Language has always been a barrier to most teachers in our basic schools in Ghana. Teachers from a different ethnic group with different local Ghanaian languages has been posted by the Ghana education service to different places making teachers finding it difficult to deliver a successful lesson due to language barrier.
At times you find a teacher from the southern part of Ghana to the northern region to teach in a primary school. Most children at this level won’t be able to understand the English language and this makes the teacher’s work tedious.
When the Education Minister-designate Dr. Yaw Adutwum was asked what his plans will be to ensure that this issue of a language barrier between the teacher and the pupils is resolved.
The honorable member responded that the issue of teacher placement and the language barrier is something we as a country need to take it seriously. He admitted that it has always been challenging posting teachers to places where they can’t speak the dialect of the people
But the minister-designate stated that the Ghana education service is doing language mapping to ensure that in terms of posting the map teachers to places where language will not be a barrier to ensure effective lesson delivery.
He added that the university of education Winneba at Ajumako is training teachers in local Ghanaian languages to ensure that in terms of posting they will be sent to places where their services are needed to reduce the language barrier among teachers and their pupils.
What about those who are already posted to the places where the language barrier is a key problem to them?
The idea about how his going to deal with those already posted is not yet known