Something I posted on the ILP blog-
Going in with the enthusiasm of a new-comer to volunteer at the Community Library, the importance of a common language as a starting point didn’t strike me. My last session at the library started off ordinarily enough with two little girls coming and sitting next to me for a story-reading session. Both in 8th standard-but like most of the children there, very small for their age- M was quite the outgoing one and read the story in stumbling phrases but with reasonably good pronunciation. S on the other hand with her retreating smile, shied away every time I asked her something-including her name!-with a “Miss English goththilla”. Helplessly I would say “Kannada goththila”, my usual ticket to eliciting at least an attempt at English, but to no avail.
However, one thing I really love about the library is how a story or an activity can spark the interest of the most recalcitrant child. Soon, S was vying with her friend to read and there was a general battle….but the thing is that even though she read the story, most of the words were empty expressions followed by colourful pictures to her. Also, even after reading almost three stories, she wouldn’t speak in English to me.
There are some words you can explain with gestures and picture but even so there would be a constant poking in M’s ribs after I explained something, and S would ask in muttered Kannada what so and so was. Without even the advantage of basic Tamil, you feel helpless sometimes because the kids DO want to learn, they want to do rhyming words (Sometimes with disastrous results-“Why can’t hill rhyme with smell, they have the same ending letter?”!), they want to be given dictation and they really want to be part of everything.
The same happens even to people who can in some way communicate with a close-enough language- Rosh who speaks Tamil was wracking her brains trying to think how you explain why the past tense of “go” becomes “went” and why “he comes” is the present of “he came”.
The system is doing and awfully shoddy job is the children in Public Schools are taught to read but not to understand what they’re reading out, because in that case the whole joy of learning a language is lost. Idealistic joys of language aside, it is of minimum practical use as well.
On a happier note, thanks to this little handicap I’ve started picking up little bits of Kannada, although I have to say that when I explain a tree to be a “mara”, and then say a wood is “place with a lot of maras”, I can’t help but join them in the giggling!
