Wilson-kaigarula
By Wilson Kaigarula
In Summary
Some quarters pass harsh judgement on youngsters,
via such derogatory expressions as ‘mitoto ya siku hizi’ (present-era
hopeless children), implying that they are slow, disinterested leaners,
or absolute failures.
If Egypt’s great pyramid of Giza is one of the
wonders of the world, the withdrawal of classics by Shabaan Robert like
‘Kusadikika’ and ‘Adili na Nduguze’ from the Kiswahili syllabi, is one
of Tanzania’s most scandalous decisions.
This is one of the issues that colleague Richard
Mgamba highlighted in his incisive piece on the books-dimension of the
woeful state of Tanzania’s education sector in the May 20, 2014 edition
of The Citizen.
The article generated two reactions in me: joy and
sorrow. Joy, because the writer reinforced his observations with a
select list of books that were principal tools of tuition and learning
but which were later dropped. I recalled many of the titles, though my
association with primary-to-high school classrooms ended 40 years ago.
I’m beholden to the writers because their material
was instrumental in equipping me with knowledge that contributed
significantly to fashioning me as a professional journalist and a
so-called social animal. Several of my generation-mates were similar
beneficiaries.
The withdrawal of those books, and their
replacement by mostly weaker and unsuitable ones, plus pamphlets, has
been the equivalent of learners being fed on poor academic diet and the
production of under-nourished and malnourished students !
The corruption-driven perpetrators are outright
social criminals, by way of authors – actually purported authors – of
sub-standard books oiling the palms of sector officials to sneak them
into the curricula.
Some quarters pass harsh judgement on youngsters,
via such derogatory expressions as ‘mitoto ya siku hizi’ (present-era
hopeless children), implying that they are slow, disinterested leaners,
or absolute failures.
Some, probably many, are intelligent, but are let
down by a shortage of good books, or being linked to plentiful, but
shallow ones.
A couple of years ago, I learnt from a Form Three
student, with one year to go before the following year’s final exams,
that, only the literature teacher had a copy of Chinua Achebe’s
internationally acclaimed novel, ‘Things fall apart’. He read out the
text to the class in instalments, in respect of which they did tests.
Those not present relied on notes borrowed from friends later !
In the distant past, everyone had a copy, enabling
average-intelligence students to perform well, while some more
intelligent new generation ones fail due to that scenario, which is
replicated in other subjects .
The books issue needs to be sorted out, but this
must be coupled by cultivation of the book-reading culture beyond
classrooms and lecture halls, focused, especially, on stuff that
stimulates the brain and widens the horizon.
The reading culture is frighteningly lacking,
culprits being the youth and adults alike. Household bookshelves are a
vanishing species, and bookshops and public libraries are literally
‘No-entry zones’
No comments:
Post a Comment