Only for a special few
I was once invited to be a guest speaker at a conference of Association of French Teachers. I accepted the invitation partly because I have a special interest in the French language.
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As I was a Minister of State at the Education Ministry at the time, I knew I couldn’t be seen to be anything but complimentary to teachers.
But I decided I would say what was on my mind rather than try to please the gathering. I took a deep breath and I said they who were the teachers of French in our schools were failing us because they had decided their subject should be regarded as a difficult subject that can only be mastered by the few very talented children.
Such a premise, of course, presupposes that the teachers were themselves special and it was not surprising that they wanted to be treated as such. The importance of the subject had been recognised for economic and political reasons since we are surrounded by French-speaking countries.
Over the years there had been various attempts to improve the learning of French but we did not have very much to show for it. Yet everybody who attends secondary school in the neighbouring countries of Togo, Burkina Faso and La Cote d’Ivoire, which surround us, is able to make himself understood in English.
I went to secondary school in Ghana, have an “A” Level in French, I can read it and just about make out what is being said when it is spoken around me, but cannot speak it to save my life.
How come, I asked the teachers, that Ghanaian children on the streets of Accra and in various military and police barracks can speak about four different languages without any difficulties but when it came to teaching them French, it is suddenly such a big problem?
French perfection
Since the French Ambassador to Ghana was in the audience, I decided I couldn’t let the opportunity go without getting in a pet theory of mine about the French and their language. I suggested that the French were too insistent on everybody speaking their language “correctly”. Every word had to be sanctioned by the French Academy; the grammar had to be exact, the pronunciation had to be on the Sorbonne University scale.
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Our French teachers had adopted this French attitude and were frightening off generations of Ghanaian children from learning the language.
The British, on the other hand, did not mind how much you mangled their language, therefore, we all spoke some English, no matter how badly. Relax please, I said, and do not assume a child had to be an Einstein to be able to learn French. I am not sure how successful my diatribe was in changing attitudes. The French Ambassador did tell me it would be acceptable if I would speak French at half the level I spoke English.
Later on I decided I had probably been speaking to the wrong group, because the people who wanted only little Einsteins to be in their classes were the Mathematics teachers. They make no secret about it.
I know exactly the day and time Mathematics became a subject I was not good at. Up until then I had been happy with it and I was doing reasonably well in the class. Then he (a certain teacher who shall remain nameless at the moment) walked in and my relationship with Mathematics changed forever.
Since this is a sore point with me I shall not dwell on it except to say that I have been following with great interest, the recent uproar about a certain Mathematics and Science survey that ranked Ghana at the bottom of the list. I have noted the spirited defence that the Minister of Education has put up, especially her point that the survey was of only 76 countries out of 195 countries in the world and there were only five African countries on the list. But I was very relieved to read that the Ministry does acknowledge that we have a problem with Mathematics and Science.
Serious subjects
Professor Sitsofe Anku, the Director of the Meagasa Mathematics , who is helping the ministry to help train many of the Mathematics teachers, is quoted as saying that many of them had themselves failed the subject when they were at school.
Professor Anku has been teaching Mathematics long enough and has achieved enough success for his views to be taken seriously.
But as I have told the good Professor on occasion, the problem starts with the belief that Mathematics is such a difficult subject only very smart children can cope with it. It certainly also used to be the case that the Mathematics teachers, who used to be mostly male, had in their midst some that were misogynists and did not want any girls in their class.
I think we all now agree that this country is not going to make much progress unless all our children in school become comfortable with Mathematics and Science. That will not happen for as long as these subjects are perceived as subjects that can only be tackled by children with high IQs and are deemed not to be fun subjects but “serious” subjects. How can it be that if a subject brings a smile to your face, or God forbid, makes you laugh, then it is an “easy” subject?
I recall that there used to be a popular story about a Professor of Mathematics at the University of Ghana who took special pride in the fact that more than half the number of students who enlisted in the first year class would not make it into the second year as Mathematics students; they would fail.
He wore it as a badge of honour that very few students could pass his subject and he probably thought it reinforced his reputation as the extraordinarily bright student he had been.
I am not quite sure how we will cure this problem but we do need to find a way to reassure the Mathematics and Science teachers that if the subjects they teach become popular, they will not lose their aura of being special.
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Who knows, the French teachers might even be persuaded to accept that it is better for the whole class to speak some French than to keep it to a small and special corner.