Our world is so vast and unique that there are constantly new things to learn and discover. The journey of education is a journey that never ends because there will always be something that we don’t know.

I was taught from a young age that we as people have the privilege of being life-long learners. Many people choose to abandon learning when they’ve completed school or even university, but even if we don’t acknowledge it, we are constantly expanding our knowledge each and every day. The importance of being curious and hungry to learn has been instilled in me and knowledge was more accessible to me because I was raised in an English-speaking household. I think that it is generally accepted that English is the ultimate language of communication in today’s world and subsequently most media, film, literature and research amongst other things are all published in English. This was a fact that was not obvious to me but was rather just a norm, and I especially did not have to take notice of this because my first language was English. When my horizons started expanding and the people that I surrounded myself with started diversifying, I realised just how privileged I am to be able to learn from information written in my home language.

The benefits of learning in one’s Mother Tongue has been researched in schools and it has been found that children learn more effectively when taught in their home language. The studies conducted about bilingual/multilingual education have shown that most children in South Africa whose first language is not English are only exposed to the language when they start school. Although it is easier for a child to learn a new language as compared to an adult, having to learn in a completely new language can be extremely daunting and difficult for a young child. As a result of the language barrier, a lot of children struggle academically not due to their abilities but rather the fact that they have to learn a new concept whilst also trying to grasp a new form of communication. To try alleviate this problem, some South African businesses like Cadbury are trying to publish more educational and fictional books languages of the country like Xhosa and Tshivenda to make literature more accessible for young learners.

The moment that I truly realised the extent of this issue was when I had the task of interviewing one of our tutors. One of the questions that we ask all applicants is how they would make a student feel confident in their abilities. This question usually stumps a lot of people, but this particular applicant answered this question so brilliantly that I was inspired to write the article that I am writing now. She went on to explain that children are most comfortable in informal settings where they don’t feel pressure to speak formally or even feel pressure to speak a language other than their mother tongue. When she mentioned the safety and comfortability of speaking in one’s own language, I realised just how much a child could possibly struggle with a subject based on not their academic abilities but rather the mere fact that the information they have to learn is written in their second or third language. This tutor went on to answer the question by saying that she would make a student feel more confident in their academic abilities by teaching/tutoring them in their mother tongue. As simple a method as teaching a child content in their own language may seem, the impact is astounding and I have not looked at the education system the same since I conducted this interview.