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Introduction
The concept of Education for All, as operationalized by the Millennium Development Goals,
drives current efforts in educational development. The assumption underlying the expansion of
formal basic education to all children is that this education will improve their opportunities to
have healthy, productive lives. Further, it is generally agreed
that schools should provide
equitable access to educational services regardless of a learner’s gender, ethnicity, language,
religion, or other characteristics. However, the reality is that even if children get to school, the
types of teaching and learning they are offered seldom meet their diverse needs.
In this context, countries around the world have paid increasing attention to the quality of
teaching and learning in schools, using assessment tools to measure key skills such as literacy
and numeracy. As assessment results have highlighted the failure of school systems to provide
effective learning, stakeholders’ attention has rightly turned toward
the issue of language of
instruction.
This document was designed as a practical response to requests from USAID’s Africa Missions,
which have increasingly indicated their need for more guidance on the role of language of
instruction (LOI) in their efforts to achieve Goal 1 of the 2011 USAID education strategy:
Improved reading skills for 100 million children in primary grades (USAID, 2011). This need
reflects a call by USAID in the Technical Notes of its 2011
USAID Education Strategy
(the
Bureau of Economic Growth Agriculture and Trade, Office of Education [EGAT/ED]), which
identified LOI among the seven areas in which Missions were likely to need technical assistance
or additional resources for designing or implementing early grade reading programs:
Language of Instruction: As reading is a process of learning to match sounds to symbols (letters),
it is much easier for students to learn to read in a language they speak and understand. A strong
foundation in a
first language, especially during the early years of school, is crucial to educational
success. In countries where appropriate language policies exist, USAID projects should be
designed in accordance with these policies. Where appropriate policies do not exist, USAID
should engage in policy dialogue with host country governments and partners in an attempt to
improve policy, as on other technical issues. (USAID, 2012b, p. 4)
A key factor in USAID’s—and others’—increased focus on language of instruction has been the
results of recent reading assessments, including the Early Grade Reading Assessment (EGRA)
administered in
sub-Saharan African countries, as well as international assessments, such as
those administered by the Southern and Eastern Africa Consortium for Monitoring Educational
Quality (SACMEQ). These assessments have consistently found that children in the early grades
do not demonstrate proficiency in basic reading skills, even when they are assessed in a familiar
local language. These assessments have prompted reflection on policies and practice around LOI
as they relate to learners’ ability to acquire literacy skills in a first and subsequent languages, and
thereby to access curricular content as well.
Although various organizations and authors have produced resources on the topic of language of
instruction in Africa (and other lower-resourced environments) in the past several years (see, for
example, Ball, 2011; Ouane & Glanz, 2010, 2011; Pinnock, 2011),
none has comprehensively
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addressed the specific programming and informational needs of USAID’s education officers and
their partners, particularly as they relate to USAID’s goal of improving early grade reading
outcomes, at both the system level and to the level of detail that is increasingly being needed by
USAID and others working to improve early grade reading and learning outcomes.
As such, this document is intended to serve as a summary of key research findings and best
practices relevant to USAID’s and other stakeholders’ programming efforts with respect to
language use in education, and as a resource for putting the evidence and lessons learned into
practice. The guidance is based on information assembled from a review of findings on language
use in education, particularly with respect to using familiar languages to provide instruction. This
review included academic research on language-of-instruction policies and practices, language
acquisition, and reading development, as well as documentation regarding country-level and
project-specific experiences and evaluations of efforts to provide instruction in L1, or other
languages familiar to children, and L2/Lx. Citations and resources included in this guide are
those that have been identified as the most relevant to USAID’s work in early grade reading
improvement, and in particular to the contexts in which its support is currently being provided,
primarily multilingual sub-Saharan African countries. The document also draws on USAID’s
current efforts to provide reading instruction
in familiar languages, including in Kenya, Malawi,
Nigeria, Rwanda and Uganda, among others.
The guide is organized into the following sections:
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