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Language-in-education policies in Southeast Asia

Language-in-education policies in Southeast Asia. Kimmo Kosonen SIL International & Payap University Chiang Mai, Thailand. Many ethnolinguistic minority (and other) groups face a ‘ language barrier ’ in education. ‘Language barrier’ – Access.

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Language-in-education policies in Southeast Asia

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  1. Language-in-education policies in Southeast Asia Kimmo Kosonen SIL International & Payap University Chiang Mai, Thailand

  2. Many ethnolinguistic minority (and other) groups face a ‘language barrier’ in education

  3. ‘Language barrier’ – Access

  4. 60 Million Out-of-School Girls (Lewin & Lockheed, 2007) • Nearly 70% of out-of-school girls belong to the ethnic, religious, linguistic, racial and other minorities, • Many ethnolinguistic minorities are poor in remote rural areas, • Significant increases in primary education have not helped these “doubly disadvantaged” girls, • Language of education is a reason for exclusion, • Mother tongue-based bilingual education can help get girls in school and learn. --------------------------------------------------------------------- • World Bank (2005): “50% of the world’s out-of-school children live in communities where the language of schooling is rarely, if ever, used at home”

  5. ‘Language barrier’ - Quality Thailand – surveys on educational quality • Minority children with poor Standard Thai skills had 50% lower learning results than Thai-speaking students in all main subjects • About 13% of Grade 2 students could not read or write Standard Thai • Over 25% of students in 10 education areas have problems in reading and writing Standard Thai • A reason: teachers and students speak different languages

  6. Quality of Literacy in OECD’s PISA (2000-2002) report • In Indonesia 69% of 15-year-old students performed at or below the lowest of five proficiency levels for reading literacy. • (94% at level 2 or below) • In Thailand the figure was 37% • (74% at level 2 or below) http://www.pisa.oecd.org

  7. Language policy • Legislation on (and/or practice of) the use of languages in a society Language-in-education policy & practice: • Language (or medium) of instruction (LoI) • Language of literacy

  8. Key Concepts • Mother tongue – first / home language – L1 • Local & regional language • Subject of study vs. language of instruction • Oral use of a language • An auxiliary language helping learners understand • Bilingual / multilingual education (MLE) • Mother tongue- / L1-based MLE • First language first MLE • Mother tongue as a ‘bridge’

  9. Sustainable strong programmesof mother tongue-based multilingual education … What do they look like?

  10. The World According to Linguistic Diversity The New York Times, 19 July 2005 Data: Ethnologue, 2005

  11. Number of Languages spoken in Asia Country Languages • Indonesia 742 • India 427 • China 241 • Philippines 180 • Malaysia 147 • Nepal 125 • Myanmar 113 • Vietnam 104 • Lao PDR 86 • Thailand 83 • Pakistan 77 • Iran 75 • Afghanistan 51 • Bangladesh 46 • Kazakhstan 43 Country Languages • Uzbekistan 40 • Tajikistan 33 • Kyrgyzstan 32 • Bhutan 31 • Singapore 30 • Turkmenistan 27 • Cambodia 24 • Timor Leste 19 • Brunei 19 • Japan 16 • Mongolia 15 • Sri Lanka 7 • Korea, South 2 • Maldives 2 • Korea, North 1 TOTAL: ~ 2200 Source: Ethnologue (2005) (30 countries)

  12. National or Official Languages in Asia • Portuguese, • Russian 2, • Sanskrit, • Santhali, • Sindhi 2, • Sinhala, • Southern Pashto, • Tajiki, • Tamil 2, • Telugu, • Tetum, • Thai, • Turkmen, • Urdu 2, • Vietnamese, • Western Farsi • Assamese, • Bengali (Bangla) 2, • Bodo, • Dogri, • Dzongkha, • Eastern Farsi (Dari), • Eastern Punjabi, • English 4 (1), • Filipino, • Gujarati, • Gurung, • Halh Mongolian, • Hindi, • Indonesian, • Japanese, • Kannada, • Kashmiri, • Kazakh, • Kirghiz, • Khmer, • Konkani, • Korean 2, • Lao, • Maithili, • Malay 3, • Malayalam, • Maldivian (Diwehi), • Mandarin Chinese 2, • Marathi, • Meitei, • Myanma, • Nepali 2, • Northern Uzbek, • Oriya, (50 languages) (22 in India) Source: Ethnologue (2005)

  13. Linguistic diversity is evident • Few monolingual nations • Many education systems use only one language

  14. Languages-in-education: SEA • National languages used as the main media • Brunei, Malaysia, thePhilippines and Singapore use several languages as media of instruction (including English) • Brunei, Laos and Singapore do not use local languages at all • Laos uses national language only • Myanmar has NFE in LLs by NGOs only • Cambodia, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam have pilot MLE projects which use local languages • Cambodia, Thailand and Timor Leste reviewing their language-in-education policies (inclusion of local languages?)

  15. Regional Trends in the Use of Local Languages in Education • Promising pilots in several SE Asian countries • Increased interest in the use of local languages by govt agencies, UN agencies, INGOs, local NGOs • Local languages used more in NFE than FE • Local languages used orally quite widely, even without official endorsement • NGOs provide more education in local languages than governments • Policies on paper vs. implementation & practice

  16. Thank you! kimmo_kosonen@sil.org

  17. Key Issues 1– Language-in-education policies Rationale for policies supporting the use of local languages: • Educational efficiency and quality • Social, political, and economic participation • Social equality & equity • Language endangerment, maintenance, and revitalization • Multilingualism, pluralism • Human rights

  18. Key Issues 2– Language-in-education policies Rationale for monolingual and elitist policies: • Economic factors - Multilingual education is too costly • National unity - Using many languages in education disintegrates the nation • Power issues - Distribution of power, decentralization

  19. Key Issues 3– Language-in-education policies Rationale for monolingual and elitist policies: • Misunderstanding of language & education issues and multilingualism - Using several media of instruction confuses students, - Using non-dominant languages will delay the learning of dominant (national, official, international) languages, - Parents want the national/international language only, as they don’t understand multilingual approaches

  20. Key Issues 4– Language-in-education policies Rationale for monolingual and elitist policies: • Technical and ‘logistical’ challenges - Non-dominant languages: no orthographies, ‘modern’ terminology & standard form - No literature and learning materials - No teachers speaking non-dominant languages - Multilingual classrooms / linguistic diversity in schools - Minority communities not interested (or this is what the decision-makers think) - MLE not seen as high priority by donors / program implementers

  21. Key Issues 5– Language-in-education policies Rationale for monolingual and elitist policies: • Policies vs. implementation - Supportive policies exist in documents, but policies not implemented • Colonial “legacy” and example - Colonialists supported elitist and dominant language only-policies - Major issue in Africa, less so in Asia • Language classification

  22. Language classification Ethnicity vs. language e.g. the Thai in Vietnam

  23. Additional issues • Role of media (TV, Radio, Internet, print) • Role of English

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