Donnerstag, 14. Mai 2015
Make Maori compulsory in schools?
surfergirl, 15:49h
At the moment there is a discussion going on in New Zealand whether the traditional Maori language should get compulsory in schools. This is one of the suggestions to save the language but there are very different opinions about this.
Making the Maori language compulsory in schools will create more bilingual New Zealanders, an education institute says. And others say the country should look to Europe for inspiration with language studies, because in European countries the majority of children actually know two or three languages. An advantage in learning the Maori language would be the fact that the Maori language is a little bit similar to other languages so that children who know the Maori language could learn other (European) languages much easier. Learning the Maori language would open doors to culture and to learning other languages. It would be much easier to understand the world. Furthermore, Maori is a cultural treasure that should be kept and so the the Minister of Maori Affairs says the time has come to be compulsory for every New Zealand school to offer Maori lessons.
On the other hand there are people who do not believe that making the Maori language learning in schools compulsory could work. They say compulsion tends to have the opposite effect and as soon as people are told that they have to do this, there is almost a knee jerk reaction and this idea of compulsion really says that the country has run out of ideas and the only thing possible is to force people to learn the language. Languages normally transmit from one generation to the next through certain means and no amount of compulsion is going to compensate for the absence of those traditional transmission mechanisms. However, the Minister Parata also says “The real enemy to oppressing the language is to make it compulsory. The importance of learning the language is that the student, the child and their family, want to learn.”
In my opinion, every single child in New Zealand should really get the opportunity to learn the Maori language and it should be made clear that Maori really is a cultural heritage that should be kept. But I agree that the idea of compulsion is not really good. Although I think you could make it compulsory for a year or two so that students have to expose and get an idea of the Maori language and so can better decide if they like to learn it really good or not.
What do you think about this? :)
Making the Maori language compulsory in schools will create more bilingual New Zealanders, an education institute says. And others say the country should look to Europe for inspiration with language studies, because in European countries the majority of children actually know two or three languages. An advantage in learning the Maori language would be the fact that the Maori language is a little bit similar to other languages so that children who know the Maori language could learn other (European) languages much easier. Learning the Maori language would open doors to culture and to learning other languages. It would be much easier to understand the world. Furthermore, Maori is a cultural treasure that should be kept and so the the Minister of Maori Affairs says the time has come to be compulsory for every New Zealand school to offer Maori lessons.
On the other hand there are people who do not believe that making the Maori language learning in schools compulsory could work. They say compulsion tends to have the opposite effect and as soon as people are told that they have to do this, there is almost a knee jerk reaction and this idea of compulsion really says that the country has run out of ideas and the only thing possible is to force people to learn the language. Languages normally transmit from one generation to the next through certain means and no amount of compulsion is going to compensate for the absence of those traditional transmission mechanisms. However, the Minister Parata also says “The real enemy to oppressing the language is to make it compulsory. The importance of learning the language is that the student, the child and their family, want to learn.”
In my opinion, every single child in New Zealand should really get the opportunity to learn the Maori language and it should be made clear that Maori really is a cultural heritage that should be kept. But I agree that the idea of compulsion is not really good. Although I think you could make it compulsory for a year or two so that students have to expose and get an idea of the Maori language and so can better decide if they like to learn it really good or not.
What do you think about this? :)
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