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On Education
As it takes up to at least 7-10 hours of my day, not to mention that I have chosen it as my career, I must treat the subject of education in one of these reports. Considering we have recently completed one set of exams, I feel I am in a decent position to do so now. First, a little background.
Lesotho follows the British educational structure. There are increasingly popular nursery schools and kindergartens scattered across the country. The primary schools run from Standard 1 through Standard 7. Just this year, Standard One and Two were made free of charge by the state. This, of course, encouraged many more people to send their children-and young adults-to school. I think the primaries are doing fine, but I have no doubt that may of the lower primary standards are overcrowded. At the end of Standard 7, the students must write an exam to see whether they pass and how well they do. They are given a "class" based on their percentage on the exam. These are, in order of increasing percentage, third class, second class, first class and first class with merit.
When the students have passed Standard 7, they must choose a high school based on how well they did on their exam, and how much money they are able and willing to spend on high school.
High school is five years long with the lower high school lasting three years and culminating in the Junior Certificate (JC) Exam. The upper highs school is two years long and culminates in the Cambridge Over Seas Certificate. The classes in the high school are Forms A-E. On the Junior Certificate, the students are required to write English, Literature in English, Sesotho, Maths, Science, Geography, Religion, and Agriculture. These are required of all students in the country (except maybe Religion). For the Cambridge, they have all these subjects, but Science is broken into two exams: Biology and Chemistry/Physics. Additionally, they have Sesotho Literature and can choose whether to write English Literature or Geography. Both of these exams are quite rigorous and determine whether or not a student can continue with her education.
Lesotho is interesting in that many more girls are being educated than boys. This is, no doubt, due to the rural nature of life. It is the boy's job in a family to watch the herd. I have seen herd boys as young as three years old (usually with someone else not necessarily much older) and some very old men watching herds, but for the most part, they are 10-25 years old: the age of students. If they are lucky, they have a brother who will take over so they can go to school. Indeed, not a small number of boys in the primary school at St. Rodrigue have facial hair and there is no doubt in my mind that a few are older than I am.
The case with girls is quite different. They are not all the same age, but their ages are more proximate than those of boys. The differentiation in age amongst girls seems to have more to do with whether they have been promoted annually through their schooling or, in the older classes, if they took a couple of years off to have a child.
St. Rodrigue High School is an all girls school on a Catholic Mission. It is quasi-private. The government pays most of the teachers and they follow the government calendar and the National Curriculum. It is certainly in their best interests to follow the Junior Certificate and Cambridge curricula as the students must write these exams. Other more prestigious high schools in the country follow the International Baccalaureate and have elective classes.
St. Rodrigue is a rural school with many more resource than other rural schools due to its affiliation with the French Canadian Order of the Good Shepard and even due to Grinnell College and the people from the college who have lived and worked here (as well as their families).
St. Rodrigue is also the cheapest school in the country and one of the most accepting. This puts it in the bottom tier academically. It draws students from the surrounding areas as well as students from all over the country who come to line on the mission in the hostel.
The National Curriculum is presented in syllabi of goals and objectives for each subject and for each Form (save D and I who both follow the Cambridge syllabus). They are certainly no extraordinarily difficult nor entirely culturally relevant. Some of the suggestions for teaching and application are pretty good, but the resources just aren't available or are unreasonable in a class of 50 students. The most distressing part is the focus on memorization. Not purely through the syllabus, but in the books and in the ways in which the subject matter is assessed. There is very little focus on application, though some of the exams do test application. The focus, instead, seems on getting the right answer. This, I believe, seriously hinders the students from learning English.
Learning English is integral to the formal education of these students. All of their subjects except Sesotho are (ideally) conducted and assessed in English. Therefore, in order to be promoted to the next form, the students need a solid understanding and expression of English. (50% is a passing grade in all subjects. In order to pass the year, they need primarily to pass English Language and Literature with a combined average of 50%, secondly, to pass 5 subjects, and to have an overall average of 50%. In this past quarter, John had one student with a 61% overall average, but her English average was less than 50%, so she did not pass). Understandably, living in a culturally and linguistically homogeneous country, they have very little use for English outside of school and without great effort, have very little opportunity to use English outside of school. Considering all of this, I maintain that the greatest impediment to their learning and practicing English is their reluctance-great fear, even-of gett
ing the answer wrong in class and elsewhere around school. As with any language, there is rarely one right or wrong way to express a thought or a feeling. But I think this fear encourages the students to clam up and let the more gregarious (and less fearful) students answer questions. In a class of 50 students this is very easy for any student to do.
The students' attitudes towards school and their education are incredibly positive. The students are lucky to be attending school. It means that their family has money enough for school fees, uniforms, books and supplies (theoretically). For this reason, the student understand the value of their education. If they don't right away, they figure it out by the time their parents get their first reports. For most of these students, school is fun. It is social and it is exciting. They mostly want to do well and they like their teachers and don't mind helping them.
I am enjoying teaching these students immensely. I only hope that they too profit from my teaching. Despite all of the frustrations, I would not mind teaching Basotho forever.
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