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Teachers’ perspectives and related classroom practices in mother tongue literacy development in Uganda


Medadi E. Ssentanda
Allen Asiimwe

Abstract

In this paper, we discuss teachers’ views and related classroom practices of teaching the mother tongue, (MT) Luganda as a subject, as  observed in rural classrooms in central Uganda. The challenges observed arise from the lack of and, in some cases, limited training of  teachers in MT teaching. Also, there is a disjointed approach to the teaching of Luganda and English, languages to which learners are  simultaneously introduced when they first learn to read. The disjointed approach to the teaching of Luganda and English brings about  the problem of letternaming when teaching the two languages. In addition, the overrepresentation of the Luganda orthography  regarding the use of /r/ and /l/ as though they are phonemes affects the quick mastery of writing skills in Luganda. The paper  demonstrates how teachers go about the teaching of the MT (Luganda) and how these difficulties affect language teaching in rural schools in two districts in Uganda. The paper ends with a discussion on what can be done to overcome these challenges with implications  on teacher-education.  


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eISSN: 2224-3380