75 years of British Council support for English in africa

75 YEARS OF BRITISH COUNCIL SUPPORT FOR ENGLISH TEACHING IN AFRICA

PAUL WOODS, ENGLISH MANAGER SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA, BRITISH COUNCIL

The Early Years

British Council, originally called ‘The British Committee for Relations with Other Countries’ was established in 1934 as a bulwark against fascism. In the mid-30’s, Germany and Italy were becoming increasingly militaristic and aggressive. Britain, on the other hand, felt that the development of cultural relations would strengthen its influence abroad. The British Council Charter defined its purpose as ‘promoting abroad a wider appreciation of British culture and civilisation [by] encouraging cultural, educational and other interchanges between the United Kingdom and elsewhere.’

In its early years , British Council arranged for lecturers and books to be sent overseas, as well as arranging visits to the UK. At first, funds were very tight – unlike its French, German, and Italian counterparts, which had budgets stretching into the millions, British Council managed with a few thousand pounds. Offices were opened in Egypt, then in 1943 in Ghana and Nigeria. After World War II ended, many barriers to cultural relations work came down and partnership opportunities increased. British Council expanded to include new offices in Kenya and Sudan.. In Egypt, the Council ran English language classes and sponsored performances of Shakespeare’s plays. ( Fisher, 2009)

The 60’s-English language teaching becomes core

Around 1960 language teaching, in association with the BBC, became a core element of British Council’s work. The two organisations also

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British Council’s office in Liverpool, 1941

began to explore the potential of using television for language teaching. A series of 39 TV programmes for teaching English was produced for non-Anglophone African countries including Algeria, Congo, Gabon, Cote D’Ivoire and Morocco. A new Department for Technical Cooperation was set up in 1961, responsible for British aid to developing countries. From the ‘60s until the mid ‘90s, British Council became responsible for education programmes and student training schemes in developing countries. During this period many students from Africa studied for MAs in Applied Linguistics, funded by the UK government.

When Rhodesia declared UDI in 1965 British Council withdrew its representative and several countries in southern Africa broke off diplomatic relations with Britain. However, British Council stressed reciprocity and partnerships, and newly independent nations increasingly requested support for English language teaching. (Fisher, 2009)

The 70’s–Partnerships and Direct Teaching

Voluntary Services Overseas (VSO) was founded in the early 60s. British Council was invited to act as the overseas arm of VSO and looked after the welfare of over 1,000 volunteers, many of them teachers of English. In 1971, when I was a volunteer teacher of English in Nigeria,

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there were nearly 200 VSOs teaching English and related subjects in secondary schools and teachers’ colleges across the country. Although VSO went on to set up its own Field Offices, British Council has maintained strong ties: Sir David Green, the Director-General between 1999–2007, was previously Director of VSO, and collaboration with VSO continues through the Global Xchange partnership, supporting the development of “active global citizens”. (Fisher, 2009)

In the early 70s, British Council provided support for the ACE (Aid to Commonwealth English) scheme, under which British ELT experts were sent to work in universities and teacher training colleges in Commonwealth countries, including Kenya and Uganda.

British books for children displayed in the British Council office in Rabat, Morocco, 1979

During the mid-70s the idea that newly rich countries should pay for their own technical aid and language teaching gained support. British Council Teaching Centres were set up, which had to make a “surplus”, or at the very least cover their costs. There was a feeling that this approach would not work in Africa, so the new centres were at first confined to Egypt and a few other countries in North Africa. Today there are teaching centres in Algeria, Cameroon, Egypt, Eritrea, Kenya, Libya, Mauritius, Morocco, Mozambique, Senegal and Tanzania.

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The 80’s-the Key English Language Teaching (KELT) Scheme and Communicative language teaching

From 1977 onwards, British Council developed a partnership with the UK government through the Overseas Development Administration (ODA)-now Department for International Development (DFID). This partnership supported programmes which included the Key English Language Teaching (KELT) scheme. This coincided with the development of a “projectised” approach to overseas aid, with detailed project plans, logical frameworks and objectively verifiable indicators of achievement. When the UK withdrew its support for UNESCO in the mid- 80s, the GBP 6 million pounds saved was redeployed to set up projects in Francophone African countries, including Guinea and Senegal. By the mid-80s there were KELT projects in many African countries, including Angola, Egypt, Ethiopia, Guinea, Malawi, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Sudan, Tanzania, and Zambia, with about 350 “experts” funded by DFID and managed by British Council worldwide. These projects covered a very wide range of activities - curriculum and syllabus design, materials production, communication skills, teacher training for primary and secondary schools and many other areas. Over the course of one and a half decades, annual “Dunford House” seminars were held which attracted UK experts and local counterparts, on themes such as “Appropriate Methodology” and “National Curricula”.

British Council also actively promoted new methods of teaching. In partnership with the BBC and ODA, the Council produced a series of teacher training films, “Teaching Observed”, (Hobbs, 1977) which was widely used in English language teacher training programmes across Africa.

The idea that language should be taught communicatively began to gain widespread acceptance. This gained impetus after Henry Widdowson published “Teaching Language as Communication” (Widdowson, 1978), emphasising the importance of language use, rather than usage. My favourite example of usage, not use, is when I met a small child coming down the road in Tukuyu, in southern Tanzania. “Hello, how are you?” she said. “Fine thank you,” I replied. “What is your name?” she asked. I told her, then she said, “Give me my pen!” “But I haven’t got your pen…” So much for drilling in structures and sentence patterns, with no attention to the appropriate use of language in a communicative context! A British Council officer, John Munby, published “Communicative Syllabus Design” in 1981. He retired from the British Council in 1997; the book

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was used as the basis for designing communicative syllabuses for English and especially ESP courses in many African countries, and is still in print. (Munby, 1981).

During the 70s and 80s, British Council worked to break down barriers to understanding and opportunity, notably in apartheid South Africa. It continued with programmes of assistance to non-violent, anti-apartheid organisations and supported English language programmes for the non-white community. This included the Molteno Project, to improve language education in black primary schools. Molteno promoted the development of an alternative curriculum, and introduced radical new ways of teaching young children to read. British Council also supported the UN Institute for Namibia, based in Lusaka, which looked forward to the day when Namibia would gain its independence from South Africa.

The 90s-the death of aid for UK-funded ELT

In the early 90’s, a new Minister, Clare Short, took over the Department for International Development in the UK. This was a disaster for aid-funded English Language teaching. Ms Short did not think English Language contributed to development, and proceeded to axe EL projects funded by DFID. In a last ditch attempt to influence opinion, the Institute for English Language Education, along with UK academics and EL professionals, organised the LAP 2000 Conference in Lancaster in 1994 to emphasise the economic and developmental arguments for ELT as an agent of change and development. (Hutchinson and Waters, 1994) But dogma prevailed, and virtually no DFID-funded ELT projects continued after 2001. One of the last to be completed was the Secondary and Technical English Project in Mozambique. The publication of Robert Phillipson’s book,” Linguistic Imperialism”, (Phillipson, 1992) a biassed and one-sided attack on the spread of English as a global language, also contributed to a lack of political will on behalf of the UK government to support large scale English language projects. Wherever possible, the Council continued to bid to design and implement major donor- or national government-funded projects in ELT. One of these was the 5-year ELIP (English Language Improvement Project) in Ethiopia, which was completed last year.

The 21st Century-Peacekeeping English

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From the mid-90’s the Peacekeeping English project was established . This focussed initially on countries in Central and Eastern Europe which aspired to join NATO, following the collapse of communism in the USSR and its former satellites. From 2003 onwards, the focus shifted to conflict and post-conflict situations, including Africa. New projects were set up supporting ‘interoperability’, to enable multinational forces from NATO, the African Union and UN peacekeepers to communicate effectively with each other in international peace support operations. (Woods, 2006).

In this way the provision of language training was directly contributing to the development of a safer and more peaceful world. Projects in Mozambique and Angola have just been completed, and new projects have been established in Ethiopia, DRC and Libya. In May 2009 I visited Sudan, to scope a project to teach English to Joint Integrated Units, composed of SAF and SPLA soldiers who were previous fighting on opposite sides.

Global English

In 2008, British Council decided to move away from funding low impact local projects in favour of larger scale regional and global products. For English. Initially 12 new products were developed, 6 for learners and 6 for teachers.

The Learner Products were: LearnEnglish Newspapers & Magazines; LearnEnglish Family; LearnEnglish Audio; Premier Skills; LearnEnglish Second Life for Teens and LearnEnglish Mobile, while the Six teacher products included: Global Path; Global Home for Teachers; Language Improvement for English Teachers; Learning Technologies for Teachers; Teachers Knowledge Test course and a Teacher Training Videos course.

Centrally, British Council is currently developing a global English Product portfolio, with three strands targeting key officials and influencers, teachers and learners:

English Nexus Network building & events Expertise, research and knowledge management Policy maker outreach

Engaging Teachers Teacher training Online courses to reach wider Teacher audiences Teacher development by radio Global CPD framework

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Communities of Practice English Connect Online courses to reach wider student audiences

Using radio to reach wider audiences Teaching Centres UK Exams

The key elements in “Nexus” are strengthening our role as a world authority in English teaching, building networks and providing content.

Engaging Teachers focuses on training, networking and resources for teaching. We are currently developing a series of radio programmes for teachers of English in poorly resourced circumstances in Africa.

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For Learners, we are strengthening our professional development offer and planning to open new teaching centres in partnership with local organisations in Africa. We are also developing a series of radio programmes, “Shared World”, for learners with low levels of English combining language learning with developmental themes.

This completes our “Cook’s tour” of British Council support for ELT in Africa over the past 75 years. It is difficult to gaze into a crystal ball and guess what the next 75 will bring. Perhaps Chinese will take over as the language of global international communication. Perhaps English will consolidate its position in Africa at the expense of other ex-colonial languages such as Portuguese and French. Or maybe we will see a shift in language policy leading to much wider use of regional lingua franca, such as Kiswahili and Yoruba.

In the short term British Council faces the challenge of offsetting a declining government grant by doubling its income from English teaching and professional development courses and extending its impact and reach through new media including digital technologies, the web/social networking sites and mobile phones, as well as more traditional means such as radio and TV, as it continues to support the role of English in Africa as a tool for both personal and national/socio-economic development.

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References

D. Allwright and A.Waters, 1994 Language in Aid projects: Towards the Year 2000 Colloquium Proceedings. Lancaster: Institute for English Language Education.British Council website: www.britishcouncil.org/history-1940-royal-charter.htmA. Fisher, 2009 A Story of Engagement: the British Council 1934-2009 London, British Council.J Hobbs, 1977. Teaching Observed. London: BBCJ Munby,, 1981 Communicative Syllabus Design, Cambridge, CUPR. Phillipson, 1992. Linguistic Imperialism Oxford: OUPM. Rose & N. Wadham-Smith, 2004 Mutuality, Trust and Cultural Relations, London, The British Council..A.J.S. White, 1965. The British Council: The First 25 Years 1934–1959, London, 1965H.G. Widdowson, 1978 Teaching Language as Communication Oxford, OUP. R.P. H Woods, 2006 The Hedgehog and the Fox: Two Approaches to theTeaching of English to the Military, in Re-locating TESOL in an Age of Empire, London, Palgrave Macmillan.

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