the informants. The
informal conversational interview allowed for a natural ﬂow of interaction and ﬂexibility
to pursue information on what emerged from talking with the participants. The advantage
of this approach was that I could interview a number of participants at the same time. The
general interview guide approach involves outlining a set of issues that are to be explored
with each respondent before the interview begins. The guide serves as a checklist during
the interview to make sure that all relevant topics are covered. Each interview session

lasted between sixty and ninety minutes.

Field notes

I took ﬁeld notes during my visits to teachers’ workrooms (staff rooms) as I

observed ofﬁcial documents, prescribed text-books, teacher documents and samples of

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work assigned to students. The kind of teacher documents I observed were their report
books (known as scheme books). These are books supplied by the Ministry of Education
in which teachers record the progress of their work. Details about this are outlined in
chapter ﬁve. I wanted to photocopy a few of those reports but realized that the teachers
who allowed me to look at their reports felt a bit uneasy. In addition, the report books had
signatures of the senior teachers in the respective departments and that would have also
revealed their identity. For these reasons, I resorted to copying down notes by hand as
they appeared in the reports. The purpose of studying these documents was to gain an
insight into how teachers talked about literacy, the resources or materials they used, the
kinds of assignments they gave to their students, and the assumptions made about literacy
and how it was learned.

Having served on the panel that prescribed textbooks in the past, I had personal
copies of the main literacy textbooks that were used during the time of this study. My
analysis of these textbooks was based on the syllabus objectives in relation to content
covered, activities, test items (exercises given to test students’ understanding of concepts)
and the skills imparted. I wish to declare at this moment that I deliberately chose not to
do much in this area because I am a co-author of one of the prescribed textbooks and
avoided bias in commenting about the other book. There is already a lot of textbook
“politics” (for lack of better terminology) among publishing companies in Botswana
because they all compete for the same school market. I also elaborate more on this issue
in chapter ﬁve.

I was allowed to sit in during teachers’ meetings and workshops and was able to

jot down some ﬁeld notes in those sessions. Initially, I had planned to visit the school on

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a daily basis to interview teachers and also do some classroom observations but was told
that within two weeks into my study, students would be writing rrrid-year examinations.
The teachers told me that they would therefore be busy supervising the examinations and
grading papers; as such I might not be able to see them. Although it was not
communicated directly, when I mentioned that I would like to visit some classrooms, the
teachers told me that they were mostly revising previously taught material as a way of
assisting students to revise for the examinations. For these reasons, I dropped the idea of
classroom visits and gathered most of the data during the ﬁrst week through interviews.
Otherwise I visited the school thrice or twice per week depending on the availability of

teachers.

Data Analysis Procedures

I transcribed interview transcripts in the evening each time I had conducted an
interview while the conversations were still fresh in my mind. I started with general
open-coding of my ﬁeld notes, identifying recurrent themes in the data (Dyson &
Genishi, 2005). I read and re-read interview transcripts to identify key issues that
emerged fi'om teachers’ statements and other data sources in relation to the research
questions. After open coding, I reviewed the ﬁeld notes and transcripts to identify major
themes that relate to my research questions. I linked data together that related to the same
theme. I then did focused-coding, reading and coding ﬁeld notes and transcripts line by
line as grouped by themes (Emerson et al, 1995). The following issues surfaced in
teachers’ statements in interviews and in survey data across all sources of data: negative

attitude towards Setswana as a school subject, hegemony of English, lack of professional

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development, time constraint, inadequate teacher preparation, disconnect between school
literacy and cultural literacy, lack of appropriate curricula resources, examination driven
teaching and lack of a culture of reading amongst both teachers and students in general.

I analyzed the official documents such as the syllabi, past examination papers and
prescribed textbooks to get the ofﬁcial perspective of what language and literacy teaching
should entail at secondary school level in Botswana and to have a better understanding of
the structural and institutional constraints under which teachers operated. I also assessed
teacher documents (record of work done, scheme books, tests and assignments) to get
their perspectives about literacy teaching and learning. I read critically the aims and
objectives of the two syllabi (teaching and assessment syllabi) in relation to content
assessed in tests and examinations. I also looked at common patterns among topics that
teachers said they did not teach.

The themes that emerged from interviews and the questionnaire were hegemony
of English, time constraints, the disconnect between school literacy and cultrnal literacy.
Even then, in my interpretation of the data and reporting it, I had “to ﬁgure out how to
say what needs to be said without jeopardizing individuals and fading the perverse
social representations” (W eis & Fine, 2000, p.48). The participants shared with me freely

their experiences and personal views about how they felt teaching Setswana.

Researcher Role
I have been a Setswana teacher at a secondary school and in University for the
past 22 years. I have worked closely with many secondary school teachers either as a

teacher or as a teacher educator. Since many teachers knew me or at least my work, I had

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the fear of how I was going to establish my role as a researcher. I served as a member of
the Task Force that was appointed by the Ministry of Education to review the secondary
school Setswana curriculum in 1995. I also served as a senior examiner for secondary
school Setswana national examinations from 1992 until 1997. I have co-authored some of
the Setswana textbooks that are currently read in schools. I served as a member of the
Task Force that was appointed by the Ministry of Education to review the secondary
school Setswana curriculum in 1995. I also served as a senior examiner for secondary
school Setswana National examinations ﬁ'om 1992 until .1997. Although I am an insider
in the ﬁeld of Setswana education, I may be considered an outsider because of my current
status of being a university lecturer and a PhD student. Bogdan and Biklen (1998) state
that who the researcher is to the subjects and what that means to them is important to try
to ﬁgure out when negotiating ﬁeldwork relations as well as for interpreting data

Having participated in the production of the curriculum I had come to research, I
was aware that I could be perceived as someone who had come to evaluate teachers. To
my surprise, many teachers felt at ease with me. Since they knew that I had participated
in the production of the syllabus they were using, they trusted that I could help and even
inform the Curriculum Development ofﬁcers about their problems. This is illustrated by
the following excerpt from the ﬁeld notes I wrote in the evening of the ﬁrst day I visited

Duma school:

It is 9:30 am. I have now spent about 40 minutes in the principal ’s oﬁ‘ice. She then

phones the heads of the departments (HOD) of English and Setswana to meet me. She is

told that the English HOD is in class. The Setswana HOD agrees that I come to her

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office. I am directed to the Setswana staff room ﬁom where the HOD also operates.
Apparently they share the room with Religious Education teachers but I discover this
some days later when I approach one teacher for an interview. A few teachers who are
not teaching at this time are present in the staffroom and I greet them as is the custom in
our country. As soon as mention to the HOD that I have come for research, she ask me to
wait a little and announces to the teachers what I have just told her. She asks me to
explain my study to the few teachers who are present in this staﬁoom and I thereafter
give them the consent forms. She does not want to deliver my message to other teachers
who are not present in the staﬁoom at this time but rather ask me to come again the
following day during recess time (10:00 —10:30 a. m.) to talk to them in person One
young teacher, a former student of mine ﬁom the university tells me that she is ready to
start the interview any time. She tells me:

“I ’m glad you ’re here mmaMolosiwa (Mrs Molosiwa). You have come at the right time.
Nobody from the Ministry ever comes to see how we are doing. We are struggling alone
with this new syllabus. I do not even have a desk for my books. Jus look at where I put my
stuff” (she shows me a small space next to a cabinet by one corner of the room). I do not
like my job because I do not have a space to wor ”. I ask this teacher how many they are
in the Setswana Department. She tells me that they are I 3, but 2 teachers who have been
given some administrative roles have their own oﬁices. I’m wondering what meaning this
teacher makes out of research It appears she considers me something like an advocate
that she brings out an administrative issue to me. How come she feels I could represent

education oﬂicers at the Ministry of Education while she knows that I do not work there?

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I have been in this staﬁoom for the past 4 hours. The HOD introduces me to each
member of her department as they come and go.

AM: Well, I ’m here to learn about how you are progressing with the teaching of
Setswana, as some of you know, I left the high school classroom long ago and I believe a
lot has changed since then.

Teacher 1: Things are still the same MmaMolosiwa, there is no signiﬁcant change to
share with you.

Teacher 2: She is telling the truth Nothing has changed. In our subject we still have that
problem of attitude which I’m sure you are aware of We also do not know how to teach
some topics.

It is 4:30 p. m. and is the oﬂicial knock of time for school administrative staff as well as
teachers. Students end the day at 4:00 p. m. The HOD tells me that she would appreciate
it if I could guide them on how they could teach some topics that they still struggle with in
the new syllabus. I agree that we can arrange for that someday aﬁer I’m done with my

interviews. There goes my ﬁrst day in the ﬁeld

Due to my status as a university lecturer and a PhD student, I contemplated that
teachers could be reluctant to participate freely in my study or be honest in giving me
their views. I was also worried that my own biases as a teacher might also affect what to
look for or ask, or even the ability to take good descriptive ﬁeld notes. But this was not
the case. Those teachers who agreed to participate in the study did so ﬁeely and some of
them even gave me their telephone numbers in case I wanted to ask them something

outside of official school hours.

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This chapter has provided a narrative description of the methodological
procedures and research design used to collect data for this study. The main data sources
included the questionnaire, interview transcripts, official documents and teacher
documents. Survey data were collected from 30 Setswana and English teachers from
whom 5 teachers were selected to be focal informants. The next chapter is a detailed

presentation of data analysis.

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Chapter Five

Official Perspectives of Literacy Teaching and Learning

“Setswana encourages students to investigate their cultural heritage for values and
virtues that are necessary for survival within the modern world The strengths and virtues
inherited from culture are relevant in preparing students for the world of work as well as
providing solutions to day to day problems with regard to preservation of self
environment and citizenry ” (Republic of Botswana, 2000).

In several policy documents reviewing the country’s education system, the
Ministry of Education has made noteworthy pronouncements on how to improve the
teaching and learning of Setswana. The above rationale of the senior secondary school
Setswana syllabus is one example of such pronouncements. Other pronouncements
appear in policy documents such as the Education Commission Reports, National
Development Plans and Vision 2016.

This chapter is an analysis of official documents and policies geared towards the
teaching and learning of Setswana in secondary schools in an attempt to understand the
official perspective of what literacy teaching and learning should entail. The main
documents I analyzed are the Setswana teaching syllabus, the assessment syllabus and
key statements (about the teaching of language) that appear in policy documents. An
analysis of these documents revealed that officially, literacy is perceived as the ability to
read, write, speak, and listen as well as the acquisition of certain skills, attitudes and
values. Another ﬁnding was the apparent contradiction between policy and practice when
examining the teaching syllabus against the assessment one. The assessment procedures

excluded certain parts of the teaching syllabus, an anomaly that could have adverse

86

 

effects in actual classroom practices. The fact that the Setswana syllabus is written only
in English with no Setswana version or accompanying teachers’ guide also seemed
contradictory to pronouncements made in policy docrnnents about the importance of
Setswana as a national language and a second official language as claimed in other
docrunents (see chapter 2 for details).

Whereas in countries such as the US and UK teachers have opportunities to make
their own decisions about what to teach students and how to teach it, Botswana has a
national curricula mandated by the Ministry of Education to be taught in all schools.
Although teachers are ﬂee to choose modes of teaching, the curricula have prescribed
content and forms of assessment. This limits any ﬂexibility for decision-making either by
the schools or individual classroom teachers. Research on the teaching of English as a
second language demonstrates that teaching practices and approaches are inﬂuenced
primarily by traditions in language teaching, by teachers’ own experiences as language
learners and by curricular documents and state frameworks as well as by available
materials and assessment procedures used to measure student progress (V aldes, 2001).

Until 1998, the University of Cambridge Local Examinations Syndicate (UCLES)
externally administered Botswana’s secondary school curricula The Setswana syllabus
under UCLES was a series of topics to be learned, followed by an outline of the structure
of the examination papers, their breadth and depth and allocation of marks. Content
covered included grammar items and selected literature texts. There were no aims and
objectives for the selected topics as is the case in the current syllabus. The best that

teachers made out of such a syllabus was to align their teaching with the expectations of

87

the examining body and drill students to pass the examinations. In that regard, students
were not provided with a meaningful education.

The main aim of teaching Setswana in schools was for communication purposes
and national unity. Even when the education system was reviewed in 1977, ten years after
the country’s independence, these were the main aims put forth as justiﬁcation for
teaching Setswana at school. There were no intrinsic values attached to it like in other
subjects. The 1977 national commission only stated that Setswana as a secondary school
subject “should receive due emphasis as a source of both the ability to commmricate in
the national language and a sense of national unity” (Republic of Botswana, 1977, p.110).
On the other hand, for English the commission:

Emphasized the crucial importance of English competence (reading, writing

and speaking) not only for further academic study but also as a preparation for

work and adult life. The main aim of English should be to develop such

competence, and the examination set at the end of the senior cycle should reﬂect

this aim” (ibid, p.111).

It was only after the curriculum was localized that a more progressive syllabus was drawn

for Setswana as will be discussed in the next section.

The Senior Secondary Setswana Teaching Syllabus
The current senior secondary school Setswana syllabus was introduced in schools
in 1998. This was a postcolonial response to the exarnination-driven British curriculum

that was in use until then. The implementation of this syllabus was a recommendation by

88

the Revised National Policy on Education in 1993 to localize the curricula which, until
then was run by the University of Cambridge Local Examinations Syndicate (UCLES). It
was felt that the country should have full control of the education standards by
developing examinations and administering them locally at all levels. The dependence on
UCLES had limitations on the education system such as the limited ability in inﬂuencing
curriculum development in line with aspirations of the nation in terms of socio-economic
development. It was argued that the localization of examinations would open up the
potential for local curriculum development and a review of the modes of assessment at
senior secondary level. The other reason was that localization would bring about
continuity between junior secondary and senior secondary syllabuses that was lacking as
the two were administered by different bodies.

The revised Setswana syllabus was a complete departure from the colonial one in
terms of content and lay out. In localizing the syllabi, the Ministry of Education
appointed Task Forces for all subject areas to produce the syllabi. The Curriculum
Development Unit (CDU) provided the Curriculum Blue Print to guide the task forces in
their job. The task forces were charged with the responsibility to:

- ensure that the subject syllabus at a particular level covers all essential components
within the subject area and relates to other levels.
- assist the Examinations, Research and Testing Division in the development of
assessment procedures for that particular level.
- advise the Curriculum Development Division on:

a) students and teacher needs in the subject at a particular level

b) problems, concerns and gaps within the subject area at that level

c) the appropriateness and relevance of curriculum materials being designed,

developed and implemented for the particular level.

89

- assist, review, evaluate and recommend new and revised materials for learning and or
teaching which have been or are being submitted to the Ministry of Education for
possible use (whether optional or mandatory) in the school system at a particular level.

(Guidelines for Curriculum Subject Panels, Ministry of Education, February 1996).

The Setswana task force comprised of members representing several institutions which
are indirectly or directly involved in education: the Ministry of Education (represented by
the department of Secondary Education, Curriculum Development Unit, Examinations
Research and Testing Division and the Department of Non-Formal education), the
University of Botswana (represented by the departments of Aﬁican Languages and
Literature, Faculty of Education) and representatives of teachers from both public and
private secondary schools. The panel came up with two syllabi: the teaching syllabus and
the assessment syllabus.

The Setswana teaching syllabus is a detailed document that lays out the rationale,
aims, assessment procedures and content to be taught with general and speciﬁc objectives
for each topic. The content is divided into modules and each module is further subdivided
into seven domains: listening, speaking, reading, writing, study skills, literature and
culture. Out of these domains, only three are assessed: reading, writing and literature. The
official perspectives of literacy teaching can be deduced ﬁom the aims of teaching
Setswana at secondary school level. These are to:

1. equip students with writing, reading, listening, speaking skills which will develop
conﬁdence and ability to assess their personal strengths and weaknesses.
2. develop in learners, self esteem, conﬁdence, pride and appreciation of the national

cultural heritage.

90

9.

provide learners with a range of experiences through the study of literature,
including the moral justiﬁcation for appropriate choices in life.

provide knowledge of communication and study skills including skills to generate
technical terminology appropriate for different technological situations.

equip learners with knowledge of cultural practices including those that promote
conservation of the environment and implications for the future.

instill in learners, positive attitudes towards their cultural heritage in order that
they may adopt the virtues and strengths inherent in their culture in an endeavor to
emerge as good citizens of Botswana and the world.

equip learners with the following foundation skills: problem solving, critical
thinking, communication.

encourage learners to acquire knowledge, attitudes, values and practices that will
ensure good family and health practices that are conducive to a productive life.

encourage learners to embrace a culture of learning.

(Adapted ﬁom the Senior Secondary Setswana Syllabus. Department of Curriculum

development and Evaluation, Ministry of Education, 2000, p. ii)

From the above aims it could be inferred that, officially, it is acknowledged that

literacy means more than the ability to read and write but the acquisition of other skills,
attitudes and values. The aims mention the skills of problem solving, critical thinking,
development of moral, ethical and social values, knowledge or awareness of technology,
development of national and cultural identity towards good citizenship, awareness of
environmental conservation, and a culture of reading for life-long learning. They also
reﬂect the values, symbols, and ways of knowing of the communities from which
students come, while introducing them to new cultures and cultrnal ways of thinking. The
way the speciﬁc objectives of topics are laid out also shows that officially, it is

acknowledged that there are multiple ways of being literate. The syllabus is aimed at

91

providing the learners with those skills, attitudes, values and knowledge that would
enable them to function better in their society and the world outside. To guide teachers in
how they could approach the syllabus in order to address these aims, the syllabus
prescribes pedagogy for its content:
The bias of the syllabus is on communicative competence such that language
structure is taught in conjunction with communication skills that enforce
appropriate use of language to meet communicative purposes. The
communication skills: listening, speaking, reading and writing should be taught
through “linguistic competence, socio-linguistic competence, discourse

competence and strategic competence (p.ii).

Unfortunately, the foregoing statement that seems to be loaded with a lot of
meaning is not elaborated ﬁrrther for teachers. The discourse “linguistic competence,
socio-linguistic competence, discourse competence and strategic competence” needed to
be explained or clariﬁed for teachers particularly since the syllabus is written only in
English but taught through the medium of Setswana The foreword by the Permanent
Secretary in the Ministry of Education does make reference to teaching methods but this
could not be taken as a substitute for the explanation of these terms. The foreword
mentions ideas such as that; the teacher must be a proﬁcient manager and facilitator; a
director of learning activities. S/he should be conscious of students’ needs and take on
board a measure of accountability and responsibility for their own learning... It is
important that we value the students’ own experiences, build upon what they know and

reward them for positive achievement.

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The Senior Secondary Setswana Assessment Syllabus

Assessment in schools is meant to monitor students’ progress at various stages
and levels. Besides school and classroom assessments, Botswana has a national
examination system with a dual ﬁrnction: to promote students from one education level to
the next and for ﬁnal school credentialing. With the localization of the curricula,
assessment syllabuses were developed for each subject. The Permanent secretary in the
Ministry of Education states in the foreword of the Setswana assessment syllabus that:

The purpose of this syllabus is to guide schools, teachers and other

educational institutions on what will be assessed in the subject area

and how the assessment will be carried out for certiﬁcation of students

completing the course. The syllabus, therefore, should be used as a source

of information on the examination. Critical to the success of our education

program, is the recognition of individual talents, needs and learning styles

of students. (Republic of Botswana, 2000, p.i)

The Setswana assessment syllabus includes three written papers that measure different
skills. The ﬁrst paper (Paper 1) assesses the students’ ability to write a continuous prose
in a variety of contexts. This includes an argumentative, descriptive or narrative
composition and a dialogue, report or speech. The second paper (Paper 2) is comprised of
Comprehension, Summary and Translation. It assesses student’s ability to comprehend,
summarize and translate information fi'om English into Setswana and vice versa The

third paper (Paper 3) is Literature. It assesses student’s knowledge and understanding of

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prescribed texts and the ability to apply skills acquired in those texts and wider reading.
The questions test students’ knowledge and understanding of literary aspects such as
development of a story’s plot, author’s style, characterization, theme, setting and their
ability to relate the literary aspects to real life situations where appropriate. The
assessment syllabus excludes all the topics under the domain of “Culture”. The
explanation given is that:

Some objectives that are emphasized do not lend themselves to pen

and paper testing; in particular listening skills and cultural heritage

content. These objectives have to be assessed during the course.

Guidance on appropriate procedures and moderation will be provided

by the National Examining body. The teachers’ guide will also provide

guidance on how to assess projects and term papers for course work.

The students’ proﬁles for projects, term papers and other course work

will be prepared in conjunction with the relevant examining body. (p.iii)

It is a commonly held belief that if the assessment syllabus tallies with the
teaching syllabus, teaching towards the test or examinations is not a problem. It has been
argued that teaching towards the test has more disadvantages than advantages. One
disadvantage is that some items on which students would have done well are likely not to
be tested because of their failure to discriminate among students (Tierney, 1990 quoted in
Soler, Wearrnouth & Reid, 2002). It has also been argued that standardized reading tests
tend to treat students as well as teachers as responders while literacy involves both

responding and initiating (Tierney, 1990 quoted in Soler, Wearrnouth & Reid, 2002).

94

Standardized tests have also been criticized on the grounds of systematic bias (e.g.
Fowles & Kimple, 1992). Examinations place teachers in the position of giving up ‘real
teaching time’ on improving test scores. This results in a narrowing of the curriculum.
The teachers become identiﬁed as working with or around the testing tools that control
rewards rather than as engaging children’s minds. They teach to the test, using actual
items from the test, coaching students. This is consistent with the ﬁndings reported in this
study. In Botswana, the effectiveness of the teacher is measured by the performance of
his or her students in examinations.

Even though the Setswana syllabus was changed from the structural one, and the
aims of teaching Setswana spelt out the kind of literate society aspired to, the literacy
assessments currently in place do not adequately address the aims. As a result, colonial
forms of assessment continue to infiltrate in the postcolonial system and thereby hold
back reforms that would better serve the literacy needs of the learners. Learners are
expected to acquire selected bits of knowledge on which they are tested after a given
period. A bulk of vital knowledge which could be tested in other ways is left untaught
because it is not covered in the examinations. This suggests that the syllabus was
implemented before examining the kinds of literacy assessments that would match it.
Literacy assessment must be grounded in current understandings of literacy and society

(Johnson & Kress, 2003; Johnston, 1999).

Other Ofﬁcial Pronouncements on Literacy
The government of Botswana recognizes the importance of educating children

through their ethnic languages. This is pronounced in a document known as Vision 2016.

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This document presents a long-term vision for Botswana when it will have been an
independent nation for 50 years. When the country celebrated the 30“h anniversary of
independence in 1996, the government set upon a task to take stock of the country’s past
aspirations, and the extent to which they have been realized and thus formulated this
vision. The vision addresses all aspects affecting the life of the society nationally and
globally. Regarding language education, the vision states:

By the year 2016, Botswana’s wealth of different languages

and cultural traditions will be recognized, supported and

strengthened within the education system. No Motswana will

be disadvantaged in the education system as a result of a mother

tongue that differs from the country’s two official languages”.

(Republic of Botswana, 1997, p.5)

An examination of the current state of affairs indicates that these ideals of the vision will
not be achieved by the year 2016. Practically, no provision has been made to introduce
other local languages in schools in terms of resources or teacher training. This is just a
political rhetoric used to appease the people.

The National Development Plan 8 (NDP 8, 1997/98 — 2002/03), a source that
outlines government policies, echoes the aspirations of Vision 2016 by stating that
teacher education will “sensitize teachers to cultural differences to facilitate interaction
with children and communities with different cultural backgrounds” (NDP 8, p.364). This
document does not elaborate on how policy could address issues of teacher education.

This shows lack of commitment by the government to take seriously the issue of cultrnal

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diversity. It is evident that the education reform proposals do not move beyond political
rhetoric into real changes in the education system.
The next section describes the policy towards textbooks as teaching resources and

textbook selection procedures instituted by the government in Botswana schools.

Textbooks and their Selection Procedures

Textbooks are a central part of the curriculum in Botswana schools. Most teachers
use textbooks as the primary source of their teaching. Textbooks provide the basis for the
content of lessons and the balance of skills taught. The 1993 national commission
recommended that as a support to the development of education and the promotion of
literacy, a National Book Policy be developed by the Ministry of Labour and Home
Affairs to: a) promote local book production and ensure a high standard of
professionalism in the book industry; and, b) promote a culture of reading amongst
Batswana (Republic of Botswana, 1993). Textbooks in Botswana are mainly published
by multinational publishing companies such as Longman, Macmillan, Heinemann and
Collegiurn. There are a few local publishers like Botsalano and Pula Press but they do
face stiff competition with the multinational companies that have an established history in
educational publishing and are better off ﬁnancially to publish high quality materials.

The Curriculum Development Unit of the Ministry of Education centrally
prescribes all textbooks used in schools through various subject panels. A Book Selection
Committee of the Department of Curriculum Development evaluates the appropriateness
and suitability of the material to the syllabuses and prescribes which books should go into

the school market. For Setswana, there are core texts and supplementary texts. The

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category of core texts covers textbooks that have to be used by all students. In some cases
more than one core textbook is prescribed. This gives schools the opportunity to select
their own choices of textbooks they would like to use with their students. The
supplementary texts category provides for materials to be used to supplement the core
texts. Students may use these for class research or individual work. In addition to core
and supplementary texts, teachers are allowed to purchase reference texts they need.
Schools are also encouraged to develop library resources for students.

Textbook selection guidelines seem to be more about literary elements in
literature texts disregarding everything else in the syllabus. Although the syllabus was
changed fi'om the structural approach to the communicative one, the same old selection
guidelines are still being used. The guidelines do not mention anything about the features
of the texts that should be selected for topics that fall under the domains of: Listening,
Speaking, Reading, Writing, Study skills and Culture, usually referred to as language
books. This therefore means that the selection committee uses its discretion to select texts
under this category. The only domain that has guidelines is Literature. The guidelines
stipulate that features to be considered in literature texts should include: readability of the
text, clarity of vocabulary and print, development of plot; whether actions of characters
are realistic to real life situations, whether the plot is simple or complex; types of conﬂict
and whether they are easily detectable; how the theme is portrayed, the kind of language
and style used by the author.

On examining some of the prescribed literature texts for senior secondary school,
I realized that they addressed a lot of relevant issues in contemporary society. For

instance; the novel “Fa a Ielela legodu” by RT. Marope focuses on gender and cultural

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issues. Through the major character, the story illustrates the need for youth to be obedient
to their parents. The drama “Motswasele ” by L.D. Raditladi is about issues of
oppression, injustice and abuse of power by leaders; based on traditional chieftainship.
Other books address crime and other contemporary issues. The noticeable thing among
the books that were on the prescription list during the time of this study was that all of
them made references to mainstream ethnic groups. From my recollection of textbook
prescription guidelines during the early 1990’s while I served as a member of the panel
that prescribed Setswana books, the few books that mentioned ethnic minorities degraded
their culture so their use in schools was discontinued. One of the requirements of the
panel that prescribes books is to review, evaluate and recommend new and revised
materials for learning and or teaching. The fact that most books are biased towards
certain ethnic groups means that those groups and their cultrnes are privileged over others
in the school curriculum. This brings in notions about knowledge and power (Popkewitz,
2000). An example is Grant’s (1994) view about the plight of Afiican Americans in the
US. Grant contends that respect for the of culture Aﬁican Americans has never existed,
citing the way textbooks promoted the cultural denigration and inferiority of their culture
in the past. His perception is that textbooks should provide the opportunity for all cultures
to be seen as equal and to be celebrated in the classroom. Apple (2001), one of the
critiques of a national curriculum in the US, has argued that a national curricultun and a
national test will lead to privatization and increasing centralization of control over official
knowledge. It will put price tags on schools so that the market can function:
a national curriculum and a national test will exacerbate even more

the process of turning schools into commodities. . .. As has happened in

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England, where their national curriculum is sutured into the national

test (the results of which are published as “league tables” in the press and
elsewhere through which schools are compared), this provides a direct
mechanism that enables the Right to put price tags on schools and say

“This is a good school, this is a bad school” (p.xxi).

In view of the fact that Botswana was a British colony, it inherited a national

curriculum and national examinations’ system from the British.

Code Switching

Code switching is an issue that needs to be discussed in the analysis of the oﬂicial
perspective to literacy teaching and learning. While code switching is a common practice
that occurs in multilingual and multicultural communities, it is not allowed [oﬂicially] in
Botswana classrooms. This applies to both English and Setswana classrooms. While in
English classrooms code switching is not allowed between English and Setswana, in
Setswana classrooms, the non-Setswana speaking students are discouraged fi'om code
switching between their home languages and Setswana However, teachers do code
switch consciously or unintentionally. Professional conversations have it that code
switching is viewed as language interference in Botswana classrooms. While the
Setswana syllabus is silent on code switching, The English syllabus pronounces that:

While the subject aims at a high level of proﬁciency in the use of standard

English, the teaching methodology acknowledges that English is not the ﬁrst

language of the majority of the learners. The teaching methodology is based

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on a communicative approach. Features of this approach include: integration
of the basic language skills, using the language without code switching, using

language in real life situations ...” (p.i).

The above statement acknowledges that English is not the ﬁrst language of the majority
of the learners but denies the existence of code switching. There are multiple views
regarding code switching. Some authorities view it as an extension to language for
bilingual speakers while others perceive it as interference, depending on the situation and
context in which it occurs. Perhaps, the purposes of code switching or the circumstances
in which it occurs can guide us in this matter. It has been found out that switching occurs
when a speaker needs to compensate for some difﬁculty, express solidarity, convey an
attitude or show social respect (Crystal, 1987; Berthold, Mangubhai & Bartorowicz,
1997). Skiba (1997) shares the same view that in the circumstances where code switching
is used due to an inability of expression, it serves for continuity in speech instead of
presenting interference in language.

According to Cook (2002), the use of code switching in multilingual classrooms
may be problematic in that in classes where students do not share the same native
language, some of the students will somehow be neglected. The notion here is that if
students share the same native language, code switching could be applied in instruction.
In Botswana, all students speak the national language (Setswana) and many teachers have
always code-switched in their classes. In this respect, it is difficult to buy into the official

policy that does not allow code switching.

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The fact that the Setswana syllabus is written in English encourages code
switching for Setswana teachers (besides the fact that the university trains them through
the medium of English — see chapter 2). The syllabus has many concepts that are not easy
to translate into Setswana This has led to inconsistencies and variations of vocabulary in
textbooks that were written for this syllabus. I illustrate this by the following examples

from the core texts schools use:

English version Sedibeng translation Marang translation
Discourse Totlego Theetso-puo

Debate Kganetsano/Phikisano ka puo Ngangisano
Public-speaking techniques Matsekana a bobui Bokgonijwa Puo
Coherence indicators Matshwao a tomagano Matshwaa-tomagano
Research Tlhotlhomiso-kitso Patlisiso-kitso

Teachers use the vocabulary they feel comfortable with depending on the
textbook they choose to use among those that are prescribed. Issues such as these could
have been addressed in the Setswana version of the syllabus if there was one. The focal
teachers in this study did express that they were constrained by the non-availability of a
Setswana version of the syllabus or at least a syllabus guide in Setswana. The extent to
which English dominates in the education system of post colonial Botswana leaves a lot
to be desired. Without giving much support to the national language, there is no
indication that pronouncements about introducing other local languages in schools will

ever take place.

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Summary

In this chapter, I have demonstrated that ofﬁcial perspectives of literacy teaching
and learning are well thought out and laid out in the curriculum and policy documents.
However, there seem to be contradictory views between policy pronouncements and
practice. Evidently, there are institutional and assessment constraints that need to be
addressed in order for ofﬁcial literacy perspectives to be fully effected in schools. An
examination of the curricula documents has shown that oﬂicially, in addition to the basic
communication skills of reading, writing, speaking and listening, literacy is the
acquisition of other skills, values and attitudes that would enable learners to frmction
responsibly and productively in the society.

Although the Setswana syllabus includes a wide range of topics aimed at
imparting essential skills to students, the assessment is still geared towards producing an
elite society with an overemphasis on academic knowledge measured through a rigorous
national examination system. The syllabus emphasizes the need for students to
understand past cultural practices, the inﬂuence of history in the development of attitudes
or bias in today’s society, their own cultures and the different cultural constructs that
exist in the society. In the next chapter I focus on how teachers interpret and enact these

ofﬁcial perspectives in their teaching.

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Chapter Six

Teachers’ Interpretation and Enactment of Policy

“One year we taught even the unexamined topics. At the end of the year our students
performed badly in the exams. Teaching according to the syllabus did not work for us
positively. From then on we realized that it would be more meaningful to concentrate
first on those topics that are examined, and teach everything else only if there is time to
do so. In this regard we ignore topics such as ‘Cultural values ’ because they are not
tested” (Mrs. Pako; one of the key informants).

This is an illustration of the dilemmas faced by teachers in Botswana schools
where teaching is driven by examinations. Examinations are part of the political and
cultural environment of the school system and thus put a lot of pressure on teachers’
decision-making regarding instructional choices they make. In order to be labeled “good
teachers” or have their schools considered “good schools”, teachers modify instruction
and concentrate on activities that they believe would better prepare their students for
examinations. Literacy teaching becomes transfer of knowledge rather than the

promotion of reasoning, creativity, problem-solving ability, information ﬁnding and life-

long readiness to learn which are clearly spelt out in the curriculum.

To gain an insight into how teachers interpret and enact the official perspectives
in their teaching, I not only interviewed teachers but also did a content analysis of their
documents. These were their record books (scheme books) which provided information
about work they did in their classes; topics taught, class work, tests and assignments

given. I also analyzed examination reports written by teachers who were involved in the

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grading of ﬁnal year (12‘h grade) national examinations during the years 2002, 2003 and
2005. I reviewed these reports because they were the only ones that were made available

to me.

The teachers who participated in this study were found to have similar perceptions
about what literacy is and the constraints that affected their own instructional practices.
These perceptions will be described below according to the major themes that emerged
from the analysis; school literacy versus cultural literacy, examination driven teaching,
hegemony of English, curriculum responsiveness to the needs of diverse learners, and
lack of professional development for teachers. Overall, teachers articulated the
importance of instilling in students the skills laid out in the curriculum aims and
objectives but felt that they were constrained by institutional structures to teach as they

desired.

The section that follows is the introduction of the key informants of the study.
Following the introduction is the discussion of the ﬁndings. All informants’ names are
pseudonyms. It should also be noted that all of these informants belong to mainstream

Setswana groups.

Key informants
Mrs. Pako
Mrs. Pako is the senior teacher in terms of age and the number of teaching
experience. She has been teaching for 26 years. She started school in 1963 (3 years
before Botswana attained its independence from Britain). She considers herself to be

coming from a background with educated parents. Both her parents had attained the

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Standard Six Primary School Certiﬁcate, which was the highest level of education
offered locally in Botswana during the colonial era. Her father worked in a shop while
her mother was a house wife. Later they ventured into farming like many Batswana of
their time. She had older siblings who attended school when she grew up. During those
days there were no pre-schools in her village but Mrs. Pako recalls that there was a
prestigious English medium school known as “Danger”. She is not certain whether this
was a nickname or the real name of the school since it no longer exists. Most children
who attended that school were from rich families. She speculates that the school was built
to cater for the children of the expatriates who worked in government departments in
their village such as the teacher training college, the hospital and offices.

Although Mrs. Pako did not attend Danger school because her parents could not
afford it, she believes that she did acquire similarly good education at a government
primary school. Her school had a diverse teaching staff. Some of her teachers were
foreigners from neighboring South Africa and Zimbabwe. Since these teachers could not
speak Setswana, they (students) had to communicate with them mostly in English. She
believes that having foreign teachers made them learn English better. She remembers
two of her foreign teachers, a Zimbabwean and a Xhosa, who used to take them to the
library and asked them to check out books, read them and summarize them. One time she
checked out a book titled “Brazil” which was about coffee production. What attracted her
to the book were the colorful pictures overlooking the vocabulary that was beyond her
comprehension. Since she could not follow the book very well due to the difficult
vocabulary, she failed to summarize it. She was punished for having checked out a book

above her level.

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Reading books was not part of the tradition in Mrs. Pako’s family when she grew
up. Her older siblings had books but Mrs. Pako does not remember having them read to
her. Her friends in the neighborhood also had their older siblings in school but nobody
ever read books to them; they did look at books together but they talked about pictures
most of the time. The older siblings acted as teachers for them in the play schools but
they mostly taught them scriptures which they also learnt at Sunday school. By the time
she started school, Mrs. Pako could write her name and also knew stories about the birth
of Jesus. Although older people did not have much education, Mrs. Pako believes she
acquired education about traditional and cultural practices ﬁom them. This included
taboos, myths, legends, folktales, riddles and proverbs. During the weekends and
holidays children went to the cattle posts to be with their parents. It was at that time that
they learnt from their parents. They shared the folktales and riddles with their fiiends
back in the village or at school.

Although Mrs. Pako pointed out that in the olden days the range for careers was
not wide, she believed that lack of support and guidance ﬁ'om her parents led her to end
up as a teacher. Her father also wanted her to become a teacher. She stated that career
choices were limited between teaching, being a police officer or a clerk in government
offices. This is the colonial legacy. Missionary schools prepared teachers to teach the
Bible; police officers to keep law and order; and agriculture ofﬁcers as Batswana are

traditional farmers.

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Mrs. Wesi

Mrs. Wesi started school at the age of 6. She has been teaching for 18 years. Her
parents could read the Bible and sing church songs from the hymn book but did not have
much schooling. Her father spent most of his time at the cattle post while the children
stayed with their mother in the village. Her mother too would move to the lands during
the rainy seasons when it was time to plough the lands. Before she started school, Mrs.
Wesi learnt how to read and write from her older siblings who attended school.
Sometimes she played school with her ﬁiends where an older sibling would act as the
teacher.

Mrs. Wesi recalled how during her primary school days their teacher would ask
them to be quiet in class and talk only when they were called upon to do so; “during those
days we obeyed our teachers and followed the rules strictly because corporal punishment
was in full use. Teachers kept sticks in their classrooms to beat children. Our parents
were aware of that and supported it on the basis that it was the Setswana way of
disciplining children. These days we cannot dream of doing that unless the principal
allows it”. Mrs. Wesi also reﬂected back at the time she was at junior secondary school
when they would memorize chunks of notes given in History class if they were to write a
test. She and her ﬁiends would take turns reciting the notes while the other colleague
looked at the notes to check if one was on the right track; “memorizing was not a pleasant
experience. When one forgot a word, everything else was gone. But we had to memorize
because those who had the art of doing so scored good grades. As I moved up the
educational ladder later on, like when I was in Form 4 and 5, I got to realize that

understanding something was much more meaningful than memorizing it. I remember

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our English teacher who penalized us for using the same words that appeared in the
passage for a reading comprehension when answering questions. She always encouraged
us to use our own words to demonstrate that we understood.”

Mrs. Wesi did not recall ever reading for pleasure as a student. All her reading
was done for school purposes although as a teacher she occasionally reads newspapers.
She was adamant that she grew up in a system where students had to write tests and
examinations all the time; “at primary school, junior secondary, senior school and at UB,
it was exams throughout. During the holidays we went to the cattle post to help our
parents with chores. We never really had time for books”. Mrs. Wesi stressed that despite
the absence of a reading culture amongst Batswana, children did acquire a high degree of
education from their families in the olden days: “Setswana like other Aﬁican languages is
rich with proverbs and idioms. Our grandparents used proverbs to emphasize a point
whenever they talked to us and I was really impressed by their knowledge of the
language. You know the moral lessons in our folktales. We learnt moral lessons like ‘all
that glitters is not gold’, ‘cheating is a bad thing’ and many more. This is the reason I
liked reading Setswana literature books at secondary school. The well written ones like
those of rre Monyaise have rich language. I also enjoyed reading African literature by
authors such as Ngugi wa Thiongo and Chinua Achebe, but now I no longer read English
literature because I don’t teach English and I really do not have time to do that. The
prescribed readings for Setswana literature are too many.”

Mrs. Wesi asserted that oral literature taught mental development and critical
thinking skills. She described how, in their home, some evenings were devoted to

competition of riddles between them and other children in their neighborhood. The

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competition was some form of a game to ﬁnd out who could think fast and use
imagination to associate a variety of things. Some Setswana riddles are questions which
are in the form of a statement, for example; my mother’s white house which has got no
door (Ntlo ya ga mme e e senang Iebati), the answer is ‘an egg’. One group says the
riddle and the other one supplies the answer. The aim is to test one’s imagination of
associating things within a short time. The answers have to be given quickly or else the

group loses its chance.

Ms. Barne

Ms. Bame has taught for 14 years. She declared that there was nothing much she
could say about her early childhood literacy experiences as she learnt to read and write
only after she started school at the age of 6. By then she could count up to 10 and write
her name which she learnt at home ﬁ'om her older siblings. Like most children of her age,
she did not go to pre-school as there were no kindergartens at that time in her village. She
comes from a background whereby books were exclusively regarded as school work.
Barne said; “I grew up in a typical village and went to a public primary school at age 6
like most of my peers. Our parents did not understand much about school. To them, we
had to read books at school and learn ﬁern teachers, then come home to perform our
duties as children. Reading and writing were school activities, once home after school I
was expected to pound maize, cook and wash the dishes, fetch water or gather ﬁrewood.
These were girls’ duties which every mother ensured that her daughters perform to the

fullest.”

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Ms. Bame grew up going to Sunday school. At Sunday school, teachers assigned
them to memorize prayers from the book of Psalms or verses from the Bible every week.
That was the major reading she did outside of school until she finished primary school.
Otherwise Ms. Barne enjoyed reading stories ﬁorn Motlhatlhami and Molatedi, 4th to 7th
grade Setswana readers.

Although Ms. Bame grew up in an environment where reading books was not
valued much, she developed a lot of interest in books when she went to secondary school.
She believes that the negative attitude many people have towards reading could have
developed at junior secondary school because there, unlike at primary school, many
teachers did not encourage reading. They would either read books to them or allowed
only good readers to read for the class.

During that time, there was a general belief that mathematics and sciences were
male subjects while languages were for females. She believes many girls internalized that
conception and gave up on math and science without putting in much effort. Ms Barne
said they concentrated more on languages and literature and outperformed their male
counterparts in them. “I remember how we memorized interesting passages from books
such as ‘Things fall apart’, ‘Cry the beloved country’ and Shakespear’s ‘Macbeth’, she
said.

Ms. Bame felt they were denied the opportunity of having guidance counselors
during their time when these days schools have counselors to advise students on careers.
This meant that even when she applied to the university, she just ﬁlled in the forms with a
very vague idea of what courses were available or what really suited her. When she got

the admission letter that said she was admitted into the BA Humanities program, she got

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very excited even though she was not sure what it involved. She had heard from other
students that people who get into that program become teachers. Bame never thought she
would become a teacher but since she wanted a university degree, she accepted it. She
majored in Geography and Setswana but ended up teaching the latter because in her
school, there was shortage of Setswana teachers. She does not regret teaching Setswana
since she had always excelled in it at secondary school. She was also inspired by one
particular lecturer at the university whom she respected as “excellent” in Setswana
Literature; “although Setswana was taught through the medium of English, we enjoyed
the way he interpreted literature texts, both poetry and novels lessons.”

Ms. Barne reads empowerment books, Health magazines and motivational books.
Occasionally she does some creative writing. She has written some poems and short
stories but has never submitted them for publication. She sometimes shares her work with
her classes before she teaches the prescribed texts. She ﬁnds it mearringﬁrl to give
examples to students with things she has personally experienced since these are about
issues that happen in the country on a daily basis which students too could relate to. Ms.
Bame also writes letters to the editor for the Kutlwano Magazine (a government owned
magazine) at times. This is the only magazine that has more than 50% articles published
in Setswana (and the rest in English). This magazine and the Daily News are produced by
the Department of Information and Broadcasting. The newspaper is distributed widely
throughout the country at no charge, while the magazine is sold at a very low price;
equivalent of less than US $1.00 and the fact that many of its articles are in Setswana and
therefore accessible to a wide readership, it is popular among the low-income people and

those in rural areas.

112

 

Ms

Wit

110

ex

h.

Ms. Lorato

Ms. Lorato has been teaching for the last 15 years. She grew up in a rural village
with parents who had some primary school education as they could read and write but did
not have much education. Ms. Lorato does not recall doing any reading with her parents
except looking at pictures in the school books with her mother. Her father, like other
males in Botswana did not spend much time in the home but was engaged in out door
activities like looking after cattle and hunting. The only forms of literacy activities in her
home were writing letters to their brother and uncle who worked far away in a mining
town. Her older sister was a teacher and her older brother was a police ofﬁcer. Even
though her sister was a teacher, she does not recall ever discussing books with her at
home. However, her sister allowed her to read her books at home.

When she was in 5th grade, Ms. Lorato’s sister was transferred to a school in a
small town. She and her younger brother then moved with their sister to her new school
so that they could get a better education compared to that in rural schools. That is where
Ms. Lorato obtained her secondary education as well. They used to visit the village only
during long weekends and holidays. Ms. Lorato found the new school was a little
different ﬁom public schools in villages in terms of facilities and resources. It had more
books, a lot of teaching aids, and even radio lessons. In the junior secondary school she
met a lot of children who came ﬁ‘om English medium primary schools. Those children

spoke English ﬂuently and Ms. Lorato envied them a lot. She believed that those children

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motivated her to read more and also try to abide by the “English only” regulation in
school although that was not easy. “We used to go to the library with my friends after
school to read books. The only problem was that our teacher would encourage us to visit
the library but never checked if we did read or not. In that way, mostof us did not take
reading seriously except for homework or in preparation for a test or an examination. I
liked writing letters to my ﬁiends at home when I was in junior secondary school. We
also had a tendency of listening to music on radio and writing down songs in exercise
books which we called ‘Music books’. My English in town also improved because we
had access to TV where we would watch cartoons.

Regarding her current literacy practices, Ms. Lorato, remarked: “Me writing?
Writing what? I never write anything besides my preparation for school work. I’m lazy to
read. I really don’t read. I prefer listening to the radio or TV than reading a book. I do a
lot of reading for school work which occupies my time. Working in an education set up
forces me to read and write all the time. I write scheme books, notes and prepare
assignments for students.” When I mentioned to Lorato that Masters Degree and PhD
programs require a lot of reading, she was adamant that she does not have the desire to

further her education.

Ms. Kabelo

Ms. Kabelo is junior to her colleagues’ age wise and teaching years experience.
She has taught for only 7 years. She grew up in the city where she stayed with her mother
who worked as a secretary in one of the government departments. Her mother trained for

a secretarial course at the then Botswana Training College after obtaining the junior

114

secondary school certiﬁcate. Her mother was an active member at the church and also a
member of the Botswana Red Cross Association. Ms. Kabelo therefore attended Sunday
school at an early age and was a member of the Girl Scouts Association. She went to
kindergarten at the age of 4. By then she could already write her name and recite the
alphabets.

Ms. Kabelo started school at the age of 6. She grew up in a home where there
were literacy materials and this motivated her to read. She had two older siblings who
attended secondary school. She recalls that the ﬁrst English book she read was titled
‘Benny and Betty come to town’. For Setswana, there were many interesting books like
Mpepu, the basic reader and spelling book in lSt grade and other books like Bofatlhogi
and Motlhatlhami that were her older sibling’s. All her teachers at primary school were
elderly women who were very caring. Reﬂecting back at the kinds of books they read at
primary school, Ms. Kabelo said; “You know I remember that in English books we read
about life in towns and cities, shopping, trains, cars and traffic lights, western food and
the like. Do you remember that book about Mr. Nkomo’s store and groceries? I forget it’s
name but those were the things we read about. All these things had colorful pictures to
illustrate them. I think English books were about English things and Setswana books
about Setswana life style which was also illustrated in pictures. We read about plowing
ﬁelds, harvest, drought, building traditional houses, traditional doctors and the like. You
remember the popular tales about the tortoise and bare being small but canny animals
while the most feared giant was the lion but sometimes not wise? Those were the same
stories we heard ﬁ'orn our elders. Now I see what people mean when they say culture and

language go together.”

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On completion of her primary education, Ms. Kabelo was admitted at a junior
secondary school (equivalent of middle school in the US) in the same city they lived in.
For senior secondary education she went to a boarding school as her mother preferred so.
Ms. Kabelo believes her love for books developed there because boarding students had a
lot of curfews to abide by so most of the time they had to study. They had meals prepared
for them. The only chores they did were to clean their hostels on weekends. Even though
there was a public library close by the school, there were no official arrangements for
them to go there. So she visited the library only during the holidays.

The school had several clubs for extra curricula activities such as Debate,
Traditional dance and Drama, Athletics and Wildlife clubs. Ms. Kabelo was not a
registered member for any particular club but occasionally attended meetings of the
Debate Society and Wildlife club. She enjoyed it when senior boys debated as they liked
using big English words. She remarked; “I don’t know how I ended up being a Setswana
teacher when this subject has always been looked down upon during our time. The rules
were very clear at our school that if you were caught speaking Setswana, you were
punished to either pick litter around the school or dig a whole for litter disposal. Since
many students would be punished everyday, this form of punishment lost meaning and
turned into fun especially for those who didn’t like school. It was an opportunity for them
time to rrriss lessons”.

With regards to her current literacy practices, Ms. Kabelo said she mostly read
newspapers, magazines and novels for pleasure. Like Ms. Lorato, Ms. Kabelo did not
write anything serious besides the writing she did for her classes. She felt that a Setswana

teacher does not have time to read outside of school work since they have too many

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novels to read with students. They are also burdened by teaching many students, at least
35 in a class. When I asked what kind of extended writing they gave to their students, her
response was that literature requires students to write essays and besides that, they also

gave them composition assignments. She said they have to give them work and grade it.

Summary

The literacy histories of the above informants provide keys to understanding their
contexts. They all bring out important salient issues in their education such as: lack of
support from parents in school work since they did not have much education; learning
being seen as the responsibility of teachers; absence of the culture of reading among
Batswana; the disconnect between school literacy and cultural literacy; and English’s
association with prestige and power in Botswana The women’s literacy interactions with
books in their homes were limited except for Ms. Lorato and Ms. Kabelo. To most
informants, the reading and writing done for school was synonymous with personal
literacy. Most of them cited elder siblings’ books as the only possibilities for reading.

Given the circumstances of these informants, school reading and writing have a
particularly strong inﬂuence in the way they deﬁne literacy. The informants positioned
reading as a school task and gave examples by their teachers at the regular school and
Sunday school. Although the informants said they did not read or did not like reading,
they engaged in a lot of literacy practices in their early childhood. They learnt stories and
gender based tasks and chores from adults, read the Bible for Sunday school classes and
played school with their siblings or ﬁiends. The point of contention is that school literacy

did not validate their home literacy practices.

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The next section is the discussion of the main issues regarding the informants’

perception of literacy teaching and learning which they brought up during the interviews.

Key Issues
Negative Attitude toward Setswana as a School Subject

English has always been associated with power and prestige in Botswana, thus
putting down Setswana as a school subject. The informants raised the concern that the
society at large had negative attitude towards Setswana as a school subject. They felt that
they were ﬁghting a losing battle by teaching a subject that was shunned by the society
including students, parents as well as other teachers. They felt that parents as well as
teachers of other subjects have negative attitude towards Setswana, and that education
policy also uplifts English at the expense of Setswana.

Teachers identiﬁed the context of their teaching as affecting their instructional
decisions. They saw themselves as being caught up between policy, other teachers and
parents’ views. All (policy, parents and non-Setswana teachers) emphasized the
importance of learning English. Mrs. Pako related that in their school, when a student
performs well in Setswana, the peers put him/her down by uttering remarks such as: “Do
you want to become a traditional doctor? What are going to do with Setswana grades? (A
o batla go nna ngaka ya Setswana? 0 ya go dira eng ka matshwao a Setswana?) Since
the introduction of western education and medical practices during colonial times,
everything traditional is despised and associated with backwardness while western
practices (together with English language) are associated with modernity. Traditional

doctors are associated with witchcraft. Mrs. Pako lamented that this was the case despite

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the fact that traditionally, people had a lot of knowledge about important aspects in their
lives such as the environment, health issue and how to cure illnesses. In relation to this,
my conversation with Mrs. Pako went like this:
Mrs. Pako: In our subject we have the problem of attitude which I ’m sure you
are aware of. We are still battling with this problem of attitude. Students do not
like Setswana. When you meet students outside of school and they introduce you
to other people they say “my Setswana teacher ” (emotionally carried away,
facial expression goes sour and raises her voice as she speaks). We know that
this is not expressed in good faith but it’s a way of making fun of us, sort of
putting us down. When they introduce teachers of other subjects they say
“my teacher ” without speciﬁving the subject ojfered by that teacher. They don’t
say “my math teacher ”for instance. Some parents also display the same negative
attitude. When a student gets an “A ” grade in Setswana, the parent says,
“if only you could have gotten this ”A ” in Math or English or any other subject.
Parents do not help us. Anyway these days a few of them show some interest
in our subject. I do see such parents during parent-teacher conferences or on
parents ’ day. They appreciate it when the child gets a good grade in Setswana.
Anyway it doesn ’t mean that they do assist their children with assignments at home.
AM: But I thought the policy was changed a few years ago. Isn ’t it that a pass in
English Language is no longer a requirement for admission to university?
Mrs. Pako: No, It ’s still the same. The policy could be on papers only. In addition
to how the student has performed in other subjects, the university still requires a good

grade in English. ”

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While I acknowledge that the way in which a school subject is constituted and
subsequently construed by educators, parents and students contributes to the speciﬁc
context in which teachers of that subject work (Grossman& Stodolsky, 1994), I do
believe teachers are individuals and have their own views. In this regard I asked the
teachers what their attitude was towards Setswana, Ms Bame responded:

“Although we sit here as Setswana teachers, in the school we do not exist alone.

We teach with other teachers. Even if we have the wish to promote our subject,

it is hard for us to do so. People will take it as if we do not want the students to

learn English. All the other subjects are taught in English and students are the
school policy is that students should speak only English around the school

premises except in the Setswana class.”

Hegemony of English

The focal teachers pointed to the imbalances between the Setswana and English
departments. Their concern was that English has always been given more priority over
Setswana in many respects. One example was the “English only” policy around the
school premises except during Setswana lessons. The policy in all Botswana secondary
schools is that students should not speak their home languages or even the national
language around the school premises. They should communicate only through medium of
English amongst themselves as well as with teachers except during Setswana classes.

When caught speaking Setswana or any other language, students are punished. In many

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schools I visited, I also observed that as one enters the school gate, there would be a sign
that reads “You are now entering the English speaking zone.”

English was also allocated some library periods on the school time-table, and the
library had more English books than Setswana ones. English teachers specialized in what
to teach; some taught only literature and others taught language. In comparison, Setswana
teachers taught both literature and language. They found it unfair that they were expected
to be knowledgeable in both language and literature. Since English language and
literature were treated as separate school subjects in the curriculum, they were scheduled
separately on the school time-table whereas Setswana was treated as one subject.
Individual teachers had to decide when to teach literature and when to focus on grammar.
This disparity does not seem to recognize the importance of the national language and in
turn the multilingual and multicultural nature of the learners.

When the teachers reported that students see the imbalances between the two
subjects and were really not interested in reading Setswana books, I did point out to them
that perhaps students did not like to read because they were not encouraged to do so, and
that by being exposed to more reading, and having time assigned to read in the library,
their horizons could be widened. I asked the teachers if they ever considered asking for a
library period or whether they thought only English was justiﬁed to have one, the
teachers declared that they never asked for a library period because they did not have
extra time. They felt that their syllabus was too loaded for a 2-year period, leaving no
room for activities such as library periods.

Another example of the powerful position English is accorded in Botswana is

evident in the syllabus. The Setswana syllabus is written in English. This poses a problem

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for teachers to understand it because a number of them are not proﬁcient enough in
English since it is a second or even third language to most of them. As a result, teachers
interpret the syllabus differently from one school to the other or even amongst
themselves.

The government and the media also communicate with Batswana more in English
than in Setswana. This is prevalent in parliamentary debates, government documents and
in the media It is very common for a government official to address people in English
when they tour villages to inform people about certain policies or get their views before
implementing them. Although such ofﬁcials do have some people translate for them into
Setswana, such practice is uncalled for especially if the villagers are predominantly
Setswana speakers. Government newspapers and magazines are written in English. An
alarming example of a magazine written in English is the “Agrinews”. This is a magazine
produced by the Ministry of Agriculture that deals with issues about crops and farming,
issues that directly affect farmers in Botswana Most farmers are at the grassroots level
with little or no formal education at all. Whether the aim is to educate these farmers or
seek their views about agriculture, they are denied the information and it is therefore not
easy for them to make any contribution. Another example is that of the “Botswana Daily
News”, a government’s daily newspaper that is distributed at no charge. More than 90%
of the news is written in English and the only news in Setswana appeared in English on

the previous day.

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School Literacy versus Cultural Literacy

Most of the informants in this study reported that they seldom read books outside
the work they did for school purposes. To most of them, the reading and writing they did
for school work was synonymous with personal literacy. Many of them agreed that in
their upbringing there was distinction between school and home regarding education; that
there was school knowledge and home knowledge. The school was a place to read books
and learn from teachers, while home was a place to perform domestic chores. In the
home, there were different roles for boys and girls. While boys worked closely with male
adults performing tasks outside the home such as taking care of domestic animals, girls
worked in the home with female adults cooking, cleaning and taking care of their young
siblings. Given this context, culturally, there has never been a culture of reading amongst
Batswana according to the informants. Mrs. Pako pointed out that:

We Batswana do not have a culture of reading like people in other countries,
especially those in the west. Whereas people in the west would prefer to read a
book than to talk to the person sitting next to them in a bus seat, or talking to the
person when they meet at a bus stop, we wouldn’t do that. I realized this in
England when I visited my husband who was studying there. We are not like that.
We talk to each other even if it’s the ﬁrst time you meet a person. When we are
on a journey together, we converse all the way and learn a lot from each other,
and not only that, we might end up being friends. We are more sociable than
people in the western countries. We believe in talking to each other not so much
in reading books.

The absence of a culture of reading among Batswana was also a concern to the
commission that revised the education policy in 1994 that it recommended that “to

improve the level of literacy amongst Batswana, a logical extension would be the

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enunciation of policies and strategies that would enhance the reading habits of the
population at all levels of literacy and standards of educational achievement.” (Republic
of Botswana, 1993, p.187)
The above notion of a lack of reading culture among Batswana reﬂects that our ways of
knowing are based on oral culture whereas western ways of knowing are based on print
culture. This, however, does not suggest that oral culture is synonymous with illiteracy
and is inferior to print culture. Whereas literacy could mean reading books and acquiring
knowledge in formal education institutions to western societies, acquisition of knowledge
in non-formal set ups could as well be literacy to Africans and even other societies.
Vuolab (2000), reﬂecting on her childhood literacy experiences as a Sami child asserts
that:
“Nature and life are illustrated in oral literature Through stories we became
familiar with animals, birds, ﬁshes, ﬂowers, trees, insects, sunshine, rain, wind,
snow, rivers, lakes, the ocean. Listening to the oral stories we learned how we
belong to nature as part of it. Oral literature taught us human beings to respect

nature, and then nature gives us security”(p. 16).

The above assertion indicates that by the time children come to school they bring with
them a lot of knowledge such as about their environment. Skilled teachers would
incorporate this knowledge in their lessons. Cultural knowledge is taken for granted in
Botswana whereas some educationists in developed countries have termed it “ﬁrnds of
knowledge”. This according to Moll, Amanti, Neff and Gonzalez (1992) are historically

accumulated and cultrually developed bodies of knowledge and skills essential for

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household or individual functioning and well-being. Moll, et al view the household as
containing ample cultural and cognitive resources with great potential utility for
classroom instruction. Although the Setswana syllabus is culture sensitive as illustrated
by the rationale and some aims and objectives, teachers did not teach topics on Culture
because they were not examined as will be discussed below.

Apple (1993) contends that school curriculum is not neutral knowledge; “what
counts as legitimate knowledge is the result of complex power relations and struggles
among identiﬁable class, race, gender, and religious groups” (p.46). Given the
circumstances, it is difficult to imagine how Botswana could attain the cultural

transmission goal of education.

The Neglect of Culture

Despite the fact that the teachers were optimistic about the values of cultural
literacy as portrayed in their personal histories, it became apparent that they did not teach
topics on culture. The teachers claimed that they tended to ignore those topics because of
time constraints. The topics were excluded in the assessment syllabus so they did not
teach them even though they were aware that they were denying the students vital
knowledge. At senior secondary school level, topics on culture call for discussing the
effects of social, political and economic factors. Unfortunately, these are the very topics
that are not included in the examinations and are therefore neglected by teachers. The
teachers confessed that they were not able to give enough written work, grade it and give
appropriate feedback to students because they had too many students in a class, about 35

to 38 in a class. They felt that when the curriculum was reviewed, nothing was done to

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the bulk of the curriculum. The material that used to be covered in 3 years was retained
for the 2-year program, overlooking quantity of content to be covered. The teachers did
not realize that they could use passages on culture to teach grammar or reading
comprehension. In fact, what I observed ﬁom my conversations with them and the
records of their work, topics were treated discretely and taught in isolation from each
other. The major problem they seemed to display was that they lacked the skills of
integrating knowledge across various sections in the syllabus. Instead, they taught topics
in isolation especially those listed under the domains of “Reading” and “Writing” as

illustrated in Table 3 below:

Table 3: Examples of topics under the domains of “Reading” and “Writing”

 

Reading Writing
Syntax and Semantics Orthography, Register, Punctuation
Forms and Functions of Parts of Speech Speech writing
Reading between the lines Essay writing
Coherence indicators Translation

 

 

 

 

(Adapted from the Senior Secondary Setswana Syllabus, Curriculum Development
Division,Ministry of Education, 2000).

One reason why teachers taught topics in isolation was because of the books they
relied on. The books treated topics discretely from each other and were generally shallow
in their explanation of concepts. The above topics need not be taught in isolation, for
instance; ‘coherence indicators’ and ‘essay writing’ should ideally be taught at the same

time.

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It has been over 10 years since the promise to guide teachers on how to conduct
continuous assessment has been made, but as of the time of this study, nothing had yet
been done. During our discussions and my observation of the teaching documents, it
came out that while some topics that were not tested were taught, those under cultural
heritage were the ones that were neglected. Topics such as “Speech, talk, dialogue,
political/kgotla address” under listening skills were taught though not listed in the
assessment syllabus, while those under cultural heritage were not taught (see Table 2 in
the appendix).

Excluding topics on cultural heritage from the assessment could be interpreted as
implying that cultural knowledge is less valuable than other topics in the syllabus.
However, teachers in this study were optimistic about the teaching of topics under

“cultural heritage.”

Curriculum Responsiveness to the Needs of Diverse Learners

The education system in Botswana is built on the national principles of
democracy, self-reliance, unity and kagisano (peaceful co-existence). Issues of linguistic
and cultural diversity have been neglected for a long time and assimilating minorities into
the mainstream language and culture has been the norm in schools. Multicultural
education issues are not emphasized in pre-service programs. As a result, teachers are
poorly equipped with skills for working in multilingual classrooms. Some teachers do not
even think it is an issue to be discussed. Teachers are seen as irnplementers of the
standardized curriculurrr, not necessarily advocates for social justice. The focus is on

teaching how to teach a given set of topics at a given level. All teachers in the focal group

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came from backgrounds that could be categorized as mainstream. They were mainstream
in their social and cultural orientation. There was a tendency for these teachers to assume
that all students were alike. When I asked the teachers if they think the syllabus addresses
the needs of the linguistically diverse students in schools, Mrs Pako said;

“Our students are the same when it comes to writing regardless of

where they are — whether they are in Maun, Chobe or in the city.

They do not differ. Sometimes they perform poorly in exams because

they might have understood the question differently from what the

examiner intended to ask. Sometimes examiners ask questions basing

on the syllabus with no idea of what actually goes on in the classroom”.

(“Bana ba rona ba kwala ka go tshwana fela mo Setswaneng go sa kgathalesege
gore a ba kwa Maun, C hobe kana mo toropong. Fa gongwe bana ga ba arabe
potso sentle mo tlhatlhobong e le ka fa e neng e boditswe ka teng. O tlaafitlhela e
le gore examiner o ne a botsa potso a akantse se sele. O ﬁtlhela e le gore ene
examiner o tsere syllabus a botsa potso, gongwe e se standard sa bana ka gore

ga se motho yo 0 mo classing, yo 0 rutang bana. ”)

It was interesting to note that Mrs Pako believed that students did write the same
way regardless of where they came from in the country. She equated students in the city
with those in very remote parts of the country where Setswana is a second or third
language. Although Mrs Pako felt that students did not differ in the way they write,
others strongly believed that they lacked the knowledge and skills to teach linguistic
minority students. They expressed the concern that Setswana and English are either a
second or third language to most students; thus it was essential that second language

teaching methodologies should be offered in teacher education courses.

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Surprisingly, many teachers in this study were concerned that linguistic diversity
is being neglected by the education system. One English teacher said; “Some students
may have an advantage as the languages used are also used at home. However, some of
the students, e. g. Bakalanga, Basarwa, Bakgalagadi ﬁnd it difficult to adjust to the sudden
use of Setswana and then English languages in school”. The teacher acknowledged the
difficulties encountered by language minority students in adjusting to school languages.
The teacher also raised the issue of students’ different abilities in learning. He said; “We
are also burdened with the huge task of identifying students’ literacy abilities but most of
us are not equipped with the necessary training to do that. We tend to focus on those
average students who can read and write. The high achievers and low achievers are often
left out as teachers ﬁnd it difficult to deal with their cases”. The latter remark by the
teacher seemed to suggest that teachers did not have the skills to operate in mixed ability
classes. Another teacher pointed out that; “The system does not prepare us to teach
diverse learners. We are also not taught the skills to teach students from diverse cultures

to whom English and Setswana are second or third languages.”

Examination Driven Teaching

Interviews with focal teachers as well as survey data revealed that they did
struggle with the demands of school policies and mandated assessments. Teachers said
they were aware of the importance of curricula objectives but were more or less paying
attention to examination demands. They strongly believed that they needed to guide and
practice their students on how to answer examination questions. Mrs. Pako expressed the

dilemma they face as teachers:

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“One year we taught even the unexamined topics. At the end of

the year our students performed badly in the exams. Teaching
according to the syllabus did not work for us positively. From then
on we realized that it would be more meaningful to concentrate ﬁrst
on those topics that are examined, and teach everything else only if
there is time to do so. In this regard, we ignore topics such as

Cultural values because they are not tested.”

Data provided by the focal teachers about examinations indicated that there was
too much emphasis on testing in Botswana secondary schools. Students wrote internal
school examinations, regional examinations and national examinations. At the time this
study was conducted, the Form 5 students (equivalent to 12th grade) were writing regional
“mock” examinations. These are common examinations written by all schools in a given
region. Teachers from various schools in the same region meet and set the examinations.
They then decide on a common marking guide (rubric) to be used in the grading of those
examinations. Students’ performance in these examinations is used to predict the
outcome of the ﬁnal year examinations, as such these examinations are held in high
esteem. Consequently, many teachers ignore the overall aims of the curriculum and
concentrate on what they know is being examined by relying on past examination
questions. The entire education system was also seen as putting pressure on teachers by
the way examination results are ranked and publicized. Mrs Wesi said:

“Generally, our students are on average. We manage to get around 60% pass rate.

Last year we were number 3 in the whole of Botswana” (Generally, bana ba rona

ba average. Re kgona go dira bo 60%. Maloba re ne re le number 3 mo

Botswana).

I30

The ranking and publicity of examination results by the Ministry of Education is
illustrated in the following news clip from the government news reporting agency, the
Botswana Press Agency (BOPA) reporting the 2005 Junior Certiﬁcate Exarrrinations

results on the Botswana Daily News as follows:

Orapa JSS leads the pack
05 January, 2006

GA BORONE - Orapa Junior Secondary School is the nation ’s academic champion
among all junior secondary schools, with a pass rate of 97.5 per cent; one merit, eight
ﬁrst class passes, 80-second class passes, 65 third class students and four grade Ds.

With last year ’s junior certificate results, which were released on December 29,
Meepong and Makhubu junior secondary schools in Selebi-Phikwe, became second and
third with 96. 7 per cent and 96.1 per cent a bonus of happiness for students, teachers and
parents for the New Years Day. The three schools reportedly augmented the regular
teaching with some strategies to prepare students for junior certiﬁcate qualiﬁcation
Hard work and collective responsibility added value to instruction

Maitshwarelo Boile, the acting school head for Orapa Junior Secondary School,
applauded the teachers for their dedication and discipline, which was instrumental in
helping the students to excel. Boile said her school excelled because the teachers
completed the syllabuses ahead of time, thus leaving some periods for revision

We have an extended study for the form threes and a policy of one-on-one between a
student and a teacher which provides students with a platform to express their problems
thus enabling teachers to devise measures of dealing with them, Boile said The practice
at Orapa Junior Secondary School is that all teachers are expected to have completed
their subject syllabuses by the end of second term every year to give the students
adequate time to revise ahead examinations.

Motshegofatsi Kgomela, the school head for Meepong Junior Secondary School is not
only happy that her school obtained the runners-up position but she is more than happy
that Meepong prevailed over Makhubu Junior Secondary School.

Kgomela attributed all top-notch performance to cooperation among Selebi-Phikwe
secondary schools, especially the regular meetings between the heads, deputies, guidance
and counselling teachers as well as senior teachers where they share ideas on how to
improve their performance. She was delighted that the strategies the educators have

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employed to deal with the misconduct of the students were eﬂective. This, she said, was
evidenced by the presence of ﬁve of Selebi-Phikwes six schools among the top 20 schools
nationwide. She added that helping the students with motivational presentations was also
a key factor in her schools ’ performance. Under this arrangement, the students present
on a variety of issues at mini assemblies to develop their conﬁdence and conscientise
fellow students about social ills that could ruin their lives.

Meepong Junior Secondary School has established an academic board, modeled aﬁer the
university senate, which reviews the students monthly tests, end of term examinations and
the ﬁnal examinations. The academic board assists educators to subject their work to
critical examination thus identifying problems that could lead to poor performance, and
solving them. Kgomela said the Department of Curriculum Development and Evaluation
should review the compact syllabuses because they were oﬁen not completed before
examinations started.

The third best school, Makhubu has ﬁve merits, followed by Gold Mine Junior Secondary
School in F rancistown with three. Makhubu also has 25 ﬁrst-class students, followed by
Moselewapula in Gaborone with 23. Kgolagano Junior Secondary School at Middlepits

in the Kgalagadi District trails others with a 44 per cent pass and it is the only school
that failed to cross the average mark. BOPA

(Botswana Daily news Online, 05 January, 2006)

Every year when the results for national examinations are announced, the overall
performance of schools across the country are compared and ranked by the Ministry of
Education. Performance of students in various subjects is also indicated for each school.
The rankings are published on newspapers for the public. Of the issues in the above news
clip, three echo some of the major ﬁndings in this study. These are: teaching toward the
test, time constraints, and lack of professional development. The schools that performed
well are reported to have managed to ﬁnish the syllabi on time and therefore had
adequate time to work on revision with students. The syllabus is described as “compact”
meaning that it is loaded with too much material to be covered in a given period. It is
reported that the school head complains that the material to be covered is too much and

that the Curriculum Development and Testing Division should look into this matter. The

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heavy emphasis on examination results communicates to the teachers that literacy is
accessing information to pass examinations. To this end, it came up during our
discussions that some teachers spend a lot of time reviewing past examination papers
instead of teaching according to the syllabus. Teachers concentrate more on the parts of
the syllabus that are tested. They pay attention to how questions are asked on these topics
and drill students to respond to such questions. Teaching is not based on the teaching
objectives as laid out in the syllabus but on assessment. Without doubt, examination
driven teaching affects both content and skills that are covered. It encourages rote
memorization and students have little opportunity to develop critical thinking and

creativity skills.

Lack of Teachers’ Professional Development

All the participants in this study felt that they were ill-prepared by their pre-
service programs to handle the syllabus they were teaching. The focal teachers also
complained that they were not provided with in-service programs to help them develop as
professionals in their subject area. The responses to the question “what do you understand
by the notion of literacy” were varied. Some (36%) teachers’ understanding of literacy
was limited to the flmctional notion of the ability to read and write only. They described
literacy only in terms of the encoding and decoding of print. Others (40%) deﬁned
literacy as having the ability to interpret and analyze information read. Furthermore, a
few (13.3%) deﬁned it as the ability to read and write, interpret, analyze information

read, and apply knowledge learned to any given situation, even to the world of work.

133

Only 6.6% described a literate student as “the one who understands the world around him
or her; one who has acquired different skills; one who has acquired knowledge”.
Although some teachers conﬁned themselves to the narrow deﬁnition of literacy,
it was evident that many of them had a broader perception of literacy as meaning making;
interpretation and analysis, application and acquisition of knowledge. All teachers had
the common understanding that the curricula deﬁned literacy as the acquisition of the
basic skills of listening, speaking, reading and writing. One English teacher’s response
was that “the curriculum’s deﬁnition of literacy is to have students read and write
coherently and skillfully in English, to manipulate information, to relate whatever is
taught to real life situations and equip students with life-long skills”. It is worth noting
that this was the only teacher who mentioned the words “life-long skills” in the survey
data In addition to the acquisition of the basic skills, a few teachers mentioned that the
curriculum laid emphasis on the students’ ability to develop critical thinking skills.
Interviews with teachers as well as survey data revealed that their understanding
of the communicative syllabus was limited but that the Ministry of Education did not
support them. The teachers stated that they were not sure what teaching communicatively
means or the terms “linguistic competence”, “strategic competence”, “sociolinguistic
competence” and “discourse competence” which the syllabus advocate. They felt that
they could have been more efﬁcient in teaching this “new” syllabus if the Curriculum
Development Unit had conducted workshops for all teachers to explain the syllabus prior

to its implementation in schools. To their recollection, only one workshop was held for

selected teachers who were regarded as representatives of their schools, a practice they

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felt was not helpful as most teachers who were sent as representatives to workshops never
reported back to their colleagues.

Although neither the Ministry of Education nor the schools gave teachers any
support in terms of professional development, the focal teachers said they did organize
workshops with other teachers in their region to assist each other with issues pertaining to
the syllabus. Ms. Bame viewed that kind of practice as having “a blind leading another
blind” (“sefoﬁl se goga se sengwe ”). She felt it was good for teachers to share their
insights on the syllabus but that having resource persons who were more skilled than
themselves in certain areas would be more meaningful. One teacher who had just come
back from the local university with a Masters Degree in African Languages expressed
disappointment that she did not feel that her latest educational qualiﬁcation had helped
her improve as a professional. She was conﬁdent with the content knowledge she had but
felt inadequately prepared in the area of teaching methods. She lamented that:

“I am just continuing from where I left off. At UB we take classes only in

the Humanities and not from the Faculty of Education. We therefore learn

only content and nothing about teaching approaches. I still teach the same old

way I used to do before going for the Masters Degree, so I am just like my

colleagues when it comes to understanding some topics in this new syllabus.”

The above view points to a gap in teacher preparation especially at the University of
Botswana. Whereas teacher trainees at the Diploma offering colleges study both content
and methods courses throughout the duration of their program, those trained at the

university take content courses in the faculty of Humanities ﬁrst and then methods

135

courses in Education (see chapter 3 for details). The teachers declared that some of them
might have studied only novels but no poetry since genres of literature (novel, drama,
poetry) are offered as separate courses and are also not compulsory. Contrary to this, in
the faculty of Education they are expected to know all aspects of their teaching subject.

According to Shulman, pedagogical content knowledge “represents the blending
of content and pedagogy into an understanding of how particular topics, problems, or
issues are organized, represented, and adapted to the diverse interests and abilities of
learners, and presented for instruction” (1987, p.8). This calls for the teacher’s
understanding of how students think and learn and also consider their socio-cultural
contexts as particular areas of inﬂuence to learning.

The interview data did reveal that many teachers took students’ socio-cultural
contexts for granted as such issues were never discussed in the teacher education
programs they underwent. From the survey data, one English teacher said; “Some
students may have an advantage as the languages used are also used at home. However,
some of the students, e.g. Bakalanga, Basarwa, Bakgalagadi ﬁnd it difficult to adjust to
the sudden use of Setswana and then English languages in school”. The teacher
acknowledged the difficulties encountered by language minority students in adjusting to
school languages. The teacher also raised the issue of students’ different abilities in
learning. He said; “We are also burdened with the huge task of identifying students’
literacy abilities but most of us are not equipped with the necessary training to do that.
We tend to focus on those average students who can read and write. The high achievers
and low achievers are oﬂen left out as teachers ﬁnd it difficult to deal with their cases”.

The latter remark by the teacher seemed to suggest that teachers did not have the skills to

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operate in mixed ability classes. Another teacher pointed out that; “The system does not
prepare us to teach diverse learners. We are also not taught the skills to teach students
from diverse cultures to whom English and Setswana are second or third languages”.
Students’ growth hardly in terms of problem-solving or critical thinking was rarely
mentioned in the interviews. Most of the time teachers were concerned about students’
performance in examinations. They were concerned about how to teach certain topics or
how to prepare students to respond to certain questions ﬁom past examination papers.
One disturbing thing I noticed among these teachers was that they did not aspire
to further their education. Many of them said they were done with schooling. Ms Kabelo
said; “staying for ﬁve years in teaching is enough. After ﬁve years one has to move on to
a different career or job, otherwise she becomes redundant or lazy and hence no

productivity.”

Textbooks and other Teaching Resources

The ﬁndings showed that teachers relied heavily on textbooks in teaching
Setswana. Most teachers conﬁrmed that they used the prescribed texts for the
instructional purposes. This was also evident in that the teachers’ work room/staff room
did not have any other resources besides prescribed textbooks. Only in a few instances
did some teachers mention using newspapers as resources even though there was not
much evidence to this. The only newspaper I saw on some teachers’ tables was the “Daily
Newspaper” which could have been there because it is distributed freely to all
government departments every day. Those who claimed to use it reported that they got

articles from it to teach topics like “Giving a speech” or “identifying main point and

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supporting arguments”. The prescribed texts have class exercises for students and
teachers give those exercises for in-class work or home work. I realized that there was
very little initiative from teachers in the kind of work they gave their students. They just
followed work in the texts and the teaching guides.

Most instructional resources used by teachers were relevant to what students
experience in their lives as they did address social issues. The literature texts addressed
issues about abuse of power by people in authority, youth relationships, while some
poems were on HIV/AIDS, drought, seasonal changes. To have an idea on how these
were taught, I relied on teachers’ record books and what they told me since I did not do
classroom observations. Test papers as well as past examination papers indicated that
students were expected to give certain agreed upon responses (giving back to the teachers
what they were taught previously). Even for literature texts, students had to give certain
responses that they were taught in class. Before teachers graded papers, they had to
discuss marking guides, which they all had to adhere to.

As concerns texts, all Setswana teachers who participated in the study complained
that the quantity of literature texts to be studied within the speciﬁed period before
students sat for the national examination was overwhelming. They also expressed their
unhappiness about the quality of some of them. They felt that some of the texts did not
address the syllabus’ objectives while others were difﬁcult to understand. Conditions
permitting, teachers would select their own teaching resources/textbooks and teach what
they believed was valuable for the students. The teachers had their own notions of what
literary aspects a typical literature text should have. For instance, one teacher lamented

about a certain drama text: “One of the prescribed drama text has 15 actors. Can you

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imagine such a book! What’s your view about that? We really wonder how book
selection is done and who the people on the panel are.” This teacher expressed the feeling
that some books are being marketed for the beneﬁt of the authors, disregarding the needs

of the students.

Scheme Books [Record of Work done

Scheme books, also known as record books are books that are supplied by the
Ministry of Education to teachers for record keeping. Teachers’ record plans of their
work; content to be taught in a given term (semester), and remarks about how lessons
progressed as well as students’ grades for class work, home work and tests. Each
department meets at the beginning of the term to agree on what content to teach and plan
their schemes. In this way, the plans are uniform and the teaching progresses more or less
at the same pace, more so that students write similar tests at the end of every month.
Although content taught is the same, teachers are free to use varying teaching methods.
Each teacher has to record work he or she has covered every fortnight and submit the
scheme to the senior teacher in the department for checking.

In order to gain an insight into how teachers record their work, I asked for a few
scheme books from selected focal teachers who were more comfortable with me in the
study. To compare between English and Setswana, I also asked two teachers from the
English department to share their scheme books with me. Reading through four teachers’
scheme books, I got the impression that these reports were just written as a procedure to
fulﬁll the school policy. All the reports had similar patterns; minimal information was

provided about speciﬁc issues covered in a topic, not much information was given about

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students’ performance or problems encountered; even when it was stated that students did
not understand something, there was no information regarding the remedial strategies that
were taken. To protect the identities of the teachers and their supervisors, I did not make
copies of the reports (since they were handwritten and had supervisors’ signatures) but
instead I did copy down notes as they appeared in the schemes. I translated the Setswana
ones into English. The following are some of the examples of how teachers reported their
work:

Setswana Schemes of Work

Table 4: Example 1

 

 

Grammar: We did form and function of the Noun and Pronoun.

Reference: “Marang 5 " — T shukudu et al.

Literature: We read “Motswasele I I ” and discussed setting and characterization. We
discussed how time setting has an impact on the behavior of actors like Motswasele,
Diratsagae and Molotlhanyi. Students were assigned to discuss characterization in
groups and write a report that they presented before the whole class.

Remarks: Students did well in literature than in Grammar.

 

Mrs. Pako ’s Record of Work for week ending March I I, 2005.

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Table 5: Example 2

 

Speaking: Political/Kgotla address. Selected articles from newspapers were read (from
the “Botswana Daily News” and “Mokgosi”) and students were asked to tell the main
ideas and supporting points. They were also asked to tell what emotions were shown in
the speeches read.

Literature: We discussed conﬂict in “Motswasele 11”. We talked about how the three
major events led to conﬂict in the play; the killing of Maleke, conﬁscation of mogatsa-
Moilwe ’s cattle and the incident of Ramodi ’s children.

Remarks: The students performed well in both literature and the activities under the

domain of Speaking.

 

Mrs. Wesi ’s Record of Work for week ending March 1 I, 2005.

Table 6: Example 3

 

 

Grammar: We did the Adjective: Form and function of the three types.
Reading between the lines: We read a passage from Sedibeng 4 and students
were asked to search for main ideas/central themes, topic sentences and
introductory paragraphs in the passage.

Literature: We discussed theme in “Motswasele 11”. We talked about the
theme of social injustice as illustrated by kgosi Motswasele among his people.

Remarks: Students did well. They seem to enjoy reading “Motswasele 11”.

 

Mrs. Wesi ’s scheme of work for week ending March 25, 2005.

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English Schemes of Work

Table 7: Example 1

 

 

Reading: Local history pp.33 — “Active English”.

Speaking: Discussion of local legends and stories as told by parents/grandparents.
Writing: Comprehension and Summary

Grammar: Sentence types — e.g. simple, compound and complex.

Composition: Argurnentative composition.

 

Ms. Lenong ’s Record of Work for week ending January 28, 2005.

Table 8: Example 2

 

 

Reading: - Reunion with father
- Wasted waters (Handout)
Writing: Cars — a composition or newspaper report based on the theme.
Grammar: Preposition of time and place used in context.
Speaking: Based on either one of the reading passages above.
The best way to conserve water

Debate: Presentation on Setswana or food in general.

 

Ms. Lenong ’s Record of Work for week ending February 25, 2005.

From the above records of work, it is clear that the skills of reading, writing,

listening and speaking as well as grammatical aspects are taught separately. The

Setswana schemes were more elaborate than the English ones. The English ones seem to

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be a list of topics covered with no clariﬁcation of whether these were lessons or
discussions held with students, or work assigned for writing. For instance, Mrs Lenong
did not give the title of the argumentative composition so it is not clear whether students
were asked to write compositions based on titles of their choice or whether this was a
class discussion of how they should write such an essay. The topic for debate
“Presentation of Setswana or food in general” does not also communicate anything to the
reader. There is no indication of the exact tasks students were engaged in. All the
schemes do not state the kind of problems students displayed or raised, and the kind of
guidance they were given in case some had difﬁculties like in Mrs. Wesi’s scheme where
she states that students performed better in literature than in grammar. The strengths and
weaknesses of the students are not explained in detail. The schemes do not specify
anything about the attainment of literacy skills mentioned in the aims of the syllabus.
Given this, it would be difficult for a substitute teacher or any concerned person to make
sense of exactly what was done and how to move on with a lesson or topic. Other
documents that gave teachers’ perceptions of literacy learning and teaching were the
examination reports. After reading through teachers’ schemes of work, I did a further

analysis of examination reports of ﬁnal year examinations.

Examination Reports

The grading of Form 5 (12th grade) national examinations takes place in a central
location for all schools throughout the country. At the end of the grading period, teachers
are asked to give an overall view about students’ responses in the papers they grade. The

information supplied by teachers is compiled into booklets and distributed to all schools

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by the Examinations, Research and Testing Division. This information is used as the
means of providing feedback to teachers about the performance of students so that they
see what needs to be improved or reviewed. Comparing the remarks teachers wrote
between 2002 and 2005, it is apparent that teachers have been identifying similar
mistakes across these years; there have been no substantial changes in their remarks. In
general, the remarks indicate lack of skills in reading, writing, critical analysis, and
interpretation, inability to think independently, and shallow vocabulary. All these conﬁrm
the reports by focal teachers that students are not exposed to adequate reading and writing
activities in secondary schools. Selected comments from these reports are presented

below.

Comments from Setswana examination reports:

“Generally, candidates ’ performance was below the required syllabus standard, e. g.
overbalance on retelling the story without showing cause and ejfect as required
candidates supported their views with very minor events. Most of them seemed not to

have understood the text itself ”

The above remark shows lack of reading and analytical skills on the part of the students.
It is further illustrated in the following excerpt:

“Over the years candidates have always found diﬂiculties in responding to
comprehension questions and this year ’s candidates are no exception. The responses
clearly indicate lack of reading skills. For instance, candidates still need a lot of practice

on responding to questions that deal with drawing of inferences and giving reasons or

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providing support for the statements that they make. They also have problems with
identijying the functions served by some parts of speech in a sentence, signiﬁcance of the

parts of speech as well as identify coherent markers ﬁom a given text. ”

The next excerpt demonstrates students’ inability to be independent when they are given
unfamiliar information because they are used to having the teacher do the task for them.
In this instance the examiner reports that students failed to summarize passages they had
not seen before:

“The summary writing is also another area where candidates seem not to be making
headway. Candidates invariably fail to use their own words in summarizing the passage.
Most of the time candidates repeat the words in the text or write out some disjointed
points that are presented in the form of a paragraph. They need to learn to extract

important points and link these points so that they end up with paragraphs that ﬂow. ”

Furthermore, students’ lack of independent thinking and interpretation is illustrated in the
poetry section:

“Many candidates failed to come up with the theme of the whole poem and used the
same words as in the poem to answer questions. There was no indication that they

understood what the words used by the poet meant. ”

“Candidates who failed in this part of the question rewrote the last stanza without

commenting on the impression made candidates failed to show how the poet had used

words to describe the subject of the poem and to create interest but just concentrated on

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explaining the subject of the poem in a general way with no reference to the language
used Candidates should not just give a narration of the story or characterization of the

doctor but give their own feelings candidates did not answer questions fully. ”

The above comments could be interpreted as limitations on teaching methods. In both
survey reports and focal interviews teachers reported that they were constrained by
having to cover a lot of material within certain time limits. Given the circumstances, they
did not expose their students to a variety of poems but only on the selected few which
they believed were likely to appear in examinations. This kind of practice suggests that
engaging students in activities such as having them write their own poems, read them
aloud or share them with peers is far fetched. Unfortunately, it is through such activities
that students could grasp the language of poetry and even begin to enjoy it.

Selected comments from English Examination reports are in no way different
ﬁ'om the Setswana reports. The examiners are concerned about students’ shallow
vocabulary which is an indication of lack of exposure to reading materials:

“Generally, this year candidates did not do very well. The caliber was lower. Therefore
the majority of candidates fell in the “D ” category. The main concern was inadequate
content and very shallow vocabulary. Some barely wrote more than a page and a half —
less than 200 words. Teachers need to encourage students to practice writing at least 350
words. Candidates were ﬁirther not eloquent enough especially those who chose
questions I and 5 which required mastery of the language and a knowledge of current
affairs or issues pertaining to government. Teachers should interest students in using the

library appropriately. ”

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Another area of concern is students’ lack of creativity which is demonstrated by the fact
that students from certain schools used the same expressions in their essays. It is apparent
that those students memorized what they were taught and reproduced it in the
examinations:

“Some candidates showed signs of being drilled because they used the same expressions.
Teachers should desist ﬁom this as Paper I is about creativity. Another concern was the
use of obscene language — some candidates are just too graphic and explicit. Teachers
should caution their students against this. L1 interference still very rife, slang, so is and
the over use of certain conjunctions like “so ” and “very ” interchangeably and the use of

“as ” instead of “when. ”

In the following qoute, the examiner is pleading with teachers to spend time
training students how to answer questions and in vocabulary development:

“In general, centres should devote sometime for ‘exam wisdom ’ to improve the quality of
candidates’ answers. Candidates have to be trained to analyse questions, to note
keywords and therefore the demands of the question. It is apparent that some candidates,
though endowed with the tools of the language, cannot meet the demands of the
questions, giving vague if not irrelevant responses. It is also apparent that there is a need
for training in vocabulary development. Candidates use or give descriptions where a
single eﬂective pregnant word could be the answer. This results in long descriptive wordy

answers without focus on the demands of the question. ”

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It is necessary that teachers guide students in responding to questions. However, the
notion that students could be trained in vocabulary development does not seem to be
feasible without exposure to a wide range of reading materials and engagement in a range
of writing activities.

The next comment conﬁrms that teaching is driven by examinations not by the
syllabus objectives. The examiner recommends that teachers need to train students for
examinations:

“The paper emphasized character, opinion, feelings yet candidates ’ answers reﬂected
limited understanding of the differences between the three There is a need to consult
the assessment syllabus in training candidates for the BGCS . ”

It is conclusive from the above reports that even though the aims of teaching
Setswana at senior secondary school level seem to be more progressive and aligned
towards meeting the literacy demands of the 215’ century, students’ performance gives a
regressive picture. Much of the reading and writing that students are engaged in are
aimed towards helping them cope with examination requirements. The weaknesses
mentioned in the reports such as lack of comprehension, lack of creativity and analytic
skills, and limited vocabulary cannot be adequately addressed in an environment that is

driven by purposes of examinations.

Summary
The teachers in this study had similar perceptions about literacy teaching and
learning. An analysis of their documents has shown that they understood literacy through

the lens of the national examinations. Botswana schools follow a national curriculum,

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with close prescriptions of content, modes of teaching and forms of assessment mandated
by the Ministry of Education. With this kind of curricula, teachers tended to disregard the
curricula objectives and taught towards examinations, thereby failing to implement the
intended aims. Even though the syllabus has clearly laid out the aims, it was evident that
the teaching goals were derived from examination questions. This practice is rooted in the
colonial context whereby students were taught disintegrated body of knowledge that did
not require them to apply knowledge to real life situations or be independent thinkers, but
instead, to acquire only a selected body of knowledge to pass examinations and serve
successfully in the colonial administration.

The data also revealed that there was lack of institutional support for teachers.
Lack of knowledge in how to conduct continuous assessment for certain parts of the
syllabus compelled them to concentrate more on those topics that were tested. The
importance of examinations in diagnosing the difficulties students may have cannot be
contested. Examinations are also used to measure achievement at different stages of
learning, and as a method of helping teachers to prepare the ground for the next level.
However, if the goals of teaching are derived from examinations, effective literacy
instruction cannot be take place. The acquisition of literacy skills is ﬁmdamental to
overall learning in school, and emphasis on examinations is bound to affect the teaching
and learning of these skills.

The sociocultural approach to literacy insists that language and literacy must
always be understood in their social, cultural and political contexts. In terms of teaching,
it is necessary that students be shown the connection between school knowledge and their

local realities. By neglecting topics on cultural heritage, teachers are denying students the

149

opportunity to draw upon the cultural resources they bring with them to school, to
understand the richness and strengths of their cultural traditions (Giroux, 1992). In this
way the school curriculum becomes a tool of cultural alienation and the students
gradually acquire the cultural identity of other people.

The next chapter is the conclusion of the study. I reassess the major research
questions in relation to the theoretical frameworks and ﬁndings of the study. I discuss the
implications of the study for teacher education programs and literacy teaching in

Botswana secondary schools. Finally, I discuss the limitations of the study.

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Chapter Seven
Conclusions, Recommendations and Implications

This study explored the meanings teachers in Botswana secondary schools
associate with the teaching and leaming of literacy given the structural constraints of
planned school policies and curricula by the Ministry of Education. Furthermore, the
study examined how teachers’ literacy experiences and beliefs shaped their instructional
practices. Data sources included audio-taped interviews, policy documents, curriculum
materials, teacher documents, past examination papers, examination reports, and
ethnographic ﬁeld notes. The ﬁndings reveal that although policies have been developed
about the teaching and learning of literacy that are aimed at moving the country into the
21St century, they have not translated into practice. This is due to a number of factors:
societal and institutional constraints, inadequate teacher preparation and lack of teachers’
professional development, and lack of a culture of reading.

The main research questions and sub-questions that guided the study were:
1. In what ways does the postcolonial experience of Botswana play out in teachers’
understanding of literacy teaching and learning?
2. What are particular meanings teachers associate with literacy teaching and learning,
given the structural constraints of the mandated curriculum and national examinations?

a) How does the national (Setswana or English) curriculum deﬁne literacy?

b) What is it that teachers understand the curriculum to be telling them to do?

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c) What are teachers’ perspectives on the curriculum’s responsiveness to the

needs of the linguistically and culturally diverse students in schools?

(I) How do teachers make sense of and come to understand students’ familiar

literacy experiences?

This chapter is a synthesis of the ﬁndings of the study and concludes by outlining
the limitations of the study, implications for practice and future research. The section that

follows is a discussion of the ﬁndings of the study under the main themes.

Findings of the Study

The overall ﬁnding of the study is that teachers’ perceptions of literacy teaching
and learning are rooted in their childhood literacy experiences and the teacher education
programs they underwent. The ofﬁcial perspectives regarding literacy teaching and
learning are consistent with the postcolonial and socioculttu‘al theoretical frameworks in
which this study is grounded. However, these theories do not seem to be in place to guide
teachers’ instructional practices. The study also revealed that there has been a
revolutionary change in content and pedagogy of the current syllabus. The problem lies in
that the new syllabus has been implemented in a system that has long been run by
examinations and is therefore still tied to the old one. Even though the syllabus is
postcolonial, the teaching is embedded within and shaped by colonial discourse. Literacy
teaching methods still follow the traditional approaches that do not take on board the
sociocultural contexts of the learners. The forms of assessment that were in place in the
pre-colonial era were also never taken into consideration by colonial and subsequently

post-colonial education system.

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The theoretical ﬁ'ameworks on which the study was grounded proved useful in
different ways: the postcolonial theory provided a lens to uncover and examine the
structural biases inherent in the language education policy and how it affects the teaching
and learning of Setswana in schools. I used the sociocultural approach to examine the
ofﬁcial as well as teachers’ perceptions of literacy in view of the current move in literacy
education that literacy is a social practice. An analysis of the ofﬁcial documents showed
that the syllabus is aimed at producing students who have the ability to read, write, speak
and listen, and have acquired skills, attitudes and values that would enable them to
ﬁrnction better in the society. In other words, the syllabus is aimed at moving students
beyond the traditional notion of encoding and decoding print into being literate in
multiple ways.

Critical theory was useful in examining the research question “What are particular
meanings teachers associate with literacy teaching and learning, given the structural
constraints of the mandated curriculum and national examinations.” The ﬁndings
revealed that teachers understood literacy through the conﬁnes of national examinations
such that they focused more on preparing students for those examinations and paid less
attention to the aims of the syllabus. Such a kind of practice seems to deny students vital

knowledge that would open their doors to read the word and the world (F reire, 1983).

153

Institutional and Social Discourses as Constraints to Literacy Teaching and
Learning

The data has revealed that institutional and social discourses constrain the
teaching and learning of literacy in Botswana schools. Teachers’ perceptions of literacy
teaching and learning are determined by the realities of their institutional contexts.
Despite the pronounced efforts in language and education policy to recognize Botswana’s
cultural diversity, an unequal picture is uncovered when one examines how local
languages are given low status by government and its respective media while English is
accorded more prominence not only in school but in all aspects of life. Consequently the
society at large, parents, teachers and students themselves do not see any value in
Setswana as a school subject, which impacts negatively on its teaching and learning as
illustrated in the previous chapter.

The high value placed on examinations also affects the teaching and learning of
Setswana. The teaching syllabus covers a wide range of topics but teachers were
constrained by time and selected what to teach, depending on what the examinations
tested. Teaching goals are derived from examination questions not from syllabus
objectives. One particular area of knowledge that remained untaught, “Cultural
Practices”, is an area that almost all focal teachers acknowledged as having shaped their
lives as they grew up. Since the assessment procedures did not create room for that area,
teachers ignored it contrary to their personal beliefs. On a personal basis, the informants
of this study acknowledged the importance of teaching students about their cultural
practices as outlined in the teaching syllabus. Traditional models of teaching and

assessment are still in place although the syllabus has changed. Forms of assessment for

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literacy are still comprised of only paper and pencil tests as was the case in the UCLES
curriculum. As explained in chapter 2, the new syllabus was introduced with pending
plans to guide teachers on continuous assessment for some topics. Since teachers were
never shown how to carry on the continuous assessment, they neglected the topics that
were to be tested in this way and focused on those which had clearly pronounced

guidelines.

In sociocultural approaches to learning, assessment must pay attention to the
social and cultural context of both learning and assessment (Gipps, 2002). Even during
pre-colonial education, assessment did take into consideration the social and cultural
context. Children learnt by looking, imitating and practicing what their elders did. At the
end of speciﬁc stages, they were given a practical test relevant to their experience and
level of development and in terms of the job to be done. The test was a continuous
assessment, which eventually ended up in a ceremony marking that the child has
graduated into adulthood (F afunwa, 1982). Language and literacy education should be
viewed (the same way) that is, as part of a process of helping students to participate fully
in public, community, and economic life.

The ﬁndings revealed that teaching in Botswana schools is driven by examination
demands. However, teachers believed that even though they tended to teach towards the
test, they did focus on syllabus objectives that included skills such as critical thinking,
analysis and application. In that regard, they believed students did acquire the necessary
skills. They cited the section on “Unseen texts” as an example. This is a section of the

assessment syllabus whereby students are given passages from texts that were not

155

prescribed and asked questions on them. The aim is to test if students can apply
knowledge learnt in prescribed texts to those they had never read in class. Teachers’
claims contradicted the data in the examination reports (see chapter 6) that students
performed poorly in “unseen texts”. The remarks in the examination reports indicate that
there has been no change in students’ performance in the last 6 years. This suggests that
instructional practices have remained the same even though the syllabus changed ﬁ'om
the structural to the communicative one.

Whenever the word culture is mentioned, what comes to many people’s minds is
“backwardness” or “not civilized”. Educational anthropologists and sociologists have
conceptualized the term culture differently over time. Over a long time culture has been
deﬁned as a (stagnant) way of life characteristic of a bounded social group and passed
down from one generation to the next (Eisenhart, 2001). Geertz (1973) deﬁnes cultme as
the dynamic and recursive construction of beliefs, values, and ways of acting among a
group of people. The contemporary views also deﬁne culture as a concept that refers
broadly to all forms through which people make sense of their lives (Rosaldo, 1993).
From an African perspective, F alola (2003) deﬁnes culture as including “values, beliefs,
daily practices, aesthetic forms, systems of communications (e.g. language), institutions
of society, a variety of experiences that capture Africans’ way of life, a metaphor to
express political ideas, and the basis of an ideology to bring about both political and
economic changes” (p.1). These contemporary conceptions of culture point to the need
for the inclusion of cultural knowledge in the school curricula.

A study conducted by Heath in 1983 provides an example of the need for teachers

to know how cultural differences relate to school subject matter learning. Heath describes

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a study in which students in a rural agricultural area conducted enquiries into the people
in their town that were particularly good at farming vegetables. Their teacher found it
meaningful for students to conduct ethnographies of their own communities. This enabled
them to connect school knowledge and culture with their own culture. This was also a
way for the teacher to ﬁnd out more about the background, beliefs, values and culture of
the students. Heath argues that students come to school with different ways of speaking
and communicating than those valued in schools. . In this regard, if prospective teachers
were given the skills to conduct ethnographies of literacy practices of students, they
would better understand ways in which their students think about language and literacy.
Research by Moll and Gonzalez (1994) similarly points to the importance of making
available to teachers the rich funds of knowledge and cultural practices that youth from
non-mainstrearn backgrounds might bring with them to their classes. Such knowledge
could enable teachers to bridge bridges between mainstream academic knowledge and
discourse, and the knowledge and discourse that students bring to their classrooms. The
traditional conception that conﬁnes literacy to the ability to read and write is powerless to

get at these kinds of analyses and explanations.

Inadequate Teacher Preparation and Lack of Professional Development

Teachers’ perceptions towards literacy have implications for the pre-service
language education curricula. As already pointed out, interviews with teachers gave an
indication that they lacked the knowledge and skills regarding the teaching of literacy.
They understood literacy in the narrow sense of decoding and encoding print. The

teachers also disclosed that their understanding of the communicative syllabus was

157

limited but that the Ministry of Education did not support them in terms of professional
development. According to Shulman (1987), pedagogical content knowledge “represents
the blending of content and pedagogy into an understanding of how particular topics,
problems, or issues are organized, represented, and adapted to the diverse interests and
abilities of learners, and presented for instruction” (p.8). This calls for the teacher’s
understanding of how students think and learn and also consider their socio-cultural
contexts as particular areas of inﬂuence to learning.

Whereas the need to learn about students, their cultures and communities, and to
build on such knowledge in teaching and learning has been found to be crucial in other
parts of the world (Ladson-Billings, 1998; books, 1994; Delpit, Zeichner and Hoeft,
1996), this is not the case in Botswana. As shown already, teachers lack the skills to
accommodate students’ funds of knowledge (Gonzalez, 1995; M011, et al, 1992) to enrich
their literacy skills. Since they did not have adequate knowledge about what teaching
second language learners involves, some teachers who participated in this study felt that
students’ linguistic differences did not matter since all of them could speak and write
Setswana. This is the view held by the society at large as described in chapter 2 and
hence the negligence of ethnic minority languages even at the initial levels of education
at primary schools.

A closer look at the syllabus objectives shows that teachers are not required to be
sources of information for topics on culttual knowledge. They are to teach these topics
through research projects that could be done by students in their communities. For
example, one objective states that students should “Trace the developments of cultural

practices in their community”. By allowing students to carry out research in their

158

communities, students are being connected to their communities, besides the fact that
they acquire the skills of speaking, listening, writing, interpreting and analyzing.

Using literature and texts based on cultural knowledge, the topics that are
currently neglected could be taught without jeopardizing the material covered in the
examinations. A core of the traditional way of life remains integral to contemporary
community life. This, for instance, is portrayed in marriages and ceremonies, and other
rituals which continue to bring the community together in socially sigriﬁcant and
meaning laden activities. These activities offer cultural and linguistic resources that
teachers could tap into and incorporate in their teaching. They could use reading and
writing assignments to teach students about the community and cultural traditions they
are familiar with. This could afford them the opportunity to be engaged in self-reﬂection,
analysis, interpretation, cross-cultural understanding, problem solving and critical
thinking which the sociocultural theory to literacy advocates.

We need to rethink our teacher education programs so as to produce teachers who
are knowledgeable and accountable. Understanding the curriculum and enacting it could
be two different things. The implementation of curricula objectives depends on several
factors: teachers’ readiness (i.e. understanding), institutional support in terms of

resources and the actual classroom contexts.

Lack of Reading Culture in Botswana Society
The previous chapter has revealed that generally, there is no reading culture in
Botswana secondary schools. In both the interviews and survey data, teachers reported

that they did not engage students in reading except for school purposes. The teachers

159

themselves conﬁrmed that they hardly read outside of schoolwork due to workload
constraints. Teachers who do not encourage extensive reading or read for their own
professional development are not good role models for students. The focal teachers
related how they acquired literacy through interaction with their peers, adults and older
siblings. Lack of not valuing reading by both students and teachers is a product of
sociocultural context. Before the advent of western education, learning was more oral
than based in books like in the western way. Although reading books was not a cultural
way of learning in pre-colonial times as pointed out by the informants, times have
changed and there is need to acknowledge that in postcolonial Botswana, literacy
demands place reading at the forefront. Culture evolves with the times; it is not static.

The few teachers who engaged in reading said they mostly read English articles
and books. However, they did mention that they read Setswana articles when they had to
research for materials to use in their classes but reported doing most of their leisurely
reading and writing in English. Literacy practices of these teachers and the materials they
read revealed the degree to which English dominated in their lives.

The beneﬁts of extensive reading and writing need not be underscored. Interview
data showed that students in Botswana schools are engaged in reading and writing to
complete teacher directed classroom assignments, they are not exposed to a wide range of
reading materials. Regrettably, research has found that students who do little independent
reading in various and diverse texts will have difﬁculty with school learning (RAND
Reading Study group, 2002).

In some studies, middle school students have reported an interest in reading a

wide range of texts (e.g., informational texts, picture books, series books, magazines,

160

poetry), but that in school their reading is limited to textbooks and ﬁctional novels
assigned to the whole class (Ivey and Broaddus 2001; Worthy et al. 1999). It has also
been observed that young adolescents ﬁnd it difﬁcult to reconcile school literacy with the
reading and writing they engage in outside of school (Alvermann, 2001). For instance,
they may read and write to fulﬁll school required tasks such as assignments, whereas
outside of school they read and write to communicate, create, and participate. Teaching
secondary school students to be strategic in their approach to reading is essential to their
academic growth. The above issues point to a number of factors to be reconsidered at

both teacher education and policy formulation levels.

Recommendations for Teacher Education

Ever since the introduction of the localized Setswana syllabus in 1998, no
evaluation has been carried out to ﬁnd out how teachers cope with it. This study has
therefore provided data that gives us insights into teachers’ perspectives about this
syllabus. It has contributed to our knowledge about how secondary school teachers make
instructional decisions that may affect students’ literacy. The ﬁndings have indicated that
there are some gaps in language teacher education programs that need to be looked into.
Teachers in this study expressed that they were ill prepared by their programs to handle
the “new” syllabus (besides other internal and external constraints). According to socio-
constructivist views, teachers and learners are creators of socially constructed knowledge.
Teachers need to have an understanding and appreciation of the socio-cultural contexts of
the learners as particular areas of inﬂuence to learning. The school and the local

community should be important resources in the teacher preparation process. It is

161

important to determine if those aspects of the learner that are crucial to his/her learning,
notably his/her language and life experiences as derived from his/her culture are taken
into consideration as part of curriculum reform and teacher preparation.

Literacy teachers need to have knowledge about language and learning, literacy,
and instructional debates surrounding the teaching of language, literacy, and culture. It is
vital that courses on second language teaching methods are introduced at teacher
education level. Setswana and English are either second or third languages to many
students, yet teachers are not equipped with second language teaching methods. Bell
hooks (1994) calls on the need for teachers at all levels to transform their pedagogical
processes in the current age of multiculturalism. She points out that most people were
taught in classrooms where styles of teaching reﬂected the notion of a single norm of
thought and experience, which were claimed to be universal. She argues;
“Multiculturalism compels educators to recognize the narrow boundaries that have
shaped the way knowledge is shared in the classroom. It forces us all to recognize our
complicity in accepting and perpetuating biases of any kind” (ibid, p.44). hooks calls
upon teachers to recognize and value all learners in the classroom. This suggests the
introduction of multicultmal education courses in at teacher education level.

Teacher education faculty should embark on research with teachers serving in
remote area schools to document the cultural life styles of the communities as well as
learning and teaching difﬁculties encountered in those areas. Such research could be
compiled into booklets to be used as resource materials in the courses offered.

The University of Botswana and afﬁliated colleges of education should introduce

language courses for the local languages that are not currently taught in schools (in View

162

of the recommendation that by the year 2016, all local languages will be taught in
school). Some of these languages are already taught in neighboring Namibia at university

level. Arrangements can be made to send interested candidates to study there.

Recommendations for Policy

There is need to conduct workshops for teachers to engage them in discussions
about the communicative syllabus and its assessment. Teachers need an understanding of
what communicative teaching entails as opposed to the traditional structural approach.
Clear and accurate assessment and reporting procedures must be put in place so that
teachers know how to assess the various sections of the syllabus. Since assessment
indicates what type of knowing and learning are valued, clearly speciﬁed assessment
criteria are required which measure the attainment of cognitive objectives such as levels
of abstraction and critical engagement.

The long pending continuous assessment must be implemented. Teachers should
be guided as to how they could conduct continuous assessment so that they can teach the
unexamined topics through project work. Literacy as a social practice includes the
construction of knowledge, values, attitudes, beliefs and feelings associated with the
reading and writing of particular texts within particular contexts (e.g. Street 1984, Barton
& Hamilton 1998, Barton et al. 2000). It is through reading and writing varied texts, and
getting feedback ﬁ'om teachers that students’ literacy skills could be enhanced. There is
need to devise multiple ways of evaluating students so that we do not solely rely on paper

and pencil tests.

163

In-service training should be provided for serving teachers and education ofﬁcers
about issues of linguistic and cultural diversity to address the problem of negative attitude
towards Setswana as a school subject, as well as negative attitudes, prejudices and
misconceptions about ethnic minorities.

Some studies (e.g. Reitzug, 2002) have shown that among the many types of
professional development, recently emerging forms such as networks and Professional
Development Schools (PDS) have positive effects on both students and teachers.
Networks are when educators from across different schools interact regularly to discuss
and share practices around a particular focus (such as a new teaching method). The
interaction could be through meetings, cross—school or cross-classroom visitations or
through electronic forms of communication. Networks have been found to be effective in
helping teachers get students more actively involved in learning and professional
development of teachers. The focal teachers in this study did conﬁrm that they were
involved in some form of networks with teachers from schools in their district.

PDS are schools in which university faculty, PDS teachers, and student teachers
work collaboratively to enhance the student teaching experience and to improve the
professional development of teachers. This is done through activities such as teacher
study groups, curriculum writing, peer observation, case conferences and workshops.
Several outcomes of staff development that are affected by professional development
have been identiﬁed: teacher knowledge, teacher attitudes and beliefs, teaching practice,
school-level practice, and student achievement. Teacher professional development should
be seen as a process, not an event (Harwell, 2003). Sustained, systematic professional

development programs that unfold as processes over time rather than individual

164

workshops and seminars, which are one-time events, have proved to be productive in
other settings. Harwell argues that practices such as simply telling teachers that scores on
standardized assessments must improve is not enough to bring change. Before change can
take place, there must be a shared sense of need for change. If teachers agree about
problems and solutions, institutional change is possible. For Harwell, effective teacher
professional development and factors that contribute to its success should have the
following characteristics:

Context (or setting)

- Supports professional development and the changes it is intended to bring about.

- Is characterized by a shared sense of need for change.

- Is characterized by teaching professionals who agree on answers to basic questions
regarding the nature of learning and the teacher’s role in the classroom.

- Is characterized by teaching professionals consider learning a communal activity.
Content

Deepens teachers’ subject matter knowledge.

Sharpens classroom skills.

- ls up to date with respect to both subject matter and education in general.

- Contributes knowledge to the profession.

- Increases the ability to monitor student work.

- Addresses identiﬁed gaps in student achievement.

- Centers on subject matter, pedagogical weaknesses within the organization,
measurement of student performance, and enquiry regarding locally relevant

professional questions.

165

- Focuses on (and is delivered using) proven instructional strategies.
Process

- Is research based

- ls based on sound educational practice such as contextual teaching.
- Supports interaction among teachers

- Takes place over extended periods of time.

- Provides opportunities for teachers to try new behaviors in safe environments and

receive feedback from peers.

(Adapted ﬁom Harwell, 2003, p. 8)

This study has established that the current Setswana teaching syllabus is
translated and interpreted differently by teachers as well as textbook authors. In a system
that measures standards through national examinations, there is nwd for the Curriculum
Development Unit to devise a Setswana version of the current syllabus so that teachers

have a common understanding of the concepts they teach.

Limitations of the Study
This study focused only on ﬁve teachers based in one urban school who were all
female. The ﬁndings of the study can therefore not be generalized to other teachers and
schools throughout the country. Literacy perceptions of teachers and their instructional
practices may differ from one teacher to the other and from one school to the other. The
multicultural situation of the Botswana context also suggests that literacy teaching and

learning require different approaches in different schools. This suggests that the study

166

could have been more informative if more schools in different parts of the country were
studied, and also if the gender of the informants was balanced. The perception of males
and females may be different in matters relating to teaching.

The other limitation is that I did not observe any classrooms to complement the
data provided by teachers. I also did not interview students to get their perception of
literacy learning. What teachers reported might not be a true reﬂection of their
instructional practices; in this regard their information may not be reliable. Based on
these limitations, the section that follows offers suggestions that future research may

focus on.

Implications for Further Research

The importance of studying teachers’ perceptions in Botswana schools cannot be
underestimated since such research is rare. Research that focuses on teachers’ voices
would provide a valuable insight into restructuring and reform processes in education and
into new policy concerns and directives (Goodson, in Day, Fernandez, Hauge & Moller,
2000). Lortie (1975) in his study “The School Teacher” has long argued that:

It is widely conceded that the core transactions of formal education

take place where teachers and students meet . . . But although books

and articles instructing teachers on how they should behave are legion,

empirical studies of teaching work — and the outlook of those who staff

the schools — remain rare (p. vii).

167

Future research could target more schools in different parts of the country, and also
balance the gender of the informants as well their ethnic backgrounds. Such research
could be extended to primary school teachers and teacher educators in colleges of
education. Students and parents could also be included in the research.

It could be more meaningful if teacher educators could embark on research with
teachers serving among ethnic minority communities in different regions of the country
to document their cultural life styles as well as learning and teaching difﬁculties
encountered in those areas. As earlier noted, such research could be compiled into
booklets and used as resource materials in the courses taught. Future studies could

include schools in more diverse communities/ ethnic minorities.

Conclusion

This study has revealed that ofﬁcial documents acknowledge that there are
multiple ways of being literate, thereby advocating for a broader perception in the
teaching and learning of literacy. The main problem is that teachers have limited
understanding of what literacy entails and continue to use traditional approaches that are
examination driven and teacher-centered, treating students as people who have no
experiences, and not even recognizing that they come from diverse cultural backgrounds.
This is an indication that there is contradiction between policy and practice. Although the
syllabus is aimed towards being progressive and incorporates critical theoretical views,
teachers operate within the conﬁnes of the national examinations and thus do not enable

students to realize that literacy is part of their everyday social practices.

168

The multiple perspectives of literacy described in chapter 3 provide a broader and
richer view of what it means to be literate. They do point to a need for multiple-process
approaches to literacy education in pre-service teacher education programs. This would
eventually translate into effective literacy instruction in secondary schools. Equipping
students with the basic communication skills of reading, writing, speaking and listening,
problem solving, critical thinking, values and attitudes for responsible citizenship are the
main aims of the current secondary school Setswana syllabus (Republic of Botswana,
2000), which needs to be addressed starting ﬁ'om the teacher education level. A
meaningful education system should take into consideration people’s sociocultmal and
linguistic background in addition to their educational needs. From the sociocultural point
of view, becoming literate involves being apprenticed into ways of living with people as
much as being able to decode and encode print or symbols. Lastly, to have an educated
and informed nation by the year 2016 (Republic of Botswana, 1997) and beyond, there is
need to reconsider the aims of the literacy curriculum in terms of questions such as what
kind of literate individuals or society we aspire to have, so that we realign literacy

assessment with the major goals of teaching it.

169

APPENDIX A

Table 9: Unexamined Topics

 

Topic

General Objectives

Speciﬁc Objectives

 

Cultural
Heritage

Trace the developments of

cultural practices
community.

in their

- investigate cultm'al practices in
their communities associated with
societal values.

- discuss elements in their culture
that make them proud of their
personal origins as individuals,
ethnic groups and citizens of
Botswana.

 

Cultural
Values

Analyse and critically evaluate

their cultural values.

-discuss relevance of certain old
cultural practices in the modern
society.

- assess the inﬂuence of socio-
economic, historical and political
contexts on cultural practices found
in the modern community.

- express and justify their opinion
about the merits and demerits of
cultural practices in the community.
- suggest ways of conserving useful
cultural practices in the community.
- discuss ways of adapting useful
cultural practices to contemporary
life situations.

 

 

Cultural
Diversity

 

Trace the development of

cultural practices
communities.

in their

 

-discuss how some cultural
practices in their communities (such
as those associated with cutting of
trees, hunting, veld burning, grass
cutting etc.) relate to current
environmental issues.

- discuss cultural elements that are
common to all societies of
Botswana and distinguish them as a
people.

- volunteer to share information
about what they have read.

 

170

 

 

Culture
Reading

 

of

 

Make a habit of reading for
pleasure as well as interest and
knowledge.

- read and extract information from
a range of materials relevant to their
needs during and after schooling.

- articulate and discuss their own
assumptions, feelings about, and
attitudes towards what has been
read.

- communicate a sensitive and
informed personal response to what
is read.

- choose reading against any form
)f house entertainment.

 

 

(Adapted ﬁom the Botswana General Certificate of Secondary Education Teaching
Syllabus: Setswana, Ministry of Education, 2000).

171

 

APPENDIX B

Survey Questionnaire

 

 

 

 

Qualiﬁcation: Gender:
Subject taught: Level taught:
Number of years taught:

This is an open ended questionnaire; please feel free to answer as much as you can. You

may write at the back of the page or use an extra page. Thank you.

1. What do you understand by the notion of literacy/ what does being literate mean
to you?

2. When and how did you learn to read and write (what age, who taught you, family
literacy practices, etc)?

a) What purposes do reading and writing serve in your life? How often do you read
and write?

b) What kinds of materials do you read? What kinds of writing do you do?

3. What does it mean to teach reading and writing at secondary school level?

4. What is your opinion regarding the changes that have occurred in the

Setswana/English syllabus since localization of the curriculum in 1998?

172

5. How does the current curriculum (Setswana or English) deﬁne literacy?

a) What do you understand the curriculum to be telling you do to?

b) What kinds of reading do you do with your students?

c) What kinds of writing do you do/engage your students in?

d) What purposes do the above reading and writing tasks serve?
6. What is your view regarding the teaching syllabus and the examination syllabus? How
does this affect your teaching?
7. Tell me what you think about the textbooks and other resources that are used in your
teaching subject?
8. What is your perspective on the curriculum’s responsiveness to the needs of the
linguistically and culturally diverse learners in school?
9. How do you make sense of and come to understand students’ familiar literacy
experiences?
10. What recommendations do you have for preparing future teachers of Setswana and

English?

173

APPENDIX C

Interview Protocol

1. What do you understand by the notion of literacy/ what does being literate mean to
you?

2. The teaching of reading has always been associated with primary school teachers.
What does it mean to teach reading at secondary school level?

3. How much reading do you do with your students?

4. Do you have a library period scheduled for your classes as is the case in the English
department? How do you feel about this?

5. One objective in the current syllabus is that a culture of reading must be instilled in
students. How do you address this objective?

6. What kinds of writing do you engage your students in? What kinds of extended writing
tasks do you assign your students? What is your opinion regarding their performance and
level of writing?

7. What is your view regarding the changes that have occurred in the Setswana syllabus
since localization of the curriculum in 1998? Do you have any problems with the current
syllabus? If so, what problems? How do you address those problems? How does your
department address those problems?

8. What is your view regarding the teaching syllabus and the examination syllabus? What
do these mean to you? How do they affect your teaching?

9. Tell me what you think about the textbooks and other resources that are used in

Setswana?

174

10. What is your perspective on the curriculum’s responsiveness to the needs of the

linguistically and culturally diverse learners in school?

11. How do you make sense of and come to understand students’ familiar literacy

experiences?

12. What recommendations do you have for preparing future teachers of Setswana?

175

APPENDIX D

An investigation of teachers’ conceptions of literacy in Botswana

Consent Form

I am a PhD student at Michigan State University and conducting a study on the perceptions
of literacy in Botswana’s education system. The purpose of this study is to uncover, interpret
and illustrate the meanings teachers in Botswana associate with literacy teaching and learning
given the structural constraints of planned secondary school policies and curricula.

I would like to interview you and learn about your perceptions of literacy and your literacy
practices, both while you were at school and that you do as part of yoru life outside of school.
This would mean that I would arrange to spend sometime with you at your convenience to
talk to you about these issues. You allow me to interview regarding (1) the different kinds of
texts you read and write in your life both out of school and in school, and (2) the purposes for
which you read and write these texts. You also give consent for these interviews to be
recorded on audiotape and transcribed to inform the study of "An investigation of language
educators' conceptions of literacy in Botswana". These audiotapes will be stored in a locked
cabinetandonlylwillbeabletolistentothem.Whenlamtluoughwiththisstudy,lwill
erase the audiotapes and throw them away.

You also give consent for samples of the texts you read and write to be copied to further
inform the study. You give consent for these samples to be published or shared with an
audience as part of the process of sharing the results of this study.

Your name will always be held conﬁdential to the maximum extent allowable by law and
will never be revealed in any oral or written presentation of the results of the study. If any
samples of your writing are shared with others, either in live presentations or in print, your
identity will be masked. Finally, you may withdraw this permission at any time during the
course of the study without negative consequence either to you or your child

Participation in this study is voluntary, you may choose not to participate at all, or you may
refuse to participate in certain procedmes or answer certain questions or discontinue your

176

participation at any time without penalty or loss of beneﬁts. My contact information between
June 15th and August 30m 2005 while in Botswana is:

Annah Molosiwa, Telephone: 3901-394, P.O.BOX 70301, Gaborone, Botswana. email:
molosiwa@msu.edu

Your signature below indicates your voluntary agreement to participate in this study.

Signature of Research Participant: Date:

 

Your signature below indicates your voluntary consent to participate in this study
WITHOUT audiotaping.

Signature of Research Participant:
Date:

 

177

APPENDIX E

SENIOR SECONDARY SCHOOL

REGIONAL MID YEAR EXAM
SETSWANA PAPER 2
FORM 5
NAKO:lhr50mins
MATSHWAO:69
DlTAELO

1.Pampirieenaledikarolodiletharo.
2 . Araba dipotso tsotlhe ka Setswana se se lolarneng.
3 . Araba potso kgotsa dipotso go tswa mo karolong nngwe le nngwe .

4 . Kwala palo ya potso nngwe le nngwe fa gare ga tsela e seng kwa
tshirnologong ya yone.

5. Tlola tsela fa gare ga dikarabo tsa gago gore karabo nngwe le nngwe e
senoge sentle .

6. ngarela mola mo leﬂhakoreng lengwe le lengwe la pampiri ya gago ka fa
moj eng.

178

KAROLO YA NTLHA

Bala palo e e Iatelang 0 ho o araba dipotso tse di fa tlase:

Go phuaganngwa ga thuto ya Setswana ya tlhago, boemong jwa go tokafadiwa le go tlhabolwa
gore e tshwanele e be e amogelesege mo botshelong j'wa segompieno, go latlhetse Batswana
moko wa boleng jwa bone, le isago ya bana ba bone le segabone. Ka go latlha thuto e
gotlhelele, re latlhile motlhala 0 re neng re 0 neetswe ke batlapele, go kaela bana ba rona tsela
ya botshelo, go ba ruta go tlotla segabone le go itlotla. Maswabi a magolo ke gore ga re a e
emisetsa ka sepe; jalo re tlogetse bana ba rona ba paputla mo setlaatlaeng. Re nnetse go
ngomoga pelo fela, re ntse re re bana ba gompieno ba 3 re ....... ga ba re ..... ; jaaka ba moloba.

Re tlhoka go itse gore ka thuto va maloba. bana ba ne ba segelwa melelwane; go fatlhoga le go
aloga ga bone go tshwaetswe ka dipaakane tse di bonalang tse di tlhaloganyegang, tse di
popota. Go ne go na le nako e ngwana wa mosimane a neng a tewa go twe: 'Go tloga
gompieno o monna, jaanong 0 ka re ....... ; le gone 0 ka se ka wa re ...... !' Fela jalo le ka wa
mosetsana. Ngwana o ne a itse gore mogolo mongwe le mongwe ke motsadi wa gagwe. 0 ka
mo otlhaya ka phuthulogo ga a dira phoso.

Ka go rialo bana ba ne ba itshwara ka maitseo a a amogelesegeng mo morafeng otlhe, le mo
setshabeng ka kakaretso. Ba ne ba aga ba ikgabeditse mo boitshwarong jwa bone. Ba ne ba
itse gore 'nxa' ya mogolo ofe kapa ofe ke
phutso - dineelelo. Jalo ba ne ba tila phutso e ka go itshwara sentle. Gape
boitshwaro jo bo ne bo bopaganya batho. Ke ka moo go tweng 'moroto wa yosi
ga o ele, go be go twe motho ke motho ka batho ba bangwe. Bana ba ne ba
itse gore ngwana o sa utlweng molao wa batsadi, o utlwa wa maanong. Ba
rutwa go emelelana le botshelo ka bobelotelele le bobelokgale, ba ikgapha mo
dikotsing.

Mo thutong ya segompieno e go tweng ke ya tlhabologo, re na le eng se se re thusang go
raya ngwana re re 'go tloga gompieno, o monna kgotsa mosadi ....?' Re na le motlhala ofe 0 re
kaelang bana ka one gore ba dire eng, ba seka ba dira eng? A thuto ya rona ya gompieno e
kgona go betla botho jwa ngwana, go mo dira motho yo 0 botho; yo 0 ipelang ka se a leng sone?
Kampo e mo dira gore a inyatse, a itshwabele; a iphutse go bo ale montsho, a bua puo e a e
buang?

179

Re tshwanetse go ipotsa gore fa bana ba rona ba ikgatlha ba bua puo ya sekgoa, le ba le bosi
tota; gore fa ba tsaya gore go itse sekgoa go go dira 'motho yo 0 botoka'; gore fa ba itshasa
ditlolo tse di feletsang di ba kgobotse matlalo, ba ntse diphisetso; gore fa ha a tie ba reke
meriri ya maitirelo ba e rwale mo ditlhogong; fa ba a nwa majalwa, ba goga metsoko ba sa
ntse ba buduletse; bana ba tshola ba bangwe; bana ba sa thole ba tlotla bagolo, re le kwa ga
mmapereko - tota matsapa di a tsaya kae? Re tshwanetse ra ipotsa gore ke eng bana ba
babotlana ba itshwaetsa ka dikgole. A jaana re se ne re di tlhaolela di bekerwe, fa ga jaanong
re tlogetse lesomo le itsamaisa mo pakeng e e diphatsa ya tlhakatlhakano ya dingwao le
ditso? Tlhang ba ba nang le matlho ga ba di tshwara teu ba nna ba re 'tsela ga se e0, ke e!'
Kgangkgolo ke gore, re tlaa tsoga re botsa mang gore di fapogile fa kae, fa re sa ipotse gone
gompieno?

Ga twe ngwao ya Setswana e buselediwe jaaka e ne e ntse; ka bogwera 1e
bojale. Ga go twe bana ba tswale ditshega le makgabe. Nnyaa! Dipaka di
fetogile, mme ga go yo 0 ka emang dipaka pele. Potso ya botlhokwa ke gore, a re tlhomamise
gore, mo thutong ya maloba ya Setswana go ne go se na sepe se se ka beng se re tswa thuso
gompieno mo kgodisong ya bana ba rona? A go ne go se na jaaka e ka tlhabololowa go dira
gore e tsamaelana le matshelo le tswelelopele? A go us go se na sepe se re ka neng re setse
ka sone go nonotsha thuto ya gompieno? A go re humisitse dipelo go e tsaya re e furunyetsa
kwa mananeng? A ka go e latlha re bo re e nyonya, re amogetse sengwe se se botoka tebang
le kago le kgodiso e e lolameng ya bana ba rona? A thuto ya gompieno e oketsa botho jwa
bana ba rona kgotsa e a bo nyaletsa? A mo dingwageng tse di masome matlhano tse di tlang
bana ba rona ba tlaa bo ba ipela ka Botswana wa bone?

Kgangkgolo fa ke gore a thuto e me e e bopang botho jwa ngwana le boene
jotlhe, e seng e e mmetlelang go nna motlhanka; jaaka o kare thuto ga e kgone
go betla motho gore a ikemele ka nosi - a ipela a b0 3 ikgantsha ka boene.
Motho yo 0 nrtegileng, e nne yo 0 sobegileng, yo 0 rekegelang ba bangwe le
ditsabone, 3 ba tlotla go be e le batho, e seng ka go bo e le bo Semangmang. 0
tshwanetse go tlhaloganya gore kwa ntle ga maitseo a a laolweng ke ngwao ya
Setswana, matsapa a; thuto ya gagwe ke lefela la lefela.

DIPOTSO:
1. Tlhalosa dielana tse di Iatelang ka fa di dirisitsweng ka teng:

a) ba paputla mo setlaatlaeng (temana ya 1)
b) ba aga ba ikgabeditse (temana ya 3)
c) ba buduletse (temana ya 5)

180

2. Bolela gore dikarolo tsa puo tse di segetsweng mo temaneng ya bobedi di
dirisitswe jang?

a) ka thuto ya maloba (tselana ya 10)
b) ba ne ba segelwa (tselana ya 10)

c) jaanong (tselana ya 13)
d) Ngwana (tselana ya 14)
3. Fa leganetsi la lefoko: tswelelopele (temana ya 7)

4. Ke eng mokwadi a dirisa dipotso tse di sa tlhokaneng le dikarabo mo
temaneng ya bone?

5. Ntsha ntlhakgolo ya temana ya 6.

6. Inola rmafoko ale mararo a a tlisang tomagano mo temaneng ya 3.
7. Bolela bokao jwa mafoko a a ntshofaditsweng. (temana ya b)
8. Tsenya makopanyi a a tshwanetseng mo seeleng se se fa tlase:

A thuto ya rona ya segompieno e kgona go betla botho jwa ngwana
go mo dira motho yo 0 botho a be a ipela ka se a leng sone?

9. Kgangkgolo ya palo e ke eng?

10. a) 0 akanya gore batsadi ba ba ka baiang paio e ba ka tsaya
kgato efe?

b) Ke eng 0 rialo?
11. Inola seele sa tlhogo sa temana ya 3.
12. Inola tiri le tlhalosi mo seeleng se se fa tlase:

A mo dingwagena tse di masome a matlhano tse di tlang, bana ba
rona ba tlaa bo ba ipela ka Botswana jwa bone?

TOTAL MARKS

181

(2)
(2)

(2)
(2)
(2)

(2)

(3)
(2)

(2)

(2)

(.1)

(1)

(2)
[30]

KAROLO YA BOBEDI
Bala pego e e latelang mme morago o arabe dipotso tse di bodiwang ka ga yone:

Ba Botswana Craft ba ne ba tshwere moletio wa bone wa ngwaga le ngwaga o o bidiwang
Letlhafula. Ka moletio 0, ba ne ba supa boswa jwa ngwao ya bone ya Setswana ka go
farologana ga yone. Fa o ne 0 batla go bona matshelo a metseselegae 0 le mo Gaborone, o ne 0
ka kgabolela ka kwa Botswana Craft fela wa ya go intsha pelo.

Go ne go le monate. O ne 0 ka 0 ja ka tse di jewang di ne di le dintsi thata. Go
sirnolola ka motsotsojane, moretlwa, mokuru le tse ditona tsa setso di ne di
setilwe sentle. Ke sa bue ka kgora ya mpa fela Le ka matlho diala a a sa jeleng
ope sepe, o ne 0 ka ja wa kgotsofala. Mongwe le mongwe yo 0 neng a eletsa go
bona ngwao ya Setswana o ne a le koo. Ngwao ya Setswana e ne e go
kgatlhantsha fela jaaka o tsena ka kgoro.

O ne 0 kgatlhantshwa fela ke sehikantswe sa'monna wa motsomi a sikere ditlhabani, a na le
ntsa ya gagwe. Sehikantswe se go ne go bonala se kgatlhile ba 1e bantsi jaaka baeng ka go
farologana ba ba ba sa se fete fela.

Go ne go bopilwe gape le segotlo, 53 ba sa dilwa sa kgaphiwa ka botswerere ka boloko. Mo
teng ga segotlo se, ga b0 go le mefuta ya ditilo tsa Setswana ka go farologana. Dipora le ditilo
tsa dikgole tsa makanangwane di ne di beilwe sentle. Go ne go le gape sebeso mo segotlong
seo. Barulaganyi ba tiro e ba tlhoma gape bojalwa jwa Setswana, mokuru o nowa o tswa mo
dipitseng tsa letsopa

Mme mongwe o ne a le foo a itirile mmaseapei jaaka a ne 3 ntse a tshepholela ba ba batlang go
utlwa bojalwa joo ka sego. Banwi ba be ba nwa ka dingwana jaaka bone Batswana ba maloba
tota. Kgakalanyana fale, ga b0 go tlhomilwe ntlo ya mogwaafatshe: ke kago e e tumileng mo
morafeng ya Sesarwa. E ne e kgatlhisa thata. Bojang jwa yone bo ne b0 lebega ekete ga e bolo
go tlhongwa foo. Mo teng mogwaafatshe o o ne 0 feetswe ka botswerere.

Fa o okamela, o ne 0 bona magapu ale mebedi fale, a mangwe ale mebedi ka fale. Go ne go na
1e sekupunyana gape mo teng le dithobanyane. Ka fa ntle ga mogwaafatshe 0, ga bo go le
kutla, e leng bonno jwa koko. Fa o tlosa matlho o leba fale, e ne e le matshelo a a
farologaneng. Dipitsa tse 18 ka palo di le mo isong. Go kgarnathetswee jaaka go phetsolwa ka
fa le ka fa. Ke tsone tsa morafe o o neng o apeetswe batho ba ba neng ba phuthegile.

182

Go me go tlhabiwa mainane, go le mmino wa borankana. George Swabi,
Masilonyane Radinoga le setlhopha sa mmino wa Setswana sa Mogwana, ba ne
ba le teng mo lenaneong go nateﬁsa maitiso a ka mmino le moopelo.

(Pego e e tswa mo pampiring ya Naledi— e fetotswe fale le fate.)

l3

14

15.

l6.

l7.

l8.

Soboka pego e o sa tswang go e bala ka mafoko ale 100 go ya
go 150.

Maikeelelo a moletlo wa letsatsi la Letlhafula ke eng? Inola seele
go tlatsa karabo ya gago.

Dirisa 1ekaelagongwe la lefoko 'sebeso' (temana ya 4) mo seeleng

Seﬁkantswe sa monna wa motsomi yo 0 sikereng ditlhabani a na le
ntsa ya gagwe, se kaya eng mo botshelong jwa Motswana?

A o bona pego e e ka solegele banana molemo? ltlatse ka lebaka.

Ntlhakgolo ya temana ya bobedi ke eng?
TOTAL MARKS

KAROLO YA BORARO

RANOLELA PALO E E LATELANG KWA SETSWANENG:

I remember the day as if it was yesterday. It was one chilly evening when people were called
to the kgotia in Mochudi and informed that independence was on the cards and that the
country will no longer be called Bechuanaland Protectorate, but Botswana, as of September
30, 1966. l was a 12 year old boy and I remember I was clad in my khaki uniform during that

historic meeting.

Every one was told to go and prepare for the big day. I did not understand the
importance of what was being said. But I was just as excited as everyone else.
Residents of all wards in Mochudi converged at their respective dikgotla to
discuss the best way of celebrating the important day. Independence Day was a
day like no other. It arrived with a bang and was celebrated with pomp and
(10)

ceremony across the country by jubilant Batswana.

(Source: Daily news, TTuo'sday .hme2, 2005)

183

(10)

(3)
(1)

(2)
(2)

(2)
[201

APPENDIX F
NALEDI SENIOR SECONDARY SCHOOL
MID YEAR EXAM FORM 4

SETSWANA PAPER 11

DURATION : [hr 50 mins

DITAELO

Araba dipotso tsotlhe ka Setswana se se lolameng

Tlola tsela fa gare ga potso nngwe 1e nngwe gore karabo nngwe le nngwe e tswe
sentle.

Dirisa tsebe e ntsha go sirnolola karolo nngwe le nngwe.

Araba dikarolo tsotlhe.

184

 

KAROLOYA NTLHA

ngololwagotsayaourafelamokarolongemr)
Bala poho e 0 ho o araba dipotso tsotlhe tse di e latelang.

Lesoletshajwalebaibai.Gobegwagalonegogarolapelo,lefantswabaitsefalesolemothoe
lediyathotengdibapile.BomsijwabaﬂrobotsenwaketsebetsebefabaIwalanmrebalemoga
fabakaswa. Baswelwabmebasalabalemomahutsmmglenmﬂrataaditshmyegelo,tsa
phitlho . Boammaanni ke gore, fa motho a tlhokafala, ke tshimologo ya ditshenyegelo . Sa
ntlhakemadiannnoslrmadijokwamerapelongbogolojangteeleborotho,seshabo,tantele
lekesi kana diphutho. Ka jalo ditshenyegelo tsa leso mo lefatsheng leno di lopa madi a a
boitshegangMomalatsingano,golebegagonalekgaisanoeemasetlamodiphitlhong.Mogo
tsedingwegojewadijotsameﬁnaﬁitafabaswibaﬁtlhwakamakeseaaunang,amanobonobo.

MoBotswanaretlwaetsegobolokabaswikamafeloabekemmesesegakatsa
ditshenyegeloBatswana ba dumela gore moswi o tshwanetse go hutsafalelwa 1e go
ga_kologelwa pele a ka bolokwa .Ba dumela Mk0 e o, e e fa ba_hutsaf_adi kgomotso . ba
itlhobogababobalaelamoswi wabone . Kajaloditshenyegelotsonedintsediaoketsega
Gantsigapegagonkego akanngwaditshenyegelolematsapaaatshwananglegoyakgormye,
matlhakung, go feela kana go tlhagolajarata 1e yone fela nako e batho be e senyang ba letile
phitlho.

BmﬂsijwabaﬂwbadnnehgmediphiﬂmmadeswmndiSaephdceloeseleGodmnwa
madiammnsinnneebﬂebmrgwebammrehfajammgbmgwebampaldnmotsabaekwa
dintshong .Baswi ba isiwa nubitleng ka dikoloi tsa manobonobo jaaka di-limoausin 1e
dikolotsam tsa maphatsiphatsi tse di gogwang di gokeletswe mo dikoloing tsa baswi. Iegale,
bangwebaregotswamomothonggmewenaobatlagoﬁtlhawagaenokatselaeentseng
janganmmmkegmeBmswmbababaekmgbaikwacﬁsitsemodikmnpmmgtsedi
ntsitsadiphitlho.ergwebaﬂmacﬁsitsemocﬁldrampharﬁngtsainsmancecﬁleﬂrmo,goyago
tsemre.Gorebatlebaipolokelegobolokabagabonekafababaﬂangkatengﬁongweseke
sonesesedirmggorediphitlhodingwemonoeboeletsedirileng.Kwagotsedingwego
hirwadikompmetsediapaymggofepabaﬂmbabatsﬂengpluﬂlmgkadijo.

Legalebangwebaregodirajaanagasegoikgantshammeelegofamoswitlotlalegomo
laelarnmogolegomorobatsasenﬂe.Kgarrgyadirrtslrolephiﬂlrokeeemashetlabangweba
regoboelwekwabogologolongkwadijokwadintslmgdinengdijewadisalokwadi 1e
bosulammeebiledinedipalagotsenakamaganoababangwe.

185

Bangwe bone ba re nnyaya, ke segologolo, segompieno ba bona se le botoka fela thata ka
jaana motho o kgonagothapakhamphani yadijo ,gonalegotlholabathobaﬁsiwake melelo
le dipitsakwadintshong. Kgangeetsweletsekagosekasekwammego lebegaeopisatlhogo,
me e bile e sa ka ke ya rarabololwa motlhofo. Ditshenyegelo tsone di tsweletse.

DIPOTSO

1. Fa temana e setlhogo . (2)
2 . Ntlhakgolo ya temana ya bobedi ke efe? (2)

3 . Tlhalosa dipolelwana tse di latelang jaaka di dirisitswe mo palong .
a) go mo robatsa sentle (1)
b) e opisa ditlhogo (l)
c) go garola pelo (1)
(1) ba tsenwa ke tsebetsebe (1)
4. Lebelela temana ya bofelo o bo o ntsha seele sa kabelelo (1)

5. Maikaelelo a mokwadi wa polelo e ke eng? Ntsha lebaka 1e 1e go gogelang go rialo. (3)
6. Lebelela seele se se latelang 0 b0 0 ntsha:

a) leamanyi (1)
b) letlhalosi (1)
c) tiri (1)

Boammaaruri kc gore Batswana ba ba berekang ba ikwadisiise mo dikomponeng tse
dintsi tsa phitlho.

7.Mokwadiosupafagobegwagalosogogaroladipelontswalesolemothoelediya
ﬂrotengdibapile.Ntshamabakaalemabediaadiranggmebathobagaroge dipelo. (2)

8. Bolelabokaojo bo ﬁwang ke karolo yapuo e e ntshofaditsweng . (2)
9. Ntslmlobakalelekagogogelanggmeochmelane lebangwebababorrengfa
diphitlho tsa bogogolo di le botoka (2)
10. Fao lebeletsetemame, obonabathobabasaitsholeiangbakafelelabatsere
tshwetso efe ka diphitlho tsa gompieno (2)

186

"lg-Time 7

 

ll .Supatirisoyadikarolotsedi latelangtsapuo mo dielengtsedi segetsweng.

a)Batswana (1)

b)Pele (1)

c)Bone (1)

12.60 yakafaotlhalogantseng palokateng, okaremolaetsa waone ke ofe? (2)

13.Faolebeletsepaloeokaremokwadiosekametsekakae?Keengorialo? (2)
KAROID YA BOBEDI

Bala temana e o bo o araba dipotso tse di latelang.

Mo dingwageng tse 10 tse di fetileng batho ba le 4083 ba bolailwe ke dikotsi tsa tsela mo
Botswana. Tota dikotsi tse di kanakana tse di bakwa ke eng? Go tabogisa koloi mo go
feteletseng, go kgweetsa motho a iphetisitse dinotagi ke mangwe a mabaka a matona a
abakang dikotsi. Koloi e e thulang e le mo lebelong le legolo e dira tshenyo e e maswe thata
le dikgobalo tse masisi. Ke sone se moono wa ipabalelo tseleng o reng "Bakgweetsi ngotlang
lebelo, lebelo le a bolaya."Lekalana la Ipabalelo Tseleng le na le tsholofelo ya gore moono 0
go tlaa bong go itebagantswe nao go ﬁtlhelela kgwedi ya Sedirnonthole monongwaga, o tla
kgothatsa bakgweetsi go ikitsa go tabogisa dikoloi phetelela le go bakela boitshwaro jo bo
diphatsa mo ditseleng. Se se solofelwa se tla tokafatsa seemo sa pabalesego mo ditseleng.

Palo ya bakgweetsi 1e b_ap§lami ba ba swang kgotsa ba golafala ka ntata ya gore ban e ba

iphetisitse dinotagi e ntse e le kwa godirno fela thata mo dingwageng tse di sa tswang go
fetatse 10. Se se diragala thata mo malatsing a boitapoloso. Ke fela fa Batswana ba ka

itebaganya le dikgwetlho tse pedi tse tsa gore go tabogisa mo go feteletseng 1e go kweetsa
motho a aiphitisitse dinotagi go diphatsa. E seng jalo maiteko a lekalana la Ipabalelo
Tseleng go fokotsa dikotsi e tla a bo le lefela. Batsarnaya ka dinao segolo bogolo bana, ba
mo diphatseng fa ba kgabaganya tsela. Badinao ba ba iphetisitseng dinotagi le bone ba mo
diphatseng. Ba dinao ban a le boikarebelogo tlhomarnisa gore ba kgabaganya tsela sentle .
Ba tshwanetse gape go gadirnantlheng tsothle go netefatsa gore go babalesegile go
kgabaganya tsela.

 

 

 

Dikoloi tse di sa itekanelang le boganana jwa bakgweetsi mo go obarneleng matshwao a tsela
le tsone di na le seabe mo dipalong tse di kwa godirno tsa dikotsi tsa tsela mo
Botswana.Leruo le le tlogelwang le sasanka mo ditseleng le lone 1e na 1e seabe mo dikotsing
tsa tsela.

187

 

Setshaba se ka tsenya letsogo ka go dirisanya le mapodisi go tlhomamisa gore melao ya tsela
e a obarnelwa. Se se ka tokafatsa fela thata pabalesego mo ditseleng. Gakologelwa ka
ngwaga wa 1981 go sule batho ba le 93, ka 1990 go sule bale 314, ka 1991 go sule bale 349,
me ngogola ka 2000 ga tlhokafala ba le 529 mo dikotsing tsa tsela. Dintsho di oketsega ka
lebelo le le tsitsibanyang mmele jaaka dipalo tse dif a godirno di supa. Tsaya kgato go
fokotsa dipalo tsa monongwaga. Tsaya kgato go boloka matshelo.

DIPOTSO

1. Soboka temana e ka mafoko a a sa feteng lekgolo le masome a matlhano.[150] [10]
2. Fa temana e setlhogo se se e lebanyeng. [l]
3. Mo seeleng se se segetsweng mo temaneng ya bobedi, inola;

a.Tlhalosi [l]
b.Lekopanyi [1]
4.Ntsha seele sa tlhogo mo temaneng ya ntlha [2]
5 Tlhalosa gore mafoko a a kwadilweng ka mokwalo o o tseneletseng a dirisitswe jang. [3]
6.Ka bokhutshwane bolela se 0 se ithutileng mo temaneng e. [2]

KAROLO YA BORARO

O solofelwa go tsaya metsotso e le masome a mabedi fela (20 minutes) mo
karolong e.

Ranolela kwa Setswaneng.

ThemnnmlNgmnﬂmdBadtaExmbiﬁmwasoﬂiciaﬂyopmedatNlmbeMusemmMmmlast
week. SpesldngatﬂreopmmgﬂeMusaunDheademFeﬂasaidﬂreexlnhiﬁmhasbeen
nmningforadeeadeandthisyear, over400basketswere exhibited Fellasaidthejudgeshada
difﬁcuhifnotnearmrpossibletaskmnmneﬂrewumesﬂeexlﬁbiﬁmcmnpeﬁﬁm.

Abasketweaver,NduheSanjerasaidthemlypmblemﬂreyfaceontheirxhrsuyisﬂremarket
addingthatthiswashisﬁrsttimetoattendtheexhibition. Hesaidwhenoneentersthebasket
wwwmeshaddnaermeammakeqtﬁckmmeyﬁsnmapeoplewmmydesememmiss
whobuyoccasionally.

Source (The Mirror 29" June 2005)

188

MINISTRY OF EDUCATION, BOTSWANA
in collaboration with
UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE LOCAL EXAMINATIONS SYNDICATE

Botswana General Certiﬁcate of Secondary Education

SETSWANA 0562/02

October/Novem ber 2003 1 hour 50 minutes
Paper 2 Comprehension, Summary and Translation

Additional Materials: Answer paper

Resdthefollowingenreﬁrllybefaeyoustart.

Follow the instructions overleaf.
You are advised to spend 1 hour on Section 1, 30 minutes on Section 2 and 20 minutes on

Section 3.
Write your answers on the separate answer paper provided.
Write your candidate number, name and centre number on each sheet of answer paper you

use.
At the end of the examination, fasten all of your work securely together using the string

provided.

189

 

(z) Pampiri e, e na le dikarolo di le THARO.
(ii) Araba diootso TSOTLHE go tswa mo karolong nngwe le nngwe.
(iii) Araba dipotso tsotlhe ka Setswana se se lolameng.
(iv) Simolola karolo nngwe le nngwe mo tsebeng e ntsha
(v) Kwala palo ya potso e o e arabang kwa tshirnologong ya tsela.
(vii) Tlola tsela fa gare ga dikarabo tsa gago gore karabo nngwe le nngwe e senoge sentle.
KAROLO YA NTU'IA

Osolofelwagotsayaouraﬂhnfela

mokarolonge.
Balapaloe,obooarabadipo&otsedielablang.

Ka kgwedi ya Hin'kgong ngwaga ono, metsi a a letswai a ne a penologela ka

phoso mo molapong wa Mathathane go ya go ﬁtlha kwa melapong ya

Letlhakane le Motloutse. Tiragalo e, e ne ya se ka ya itumedisa batho ka bontsi,
bogolo jang ka e bile ditlhapi tsa mefuta e e farologanyeng, di ne tsa bonwa fa godirno
ga metsi a noka ya Motloutse di ile ga maoto hunyela.

Molemi mongwe o ne a bua fa a latlhegetswe ke dijwalo tse di akaretsang
merogo ya sepiniche, khabeche Ie digwete ngogola ka ntlha ya tikologo e e
leswafaditsweng. O boletse fa kwa tshirnologong ba ne ba sa lemoge gore
mathata a dijwalo a bakiwa ke eng, fela ba ne ba Iemoga fa naga e ne e le
tshweu gongwe le gongwe. A re e ne ya re kwa morago ba lemoga fa mathata
a ne a bakwa ke metswako e e mo metsing a a tswang kwa moepong wa BCL.

Mogolwane wa meepo rre Mike Marsden, o ne a kopa gore ba inelwo diatla
metsing ka jaana kelelo e ya metsi, e ne e le lantlha e diragala gape ka ebile e
ne ya tlisiwa mo taolong ka bofefo morago ga 90 tsaya kgato ga bagolwane ba
moepo. Go ya ka mogolwane yo, metsi a a letswai a ne a tswa mo matamong
a moepo. 0 boletse fa go elela ga metsi mo, go ka b0 go sa diragala ka jaana
metsi a teng a ne a tshwanetse go gogelwa gape kwa moepong go ya go
din'siwa gape.

190

O ne 3 re go elela ga metsi a, go bakilwe ke dipula tse dintsi. A re dipula di
dirile gore diphaephe di 205e ka tsa kgona go goga metsi a a elang. 0
tlhalositse gore diphaephe di dikologile matamo a a tsenyang metsi gore di tie
di goge metsi a a dutlang fa go gogelwa metsi a a phepa kwa letamong Ia
metsi a a nowang.

Rre Mike Marsden o boletse fa go elelela ga metsi a mo nokeng ya
Mathathane, e ne e le phoso. mme a tlatsa ka gore metsi a eleletse mo nokeng
ka ba ne ba sa kgona go a goga nako e sa le 25 teng. O boletse la a tshepha
gore metsi a0 a ne a ka se ka 3 leswefatsa metsi a a nowang ke batho le
diruiwa ka noka ya Letlhakane e ne e ela nako eo. Go itshireletsa mo nakong e
e tlang, ba moepo wa BCL ba rekile diphaephe le dipompo tsa madi a a kana
ka P2 million, tse go neng go boletswe fa di tla gokelwa mo nakong e
khutshwane.

Ntlha e nngwe ya tikologo e e opisang tlhogo ka Selibe—Phikwe, ke ya gase
ya Sulphur Dioxide. 30 Go ya ka moitseanape wa tikologo wa BCL, Mike
Hagger, gase ya sulphur dioxide e ka oketsa mathata a khupelo. Le fa go
ntse jalo, o tlhalositse fa motho yo 0 itekanetseng 3 ka se amege motlhofo
bogolo jang mo lobakeng le Ie khutshwane. Hagger o kaile gape fa mosi o o
tswang mo moepong 0 se borai mo dijwalong ka jaana ditlhare tsa mosu di
kgona go gola mo kgaolong e. Ngaka ya moepo, Dr John Penhall, o boletse fa
gase ya sulphur dioxide e baka bolwetse jwa 35 khupelo mme e sa bake
malwetse a kankere ya makgwafo le kgotlholo e tona jaaka bangwe batho ba
akanya. A re dipalo tsa balwetse ba khupelo mo Selibe-Phikwe di tshwana fela
Ie tsa mafelo a mangwe. Dr Penhall a re tota le fa go twe gase e ga e
diphatsa, e kgona go nna diphatsa mo babereking ba meepo e e ﬁtlhelwang
mo go yone, ka jalo, go botlhokwa gore babereki ba itshireletse ka go thiba
melomo Ie dinko fa ba tsena mo moepo.

Go tsewa ga motlhaba kwa nokeng ya Motloutse go dirisiwa mo moepong wa
BCL, ke nngwe ya dilo tse di tlisang mathata a tikologo mo Selibe-Phikwe.
Hagger o boletse fa jaanong moepo o dirile dithulaganyo le ba kompone ya
Nata Haulage go ba tlisetsa motlhaba. Kompone e, ga e letle go kgaolwa ga
ditlhare ka e rotloetsa pabalelo ya tikologo. Hagger o kaile fa a lebogela
maiteko a mogolwane wa moepo a go laola seemo sa tikologo mo 45 Selibe-
Phikwe, a ho a bua gape gore Marsden ke mogolwane wa ntlha wa moepo go
etela mafelo a a amegileng le 90 thusa go mlaganyetsa phuthego go tla go
buisanya ka mathata a.

191

 

 

DIPOTSO

l

Tlhalosa mafoko kgotsa dielana tse di latelang go ya ka fa di dirisitsweng ka teng mo palong.

(i) penologela [temana2]
(ii) e e opisang tlhogo [temana?]
(iii) di ile ga maoto hunyela [temana2]
(iv) ba inelwe diatla metsing [temana 4] [4] ’
2 Mo seeleng se se latelang tlhopha tiri, sediri le lesupi. F
Kmrrpmeeerotloetsapabaleloyatikologo. [3] 1
3 Bolela gore mafoko kgotsa dielana tse di latelang di dirisitswe jang mo
palong e.
(i) tsa motlhaba [temana 1]
(ii) ka bofefo [temana 4]
(iii) mogolwane yo [temana 4]
4 (a) Bolela kgang-kgolo e mokwadi a buang ka yone mo palong e. [1]
(b) Ntsha dintlhana di le pedi tse mokwadi a di dirisitseng go netefatsa kgang ya gagwe.
5 Mo temaneng ya boferabobedi (8), Dr Penhall go lebega a ikganetsa. Tlhalosa go ikganetsa mo,
ka botlalo. [2]
6 (a) Fa o bona maikaelelo a mokwadi wa palo e, ke go kgala, go tlhalosa kana go rotloetsa? [l]
(b) Ntsha lebaka go netefatsa karabo e o e ﬁleng fa godirno. . [2]
7 (a) Fa e le gore banni ba Selibe—Phikwe ba ba sa berekeng mo moepong, ba dumela fa gase etsenya
matshelo a bone mo diphatseng, o tsaya gore morago ga go bala palo e be ka felelaba akanya
jang?
(b) Netefatsa karabo ya gago ka lebaka le le lengwe. [2]

192

8 Tlhalosa bokao jwa dikarolo tsa puo tse di latelang go ya ka fa di dirisitsweng ka teng.

(i) Le fa go ntse jalo [2]
(ii) gape [2]

9 Inola seele sa tlhogo mo temaneng ya ntlha.
10. Seele se se fa tlase se tlhoka makopanyi ale mabedi. Se kwalolole me o tsenye makopanyi

a a lebanyeng.
Go tsewa ga motlhaba mo nokeng ya Motloutse ----- go kgaolwa ga ditlhare --- le

goleswefdsaﬂefogarmqrokedhrgwetsedingmgmegismgbdlnbatxopoe [2]

11 Thuto e mokwadi wa palo e, a e abelang babadi ke efe? [2]

193

KAROLO YA BORARO

Ogrkololwagotsayametsotsoeb-meme-annbedim)mokambnge
Ranoldatemanaeehtdangkwanswarmg.

Trees are a source of life. For instance animals eat their leaves, ﬁ'uits, branches and roots.
People gather [hits and sell them to get money. They also provide us with a source for
medicine. For example, Mosukujane and Morolwane roots are used as blood puriﬁers. Trees
also serve as wind-breaks and as such they help prevent soil erosion. Trees should be

planted with crops. They have long roots, so they do not compete with plants for nutrients.

Trees need to be conserved because they add nutrients to the soil and make the environment
beautiful. After cutting down trees, people are advised to replant more trees and they are
also encouraged to take part in tree planting campaigns. They should also be aware of the
dangers of wild ﬁres as these destroy the environment. [10]

194

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