Africa-Press – South-Sudan. The National Examination Council (NEC) Secretary General yesterday blame poor performance of English due to lack of availability of learning materials.
Mr. Simon Nyok told Juba Monitor yesterday that poor result on English languages due to lack of proper learning materials students countrywide He said they had done thorough assessment and the National Examinations results was the kind of mirror where Ministry of General Education would use to revise its strategy for future plans to improve education.
Nyok revealed that there was lack of content supposedly to be widely shared across the board and the set books were not made available for the pupils to familiarize themselves with the contents.
He also said in the policy of the Ministry teaching local languages in upper classes like primary one to three would boost ability of learning the languages.
“We are seeing the contents in the report but learners are not accessing them from their teachers.No availability of learning materials for teachers to effectively deliver the content”, he said. Nyok admitted that, the states in Northern part of the Country were affected by recent ban of Arabic as the medium of instruction.
He called on Windle International Organization to offer Intensive English courses to supplement the languages. “The Ministry’s abrupt transitionpolicy from Arabic to English has really resulted in poor performance of Arabic patterns in English Literature. We call upon partners especially Windle Trust to offer Intensive course”, he added. He disclosed that, the Ministry had already deregistered students who skipped classes. They only allowed those with verified documents during admission time in a bid to reduce irregularity. Other challenge among, state ministries do not distribute textbooks but keep them rotting incontainers. “We deal accordingly with those who skip classes from seeking admission. We have deregistered thousands of Students and this signaled warning to those still doing it”, he said.
Yesterday some teachers were also blamed on poor foundation from pupils themselves and lack of writing skills among others challenges.WhileYauna Manyang Makur the lecturer at Juba University and principal of Interface Model secondary school, blamed it on poor teaching of nine languages that can quip learners with skills.
Makur cited underperformance on poor reading, saying majority of them had low reading skills. “Reading culture is a problem here. There are many textbooks but they pupils do not love books for reading. Also, there is need for school curriculum to adopt and encourage teaching of local languages as this will improve proficiency in English language”, he said. Nevertheless, Duku Ivanfrom Light House Secondary School revealed that. The problem was a result of COVID-19 Pandemic prompted many students to double their academy year. He acknowledged that, some pupils skip senior 3 to senior 4 and it became difficult for them to have good foundation in class performance. “One of the Challenge observed was a result of covid-19 Pandemic that forced some students to skip classes in Academic year to compensate for one year spent at home during the Covid-19 locked down”, he added .
