There and Back Again: Peace Corps Uganda: October 2015

“If you have sorted out the world in one language, it becomes much easier to sort it out in a second language.” – Pauline Gibbons

Language and literacy are fascinating. What a wealth of knowledge, history, and culture that lives within just one tongue. What incredible universes the written word has opened up to us. They are glimpses into the human mind, snatches of the magic and power we have inside of ourselves. They are the cornerstones of the world we have built.

In college, I was introduced to a profession where my passion for language and literacy was combined – teaching English as a Second Language. The English language is an intricate puzzle that, when unlocked, can open to life-changing opportunities and insights, and few things bring me greater joy than to work on that puzzle with others. But as much as I love English, as much as I delight in sharing in it and despairing of it with others, I also realize how much the world would lose if every thought originated only in English.

English is not meant to be a replacement, a bulldozer razing indigenous languages and cultures; instead, it is meant to be used as a tool, a tool to make connections and exchange knowledge. This is not always the message that is communicated and, unfortunately, centuries of colonialism have wrongly placed it as oftentimes higher, more valuable, more desirable than one’s own mother tongue.

This colonial hangover is present even today in Uganda. Despite a switch to education solely in local language from Primary 1 to Primary 3, with Primary 4 being the “transition year” to instruction in English from Primary 5 to Primary 7, there is no denying that English is the language of opportunity here; whether someone is looking for a professional job abroad or in country, being able to speak English is a must. However, this attitude has led to a devaluation of native languages and a misunderstanding of how best to achieve fluency in a second language. Such unfortunate devaluation can be seen in the following words of one Ugandan:

“Children … should learn a language which helps them in the future. Not put them in brackets of a second community.”

Rural parents and community members often believe that such a language policy, attempting to ensure that a child learns in their native language in at least the first three grades, has been imposed for political reasons; they are frustrated because they want their children to master the language of wider communication, English, as quickly as possible. Some even mistakenly think that African languages are not able to deal with scientific and technical concepts. To them, a local language policy seems like a step backward to the past, not forward to the future. This is detrimental because, as any Peace Corps Volunteer knows, if a community does not embrace an idea, it will not happen.

But many in the Ugandan community, especially the rural community, are not embracing this step because they have not been informed of the pedagogical advantages afforded their children when they are they are instructed in their first language before moving on to being educated in English. It can seem contradictory, but the more time children spend learning in local language, the better they will perform academically and the more fluent they will become in their second language. For example, first language speakers of Afrikaans in South Africa, in places where English is taught only as a subject for one lesson per day, have been shown to successfully achieve high levels of bilingual proficiency in both Afrikaans and English – not being instructed in English was in no way detrimental.

If parents want their children to learn the language of wider communication, in this case English, it will take these pupils six to eight years of learning English before it can be successfully used as the medium of instruction for academic concepts. If this process is hurried, the pupil will learn neither the new language nor academic content well enough. Imagine trying to learn physics or study classic French novels with only your three years of high school French!

When it comes down to it, if a pupil is not literate in their first language, it is incredibly difficult for them to become literate in a second language. Literacy, in both first and second languages, is immensely important to individuals and to countries as a whole. It has been found, using panel data for forty-four African countries, that literacy was among the variables with a positive effect on GDP per capita growth. Literacy skills are fundamental to informed decision-making, critical reflection, personal empowerment, creativity, and participation in political, social, and cultural spheres. Furthermore, while it’s hard to separate the benefits of literacy from education, schooling, and knowledge overall, it has been shown that literacy among women improves livelihoods and leads to better child and maternal health in addition to empowering those women to gain access to and challenge male domains. The Reading Agency has even shown that reading for enjoyment can increase empathy, improve relationships, reduce symptoms of depression and raise wellbeing!

However, first-language literacy and literacy in general face particular challenges in Uganda. There are 63 main languages spoken, none with a large enough majority for one to be selected as the national language. 52% of Uganda’s 36 million people are children below the age of 15, and 71% are not finishing primary school in time. This is caused by, among other reasons, low competence, low literacy rates, and lack of interest. In fact, Uganda is ranked lowest in the region in literacy according to a 2012 Uwezo report.

These are problems that many Ugandans are well aware of and something that two amazing Ugandans in particular decided to do something about. Peter Mugogo and Aaron Kirunda, the founders of their own business based in Kampala, decided that establishing their own microfinance company was not giving back enough to their community. They passionately believe that Uganda’s future belongs to that 52% below 15, and they realized that the literacy rate needed to be improved, academic achievement celebrated, and key life skills developed in these children in order to ensure that they were motivated to stay in school and ensure a bright future for Uganda. So, three years ago, they started Enjuba Spelling Bee, an English spelling competition for teams of three in Primary 4 through Primary 7.

Aaron and Peter

One year ago, Peace Corps Volunteers Loren Evans and Jason Economou made their own realizations. For the literacy rate both in pupils’ local languages and in English to improve, communities had to embrace the government’s local language education policy for Primary 1 to Primary 3 and possibly even a future extension of it to Primary 5 or Primary 7. This meant boosting the status of indigenous languages, developing the orthography of languages if necessary, providing teachers with professional development, and increasing the amount of available written materials in local languages. Thus, the My Language Spelling Bee, a local language competition for Primary 3 pupils which I wrote about last year, was born.

This year, as one of the National Co-Directors, I have had the incredible privilege of being able to witness the birth of what I and my Co-Director, Ben Ferraro, truly believe is a model Peace Corps partnership with dedicated, hardworking, and passionate Ugandans.

My Co-Director, Ben, working on the My Language Spelling Bee in Arua district.

Enjuba Spelling Bee and My Language Spelling Bee, along with the Ministry of Education and Sports, have joined together to create Uganda Spelling Bee, offering in-service teacher trainings, a P3 local language spelling competition, and a P4 – P7 English spelling competition across Uganda. We believe that this national initiative, besides just being incredibly fun, will help primary school pupils and their school communities understand the importance of both first and second language literacy. This awareness and these competitions will, hopefully, in turn, increase literacy rates by training teachers in learner-centered literacy instructional techniques and by helping pupils learn key life skills, ignite their curiosity, become inspired to stay in school longer, and develop pride in their mother tongue as well as improved competences in English. It’s a lot to put on one project, but if anyone can do it, Peter, Aaron, and their team of highly-educated, caring Ugandan volunteers can do it.

Michael and Juliet, two more volunteers from Enjuba Spelling Bee

This month has been the beginning of the culmination of a year’s work for Uganda Spelling Bee. Recently, the Runyankore/Rukiga My Language Spelling Bee finals and English Spelling Bee semi-finals were held at the Primary Teacher’s College where Kris and I live. The response, excitement, and anticipation of this year’s events by the community were overwhelming. Our reach was much greater than last year due to the new partnership and due to the fact that ownership of this project has been almost entirely taken on by wonderful community partners in Bushenyi district, partners such as Mugisha Laban, who have embraced Uganda Spelling Bee and taken it far past where I ever thought it could go. In-service teacher trainings revolving around spelling bee practices and learner-centered teaching techniques were held during the second school term and school, district, and regional-level competitions, run almost entirely by Ugandans, proceeded from there. The Runyankore/Rukiga My Language Spelling Bee alone reached over 10,000 pupils, 275 teachers, and 190 schools in the Southwest overall – and that’s just one of the six language regions Uganda Spelling Bee is currently operating in.

The day of the competition was filled with music, word lists, and excited pupils practicing under the shade of nearby trees.

Paul Benz, the Music Man!

Kris and Immaculate enjoying the entertainment.

The Deputy Principal of the college opened the event by speaking of the importance of local language literacy and the role it plays in achieving second language competence. He urged teachers to continue the learner-centered literacy practices they had learned and praised the event as a project that supported the celebration of academic excellence and that now belonged to the community itself.

The preliminaries for My Language Spelling Bee and the English Spelling Bee were held side by side, with brief musical interludes, before lunch.

The English Spelling Bee pupils were a bit shy and nervous at first, so the judges had the pupils take their spots and quiz their teachers!

This adorable 8-year-old pupil did a great job in the My Language Spelling Bee.

The MLSB judges conferring.

A small break before lunch.

The college students and scouts helped us serve.

Olivia, my P3 pupil.

After lunch, all attending watched the My Language Spelling Bee finals, with pupils spelling words like omuhingánzima and ekiteetéèyi, until only one child remained.

Then came the English Spelling Bee finals, with the primary school pupils impressing all of the adults present by tackling words such as endogenous, paradigm, and xenolith.

Everyone, of course, received certificates and the top three My Language Spelling Bee finishers received donated books, games, world maps, and academic supplies for themselves and their schools.

Laban closing the ceremony.

The winning pupils from my school.

The Southwest Uganda Spelling Bee team! Minus Robert Hahn, that is.

Letting off a little steam after a long day.

The top three English Spelling Bee teams now move on to the National Championship in Uganda’s capital, Kampala, on October 17^th - an exciting prize in and of itself for the public school children, especially since some have never been outside of their own district or ridden a bus before. It’s going to be an extremely exciting event, and I invite all of you to be a part of it by liking Uganda Spelling Bee on Facebook and Twitter. Please, follow along and give these amazing pupils your moral support on their big day!

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/UgandaSpellingBee?fref=ts

Twitter: https://twitter.com/spellingbeeug

Website: http://www.spellingbee.ug/

References

Mother Tongue Matters: Local Language as a Key to Effective Learning

English Education, Local Languages, and Community Perspectives in Uganda

Optimising Learning, Education, and Publishing in Uganda: The Language Factor

Mother Tongue Classrooms Give Better Boost to English Study Later

Why Literacy Matters - UNESCO

Reading for Pleasure Builds Empathy and Improves Well-being

Language Education Policy and Multilingual Literacies in Ugandan Primary Schools

Primary schools consist of classes P1 - P7. Here are my super cool P7 pupils, ruling the roost at Bushenyi Demo.

Christopher Mutarebwa, the Primary 7 Library Prefect, ducked into the library the other day to return a textbook he had checked out (yes, Ugandan textbooks are among our most popular books in the library – these kids!) and take out another. As I was working to sort the newest shipment we had received, he approached me and, after the usual greetings, eagerly asked me, “Teacher Heidi…can you get for me a pen pal from America?”

Christopher, age 14

Christopher is a great pupil, hard worker, and incredibly ambitious. He goes to school during the day and tends to his family’s cattle in the mornings, evenings, and weekends. As he walks through the grassy, rolling hills and overlooks his grazing long-horned cows, he dreams of attending university in England. It’s a dream that I know is within his grasp. He has constantly impressed me and some of my favorite cross-cultural conversations in Uganda have been with this 14 year-old boy.

So, of course, I said he could have a pen pal. His face lit up and as he left for class, I returned to labeling the new books (OK, reading them, reminiscing about my childhood, and then labeling them), pondering who I knew in the U.S. that would make a good match for him.

The bell, an old tire rim that a lucky pupil is permitted to beat with a rock at the beginning and end of every break, sounded for lunch. As I put my work down, I turned around to close the library’s shutters and was treated to the sight of a swarm of P7 pupils running down the hill towards me. They crowded around the window, yelling and laughing in English and Runyankore, and after a minute I finally made out the gist of what they were trying to communicate – they all wanted pen pals from America too! I grinned and promised that if they organized themselves and gave me a list of the names and ages of everyone who wanted a pen pal, I would try my best to get all of them one.

Some of the P7 pupils who want pen pals, post-swarm.

Few things are more impressive to me here than the ability of pupils, aged 4 to 14, to handle themselves and their classmates in an orderly, mature, efficient fashion. Three minutes later I was given a beautifully handwritten list of the P7 pupils who were dying to make a friend in the States.

Staring at the list of hopefuls, I thought back to when I was a child. I was lucky enough to have pen pals from all over the world. I got air mail letters from Australia, the Philippines, the U.K., and beyond. Nothing was more exciting than seeing those red and blue envelopes arrive and reading stories, both strange and familiar at the same time, from kids my age across the globe. I even kept in touch with one pen pal, Leticia, for years and still remember her fondly.

I want, so much now, to give that experience to these pupils, these kids who work from dawn until dusk but with any free time that they have are always in the library studying, giggling over books with friends, or patiently reading to the little ones. I want to help them create life-long friendships with other kids who will share their passion and excitement.

If you know someone around the ages of 10 to 14 who is interested in a long-term correspondence with a Ugandan around their own age, please let me know either by commenting on this blog or emailing me at heidigramlich@gmail.com. While none of these pupils have their own mailbox, the school does have a P.O. Box the next town over and I can facilitate the first exchange of letters.

I really do believe that it would not only be a wonderful chance for my Ugandan pupils but also for American students as well. It’s an incredible cross-cultural opportunity to learn, grow, and expand your horizons – these kids have a lot to offer. And they’re pretty funny too.

They wanted "snaps" (pictures) taken to show their future pen pals. Some of the ages are rough approximations as most rural Ugandans don't have birth certificates and, in general, don't celebrate birthdays.