Challenges Facing Mpondo Learners in Learning Standard Xhosa: Teachers’ Perspectives

Abstract

Granting equal opportunities to non-standard and standard language learners is unfair practice, since these two language groups are expected to achieve the same outcomes at the end of their school career. Learners who speak a non-standard variety of a language are at a disadvantage in classrooms that promote the standard language and face struggles such as differences in pronunciation, grammar, vocabulary, syntax, orthography, and discourse style. The current study exposed the challenges Mpondo-speaking learners face in learning the Xhosa standard language through the eyes of their teachers and subject advisors. The study was qualitative and a case study design was followed. Three Xhosa subject advisors and three Xhosa teachers were purposively sampled to provide data for the study. The findings showed that Mpondo-speaking learners were not exposed to the Xhosa standard language outside of the classroom context. The results also indicated that since Mpondo is a language that learners learn before going to school, it conflicted with Xhosa vocabulary and complicated the life of Mpondo-speaking learners when learning the new language, Xhosa. The results also showed that Mpondo-speaking learners received penalties in terms of marks allocation. They were punished for using their mother tongue. Finally, the findings revealed that Xhosa teachers and Xhosa subject advisors were of the view that using a dialect and standard language simultaneously in the classroom could minimise the challenges experienced by Mpondo learners.

Keywords:

• language group
• mother tongue
• non-standard language
• self-image
• social group
• standard language