Mother Tongue-based Literacy Programmes: Case Studies of Good ...

Teaching Plan: Bridging to the National LanguageGuided by a clearer understanding of the processand additional materials, with the support of regularconsultant visits and with an additional grant fromUNESCO, the project went forward stronger thanbefore. Inspired by materials from Papua New Guinea,ONFEC personnel began developing a total curriculumbased on the learning standards stipulated in theThai national curriculum, but geared to helping PwoKaren (and other minority) children achieve requiredcompetencies in each grade, but in a bilingual setting.A cultural mathematics course was inititated, drawingupon mathematical concepts implicit in the village© ONFECsetting (patterns used in weaving, shapes of traditionaltatoos, the angles of thatched roofs, the balancingmechanism of traditional foot-operated rice mills, etc.). Detailed daily and hourly lesson plans weredrawn up, much to the relief of teachers who had been stressed by having to create their own lessonplans. Existing materials were revised and new ones created, as needed. Work on materials for “bridging”to Thai commenced, including Total Physical Response (TPR) for developing Thai listening and speakingskills, a “Transitional Primer” (to systematically introduce students already literate in Northern Pwo Karento Thai reading and writing), and diglot books with parallel Thai and Northern Pwo Karen sentences.100%90%80%70%60%Table 1: Grade Level Progression Plan Envisioned Mid-2006K1 K2 P1 P2 P3 P4 P5 P6Build capacityin oral L1; L1as Languageof Instruction(LOI), allsubjectsBuild capacityin oral L1;Introduce L1literacy; L1 asLOI all subjectsBuild capacityin oral andwritten L1;L1 as LOI allsubjectsBuild capacityin oral andwritten L1;L1 as LOI allsubjectsBuild capacityin oral andwritten L1; L1as LOI mostsubjects50% Develop oral40%30% L2 oral skills20%taught as10% Songs in L2secondSongs, TPR in L2languageBuild capacityin L2 oral skills.Introduce L2literacy.and writtenL2; L2 for somesubjectsBegin listeningL3Build capacityin oral andwritten L1; L1as LOI mostsubjectsDevelop oraland writtenL2; L2 for somesubjectsBegin writtenL3L1 somesubjectsDevelop oraland writtenL2; L2 for mostsubjectsDevelop L3L1 somesubjectsDevelop oraland writtenL2; L2 for mostsubjectsDevelop L3L1 = Northern Pwo Karen Source: NPKOM Grade Level Progression 6L2 = ThaiL3 = English6 It should be noted that content subjects, such as science and math, are taught in the L1 in the early grades.Teachers may utilize the “sandwich” method for content courses in upper primary grades. This involves introducinga concept in the L1, explaining key L2 vocabulary in the L1, teaching the bulk of the lesson in the L2, andproviding a final summary in L1.[ 154 ]