KARACHI:
Across the country, most teachers in public schools particularly in smaller/rural areas find teaching the English language a challenging task. There is a general unawareness of the growing importance of English as a global language because of which many teachers do not give the subject the required attention. Also, teachers do not have adequate training or skills to adapt to English language teaching in a multilingual situation. They simply follow bilingual textbooks, which confuses the students, and they struggle to adopt both English, and Urdu along with their cultural languages.
When students from these areas travel to urban cities of the country, they often face difficulties in educational institutes or at work. Although English is not used everywhere, many institutes undertake teaching in English and most employers now require some proficiency in English. Resultantly, students often lag in their studies or face setbacks at work.
Perhaps, the school administration and teachers should change their approach to teaching the English language. Instead of bilingual books, teachers should be trained and provided with the proper teaching materials. Students should be taught the language according to their stages of learning and given the chance to practice through exercises or activities. Whilst English should remain a second language, it should not be disregarded entirely because it is now used in most global spheres and serves as a token of progress. Thus, the relevant authorities should work with public schools to improve English language teaching and learning.
Waseem Akram
Khairpur
Published in The Express Tribune, April 20th, 2022.
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