So the Ministry of Education has found errors in primary school textbooks and urges teachers to report them (FT 21 July).
In September last year I wrote to these columns (letters, September 23) to say just that. So why has it taken the ministry 10 months to acknowledge the crisis?
And what does it say about the “quality” of work in curriculum development that so many errors were made? And it is not just punctuation or “punctuations” as the ministry’s acting principal education officer for primary education Ruci Qele, so incorrectly puts it just to compound the very problem she identifies. It is factual error (as in the Social Science section, for example).
The simple truth is many teachers don’t see these mistakes, children take them on as gospel, and most teachers who do spot them are afraid or too lazy to report them to their errant masters who I believe steadfastly ignore or bully them.
Is it any wonder the same ministry, as well as the private sector, has expressed concern over the quality of university students?
