Gambia, The - Education Sector Program Development Grant : School Language Mapping Report (English)

In the Gambia, very few children start school with a high level of English, and nearly all speak a variety of national languages. To support the development of a long-term plan for sustainable and efficient mainstreaming of the national language approach into the curriculum, a language mapping was completed. The purpose of this language mapping was to examine the language(s) that children are the most comfortable in for each public (both government and grant-aided) lower basic school. The primary objective of this report is to provide Ministry of Basic and Secondary Education (MoBSE) with comprehensive data on language prominence and distribution at the school level, alongside insights into key stakeholders' perceptions regarding the use of national languages as a medium of instruction. This detailed analysis of the school mapping results aims to directly inform the development of the language of instruction (LOI) policy and support the formulation of an operationalization strategy for its implementation. This exercise is in line with MoBSE's commitment to data-driven policymaking. It is crucial to note that while this report plays a significant role in the policy development process, its scope is mainly confined to presenting factual data from the language mapping exercise. This mapping is part of a parallel initiative supporting the development of an LOI policy, with the foundations of an LOI operationalization strategy also underway. This report is structured as follows: the introduction outlines the key considerations for developing the language mapping and the terminology used. Section 2 provides an overview of The Gambia's country, education sector, and linguistic context. The methodology is detailed in section 3, followed by the data interpretation approach in section 4. Section 5 presents the main findings (with comprehensive details in the annex). Section 6 synthesizes these findings into key recommendations.