We would be able to go and do it. In some parts of the workbook, now that you talk about it, yes, I understand enough to do it. In the story book it doesn’t have anything hard in it, it is easy for us to
be able to do it. On the story side, how is it easy? Because we have found out the small rules in order to spell the language and it is all right. We are able to do it.
Another teacher said the workbook stories were not hard to develop and write. He said that they would be able to do it because they had been shown how. He added that having someone
that they could talk to about it and who could check on what they did would help. He said that he did not find anything in the story books that was hard; it was easy to do them. The same
comment was made by another teacher who said that the teachers wrote the stories or people in the community could write them, edited them, and made them into books. He said that they
understood how to make books because they had been shown how and it was not hard for them to do.
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Appendix M. Workbook Format Changes, Application, and Comparison
1. Changes to the Format of the Primer Material in the Workbooks
In returning to the Tau villages in the Kwanga area after an absence of two years, the researcher had a particular interest in research related to the format and presentation of the
lessons in the workbooks which contained the primer lessons. Through the original research and subsequent training of teachers, it became evident that teachers would be able to handle the
teaching of the workbooks in a more efficient way, if some changes were made. Some of the reasons for the changes were prompted by feedback from trainers and teachers:
1. The linguist working in Urat reported that the trainers had experienced some confusion and
difficulty when training teachers to use the format to teach different content on different days in lesson one.
2. A teacher pointed out that each part of lesson one was only taught once with no provision for
revision and consolidation each week. 3.
The content of lesson three was similar to that taught in lesson two, but with an opportunity for students to participate in games, which some teachers pointed out, were not appealing to
all adults.
4. There was not enough opportunity given for reading the connected material.
•
In the new layout see Appendix C, after the first session where two key words were introduced and practice given to identify the syllables used the format remained the
same for all subsequent sessions. The changes were related to lessons one and three. The lessons were taught in the same way as previously, but with a different order of
presentation.
•
The connected sentences were put first as part of lesson one, to give an opportunity for self-generated learning, with individuals attempting to read the text before all read it
together.
•
The key picture and the key word, taught by analysis and synthesis, completed lesson one—the phonemes of the syllable in focus were isolated but were taught only in the
context of the syllable, not in isolation.
•
The big box was left as lesson two but with selected activities from lessons two and three of the previous format taught as fitted the class.
•
The sentence using the key word, previously taught in lesson one, was taught as lesson three, after which the students re-read the connected material previously read in lesson
one.
•
Writing was left as lesson four to be taught as previously planned. During the intervening two years since the adult program, the teachers had successfully set
up and taught prep-schools in Tok Pisin using the Multi-Strategy method. Interest in literacy was high. To begin writing the books for the changeover from Tok Pisin into Kwanga, community
members were encouraged to join together to discuss the orthography and decide on a trial alphabet. A group of literate men met together, wrote stories, noted and discussed words with
spelling difficulties and, in a one-day session, settled on a working orthography.
In the next step, interested members of the community of varying ages met and discussed suitable materials, wrote and edited stories for the Story Track, and chose the key words and
wrote the pages for the workbooks in the Word-Building Track. In a week, all the necessary books were in draft form, so three men did the final editing and helped prepare the stencils for
the first books. People of all ages, including children, helped in the printing on silk-screen printers in the village, after which, they collated the books ready for the classes. The teachers
were given a short two-day in-service course, then they used the books in the current prep- schools, where there was a very enthusiastic changeover from Tok Pisin to Kwanga.
People in the neighbouring village of Warmenakor heard about the activities and came to ask if they could have some help to begin an adult class. The Tau teachers demonstrated and
gave four young men some training for two days. It was not possible to continue training at this stage, so the Warmenakor men took some copies of the books and started a class. They began
teaching a highly motivated group of young adults who had not had a previous opportunity to learn to read and write. These applications of the new material in the prep-school classes and the
adult class are presented in the next section.
2. Applications of the Materials With Format Changes 1. Use of the material in prep-school classes
When the teachers began using the new Kwanga materials in the prep-school classes, the researcher monitored the lessons to note any difficulties. One outcome of the change to their own
language was quite dramatic in the Story Track lessons. The children made such comments as, “Now it is easy because we can think and write.” “Now we can write because we know what to
write next.” Such spontaneous comments support the notion that in the area, especially with children and women, enough Tok Pisin is known to use in everyday conversation but there is not
the in-depth knowledge and understanding to enable full expression in writing. There seemed to be few difficulties in using the story books—reading with comprehension was evident along with
spontaneous, creative story telling and writing.
In the Word-Building Track, the teachers made the transition to the new format without problems because the activities were essentially the same as previously taught in Tok Pisin. In
the activity with analysis and synthesis of the key word, the new extension of breaking the syllable into phonemes was done appropriately. Two children in one class did say a vowel with
the separated consonant for example, ka.a, instead of ka at first, but quickly understood the idea because the letters were always said consecutively in the context of the syllable. There was very
little confusion in clapping the syllables: to differentiate between syllables and phonemes, the phonemes were tapped on the fingers. From observation and feedback from the teachers, this
further breaking down of the syllable did seem to help the children to identify the single letters. There was no problem of blending because the individual letters were learnt in context, being
immediately read in larger units of syllables and words.
The teachers gave favourable comments about the new format, both for ease of teaching and for preparation, with the same structure used each day. The enthusiastic transition from Tok Pisin
to Kwanga materials and the full acceptance of the new format for the workbook in the prep- school classes boosted the resolve to test the materials with an adult class. The next section gives
a description of the beginning of classes for preliterate adults in the neighbouring village of Warmenakor.
