Dear Editor,
Once again, I shudder to think that many CSEC (CXC) students across the region have performed poorly in the English Language paper, especially on the essay, the summary and comprehension questions. Just imagine the pass rate was just below 50%. It behoves us to examine the root causes of this unfortunate situation in our modern education system.
To my mind, the majority of students have virtually neglected the wide reading of good books (the classics), since modern technology has been introduced in our midst. Moreover, students are hardly encouraged to write letters to their friends. Consequently, the advent of technology has become the replacement in the form of the e-mail, text messaging and even cell-phoning to effect speedy communication far and wide.
I, therefore, suggest that our Ministry of Education review seriously some traditional methods of teaching essay writing, summary (précis) and doing reading comprehension pieces. In my opinion, such methods may be incorporated into the pilot project instituted by the ministry.
In view of my long-standing knowledge and experience with three languages – English, Latin and French – for the past GCE examinations, the students must be taught how to compose a proper sentence, a constructive paragraph, thus concluding with a well-written essay.
In short, the essentials for a good essay are: (1) mastering the details of the construction of a sentence, including the correct use of tense; (2) the unity and emphasis of the paragraph – the topic sentence is the most important in the paragraph and it should draw attention to itself; (3) coherence – it means arranging the words in the proper order; and (4) development, which means enlarging on the topic.
The summary and comprehension sections are also very important. Two or three times, students have got to read through the passage set very carefully in order to identify the salient points, thus using their own words, as far as possible.
As regards the comprehension passage, very careful reading is also applied, together with the questions based on the text.
I advise students that careless reading in any examination costs marks. So they must keep their wits about them. Further advice is that general reading helps immensely to improve their quality in almost every respect. Reading is indispensable, as there is no short cut to it.
In any language we are working on, Spanish or French, for example, the same principles apply; correct use of vocabulary, tenses – present, past and future, and at times the conditional form. To help improve language quality, the teacher ought to possess a good command of English. He or she has to explain or illustrate accurately any aspect of the language so that assimilated learning by the students may take place.
Ultimately, I feel we have to teach English like a foreign language. The mechanics of the language should be taught to a good extent, especially in the secondary schools, starting with the junior forms. Although some students might have passed English with a good grade at CXC, yet they would be unable to distinguish a participle from a gerund, or even the kind of sentences they have used. Language has got to be taught in its entirety, if the students are to improve to a level of excellence.
All in all, the teachers and the officials of the ministry need to blend their efforts vigorously in order to remove dismal failure from our written language.
Yours faithfully,
Autry A Fernandes
