President’s mission in education, leapfrog in teaching English and ICT

President Mahinda Rajapaksa deserves a garland of accolades for his initiative in developing English language skills and those of Information Communication Technology among students.

His vision and mission in steering the country, though based on the social cultural milieu of the society, is embodied with the recent tendencies emerging elsewhere in the world in the field of education.

The student to be produced from the school must be acquainted with the essential knowledge and competencies to face the challenges thrown by the future world. With the world becoming multi-cultural and multi-faceted, English language seems to be playing an important role in its forward march, and therefore, the ability to use it proficiently in every field concerned will pave the way for the students to achieve their life targets.

Speaking in English

The President has incorporated new vistas to the education reforms introduced by the government by emphasizing the fact that students must be provided with a conducive environment to speak the language, which is, according to the writer, the most important skill in the modern day society.

His entrusting the task with the Presidential Task Force has yielded positive results: Teachers have already been trained in India and a syllabus designed for the task.

Though it is too early to comment on the success of the program, it will definitely bring in a new dimension in the field of teaching English in the country. The most important aspect of his vision is to seek expertise from India, which no government in the past did. Earlier, we slavishly sought to buy expertise from the countries like England, America, Australia and New Zealand particularly when it came to the avenues of training teachers.

Today English no longer belongs to the English speaking countries for there are different Englishes in the world.

India is unique in developing their own variety of English with their own vocabulary as well, and English teaching methodology to suit their country. Thus, turning to India to obtain its experiences in teaching methodology to suit their country. Thus, turning to India to obtain its experiences in teaching English is a praiseworthy attempt taken by the President.

Communication technology

The engine of the fast changing world is ICT. The President’s sagacity in realizing its importance and to spearhead a comprehensive program to teach it in the school system will turn new pages in the realms of education.

We should also be grateful to Education Minister for his brainchild of establishing a separate College of Education for Training Information Communication Technology Teachers.

President Mahinda Rajapaksa’s interests in the field could be seen in his coming to declare open the College. Education Ministry has trained the teacher trainers at foreign universities for the task, and this initiative is to bring drastic changes in the quality of education given by the school system of the country.

The majority of the schools have been provided with computer labs and almost all schools have been given computers and other technological equipment used in the teaching learning process. The time for all the schools to use integrated white boards will not be far away.

In the next few years, the student’s computer literacy will undoubtedly improve to such an extent where they can use it as a tool for learning other disciplines in general, and gain expertise knowledge in ICT itself to work in the same field in future.

Moral education

It is heartening to see the President in his speeches on education emphasizing the importance of moral education which we seem to have overlooked over the years. Education is nothing but values.

Whatever subject is learnt by the student, its ultimate result should be an enhancement of his values.

The President himself being a person who is deeply rooted in the country’s value system is keen on producing a student who is an integral part of the socio-cultural milieu of the society with a great respect for the environment he lives in.

Even in the post independent educational policy of the country, the remnants of the Biritish legacy of education were seen, and this in a way uprooted our students from our own soil.

There was a time when political leaders opined that there was no use in learning subjects like literature and history.

The set back that occurred in the development of student’s morality due to this situation continued until recently when the present government began to pay a serious attention to arrest it and to remedy it by integrating moral education into the school curriculum.

Bilingual education

The bilingual education which is at present in operation in the country has already proved its success. Three batches sat the GCE Ordinary Level Examination, and the result of the students of the first two batches made a watershed in the history of the field of education in the country. In almost all the schools where bilingual education is given, the results of the bilingual students have been far better than those of the students who studied in the vernacular languages.

The writer does no way try to downgrade the education given in vernacular languages, but he endeavours to show that this situation is an indication of the realization of educational goals of the Mahinda Rajapaksa’s Government and the attempt taken by the Education Minister, the other officers and specially the teachers.

The writer is of the opinion that Education Ministry and those officers and teachers who are involved in teaching English language can research into this development and obtain experiences from it when planning English teaching policy and developing syllabi. Bilingual education in the Sri Lankan education system amply proves that Content Based Languages teaching yields more results than teaching general language competency.

Anil Pagoda Arachchi - Veyangoda