How to make English the tounge of vocational learning in the NUCOOP Bachelor programme?

The teachers in the NUCOOP Bachelor programme in Vocational Education are beyond doubt expected to be using the English language when teaching. At the same time it is expected that not all of the teachers are used to teaching in English and that even a smaller part of the Sudanese bachelor students are feeling at ease when using the English language.

In some parts of the Sudanese upper secondary schools English is not taught at all. It is expected that some of the bachelor students are going to qualify for admission partially based upon their vocational merits.

Lazarus is worried that his computer training which he paid for him self is soon becoming useless because of his lack of acces to a computer.

Lazarus, a young man from Malakal told me how he had learned his English. By listening to others, picking up pieces of phrases and actively construct-ing his English language he has on his own obtained sufficient knowledge in English to be able to participate in social inter-action using the same language. Lazarus is beyond doubt a clever guy and he is called wise by his peers. He has in his own way managed to cope with the challenges caused by that his school did not offer him the opportunity of learning English.

The NUCOOP bachelor programme in vocational education will have to face the challenge of a student body supposed to be lacking sufficient knowledge in English by integrating intensive focus on language training in all of its activities.

One way might be to offer the students access to high quality soundtracks presenting readings of English literature as well as vocational texts. The individual use of technology supported interactivity enabling each student to record and listen to his or hers own pronunciation and intonation and to compare it with the sound tracks will probably contribute to an increased learning outcome.

Another approach might be to facilitate a systematic formalisation of the tacit knowledge often characterizing vocational practice by open reflection and sharing.

The big question of how to manage to make English the tongue of learning in the NUCOOP bachelor programme in vocational education in South Sudan still remains mainly open and ideas are welcomed.

How is this possible?

Actually I don’t really know what I expected coming to Khartoum for the first time. The temperature of some +39 Celsius did not feel as I think I expected. The partly clouded sky and the nice fair breeze is obviously to thank for the way the weather welcomed me this afternoon. Due to the early arrival of the plane I had some time to observe the way of life outside of the Khartoum International Airport. I’ve seen some airports during the years, and what I really noticed here was the respectful and calm atmosphere, the politeness and the friendliness, both between the Sudanese and towards me appearing as a pink European with at lot of luggage.

Another thing which I noticed was the type of cars of the NGOs. It made me reflect upon their needs of reliable heavy duty vehicles.

After some time I called Benjamin which happened to be close by and when the driver of UNU came, we left for the hotel.

Arriving at the Acropole Hotel, I bumped into a smiling retired British Naval Commander and learned that his church has established some 300 schools in Sudan, mostly primaries. They are now about to start a new secondary school in Juba. It is definite that we new comers have a lot to learn from those having learned a lot before us. Sudan, with its history, with its politics and with its complexity is obviously hard to understand for me.

When Deputy Vice Chancellor Dr Faisal arrived at the hotel he, Benjamin and my self sat down and talked in the lobby of the hotel. His warm and friendly greetings felt reassuring to me. We talked trough my mission for this visit and agreed upon how to proceed.

Having dinner at Acrpole Hotel turned out to be totally different from what I had expected. Not that I know what I expected, but it for sure was not sitting around a table speaking Norwegian. A group of four from the Norwegian authorities of immigration doing research upon the actual situation in Sudan from the perspectives relevant for the judging of immigration issues knows a lot which is of interest for someone trying to understand what it’s all about. And they generously shared.

My thoughts when going to room 34 was simply: How is this possible? If this day is proved equal to the ones to come, then it is totally up to us to make NUCOOP a story about a successful example of capacity building. Of course my thoughts were optimistic, ...

Why Sudan and why Malakal?

Together with Upper Nile University in Sudan and Kyambogo University in Uganda we at Akershus University College in Norway are working to establish a bachelor programme in vocational education at Upper Nile University in Malakal.

The bachelor programme in vocational education at Upper Nile in Malakal (NUCOOP) is made possible first of all due to the efforts of our friends and colleagues at Upper Nile University, both in Khartoum and in Malakal as well as those at Kyambogo University whom are launching a master programme in vocational pedagogy (NOMA) and by combining the two funding programmes for higher education NUCOOP and NOMA offered by SIU in Norway.

News from my visit to Sudan April - May 2008

This is going to be my first visit to Sudan and the plane with which I'm leaving Oslo, Norway takes off tomorrow at 06:30 CET.

It is my intention to try to post messages on the fly, but so far I've not been able to post from my mobile phone via go@blogger.com. Hopefully this will be solved before May 14th when I'm returning to Oslo.

What is working is the service Twitter which allows me to send text messages of 140 characters via SMS.

These messages will turn up in the sidebar the right hand side under the title I'm ... and you should be able to add these tiny nuggets of information to the picture created by the postings which will be made when a network connection is available.