Developing the academic literacy of isiXhosa-speaking learners in an Afrikaans-medium school in the Intermediate Phase

Abstract

South Africa in its multilingual state presents many challenges for teachers to achieve the task of developing learners? academic literacy. Many learners in South Africa either do not have the privilege or access to mother tongue instruction. Thus, in some instances, teachers are faced with the challenge of having to instruct a minority of isiXhosa speaking learners whose mother tongue is different from the Language of Learning and Teaching (LoLT) of the school and the majority of the class. There have been numerous studies that investigate what strategies teachers can use when they share the MT of the learners, such as the use of code-switching This study looks at teachers who are Afrikaans-speaking and teach in an Afrikaans-medium school, and how they develop the academic literacy of a minority of isiXhosa-speaking learners in Grade 4.