Concern over quality of writing in schools

Sukulwenkosi Dube Plumtree Correspondent
THE government has challenged schools to develop quality writing skills in pupils in order to produce competent and employable citizens.
Speaking during the Matabeleland South provincial Potraz young people’s letter writing prize giving ceremony at Alan Redfern Primary school in Plumtree, Provincial Education Director, Tumisang Thabela, said government was concerned with informal styles of writing that are creeping into schools.
“We’re now living at a time when an informal way of writing has become common because of the advent of ICTs. Now people have created a simpler way of writing to one another through cellphones and computers. Words have been changed into shortcuts,” said Thabela.

“For example the Ndebele word sisi is now being written as cc. The problem we have as a ministry is that pupils are now using these styles of writing even in their school work. This is alarming because the informal style of writing is not acceptable in the corporate world.”

Thabela said teachers should ensure that pupils master the formal way of writing across all languages and stick to it.
“This problem is there across all languages. It’s up to teachers to ensure that school children appreciate the formal way of writing at all times especially at primary level as that is the foundation. There’s also a need to come up with writing clubs in various languages,” she said.

“It’s unfortunate that at the moment it’s only the English writing clubs which are being emphasised but these clubs are needed across all languages so that pupils develop a deeper knowledge of the languages they are learning at school.”

She said letter writing was no longer popular in society, but yet it remained an art and an essential part of culture.
Three pupils from Alan Redfern Primary, Precious Sibanda, Nicole Sibanda and Comfort Dube all aged 12 occupied the top three places at this year’s 43rd provincial young people’s letter writing competition.

Potraz director of postal and courier services, Kennedy Dewera said letter writing competitions were held every year to ensure schools produced literate pupils.
“As Potraz we partnered with the Ministry of Primary and Secondary Education by sponsoring these competitions to ensure that schools produce sharp pupils. Our organisation specialises in postal and telecommunications and we realised that these sectors need literate people. All the sectors in our country employ literate people and we decided to take up the challenge of ensuring that literate pupils are produced by schools,” said Dewera.

He said the competitions were being held under the Universal Postal Union, which is a United Nations specialised postal agency.
Dewera said the competitions started in 1971 adding that each year the organisation selects topics relevant to society for young people to write about.
This year’s competition required pupils to write a letter explaining the impact of music in people’s lives.

The school head, Dumisani Ncube, said music was a language on its own and emphasised the need for pupils to know that.
Winners were issued with prize money, a stationery hamper and a certificate.

The school received three shields, a certificate and library books worth $600.
Precious who came first will represent the province at the national competitions. She received $300 in cash and a stationery hamper worth $50.