The infinite variety of language means that even the choice of mother tongue is not an easy one. Urdu is the mother tongue of only a minority of Pakistani children. In Punjab most families speak Punjabi at home. So why does TCF not teach Punjabi children in Punjabi? Because, says Riaz Kamlani of the charity, “there are a dozen languages in Pakistan, and we don’t have the resources to use them all as a medium.” Urdu is a compromise.
語言多種多樣，這意味著即使選擇母語也并非易事。烏爾都語是巴基斯坦少數(shù)兒童的母語。在旁遮普，大多數(shù)家庭在家里說旁遮普語。那么為什么公民基金會不用旁遮普語教學(xué)呢？基金會的里亞茲·卡姆拉尼說，因?yàn)椤鞍突固褂惺畮追N語言，我們沒有足夠資源把它們都用作教學(xué)語言。”用烏爾都語已經(jīng)是一種妥協(xié)。
These complexities mean that mothertongue teaching requires careful planning. Ben Piper, who leads a usaid-funded literacy programme in government schools in Kenya, found, to his surprise, that children taught in their mother tongue learnt less maths than those taught in English or Swahili (the mother tongue of only a minority of Kenyans). The problem, he realised, was that teachers are assigned jobs by a central agency, without regard to their mother tongue, so they often do not understand the local language in which they are supposed to teach. In Ghana Elorm Apatey was teaching in an English-medium junior high school in the Volta region. To help his pupils, he also spoke to them in Ewe, his and their mother tongue. But because there are so many dialects of Ewe he had to employ linguistically talented pupils to translate for those who did not understand his Ewe.
種種復(fù)雜性表明用母語教學(xué)要求詳細(xì)規(guī)劃。美國國際開發(fā)署資助的肯尼亞政府學(xué)校掃盲項(xiàng)目的負(fù)責(zé)人本·派珀吃驚地發(fā)現(xiàn)用母語教學(xué)的孩子比用英語或斯瓦希里語（少數(shù)肯尼亞人的母語）學(xué)的數(shù)學(xué)知識要少。他意識到，問題在于，教師是在不考慮其母語的情況下由一個(gè)中央機(jī)構(gòu)分配工作的，所以他們經(jīng)常不懂自己要教的當(dāng)?shù)卣Z言。Elorm Apatey在加納Volta地區(qū)的一所英語中學(xué)教書。為了幫助學(xué)生，他還用他們共同的母語Ewe說話。但由于Ewe有如此多的方言，他不得不雇用有語言天賦的學(xué)生為那些不懂Ewe的人翻譯。
The complexity of the linguistic landscape in many countries argues not for abandoning mother-tongue teaching, but for developing layered curriculums that ease children into learning other languages. TCF is doing that for the inhabitants of the Thar desert, in a remote part of Sindh province. Their mother tongue is Dhatki. Sindhi, the provincial language, is quite close to that. Urdu, the lingua franca of Pakistan, is necessary but less familiar. English is hardest of all, but as desirable to the Thari people as to anybody else. So the curriculum will start children off in Dhatki and gradually introduce them to the other languages they will need as citizens of Pakistan, and of the 21st century. English will be a subject, not a medium.
在許多國家，語言環(huán)境復(fù)雜并不意味著要放棄母語教學(xué)，而是為了開發(fā)分層的課程，讓孩子們學(xué)習(xí)其他語言更容易。公民基金會正在為信德省偏遠(yuǎn)地區(qū)塔爾沙漠的居民提供幫助。其母語是Dhatki語。省級語言Sindhi語和Dhatki語很接近。巴基斯坦的通用語烏爾都語不可或缺，但并不為人熟知。英語是所有語言中最難學(xué)的，但Thari人對它的喜愛不亞于任何人。所以孩子們的課程將從Dhatki語開始，逐漸轉(zhuǎn)向巴基斯坦公民所需的其他語言。英語將作為一門學(xué)科，而不是一種教學(xué)媒介。
Such linguistically sensitive schooling demands more resources than most governments can afford. Instead, more pupils are likely to be taught in English, despite the drawbacks that entails. Their parents will make sacrifices to buy what they believe to be an advantage for their children. “If our children don’t speak English, they can’t excel in today’s world,” says Rukayat Tanvir, whose husband is a shopkeeper in Lahore, and who sends five children to an English-medium private school. “It gives me pleasure to hear my daughters speaking English even though I can’t understand what they are saying.”
這種對語言敏感的學(xué)校教育所需求的資源大大超出了大多數(shù)政府的承受能力。而更多學(xué)生可能接受的是英語媒介教學(xué)，盡管用英語教學(xué)也會產(chǎn)生一些缺點(diǎn)。父母會做出犧牲，購買他們認(rèn)為對孩子有利的東西。“我們的孩子如果不會說英語，就不能在當(dāng)今世界出類拔萃，”胡卡亞特·坦維爾表示。胡卡亞特·坦維爾將五個(gè)孩子送到一所英語授課的私立學(xué)校，丈夫在拉合爾有一家店。“聽到女兒們講英文我很高興，盡管聽不懂她們在說什么。”
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