The Primary Bilingual Education Experiment in Mozambique, 1993 to 1997

Abstract

The recent experiment in bilingual education in Mozambique known as PEBIMO, which utilised two different Bantu languages in transitional programmes for lower primary schooling, offered an alternative to exclusive instruction in Portuguese, which is a foreign language for approximately 98 percent of Mozambicans. Evaluations done during the final two years of the experiment using both quantitative and qualitative means demonstrate that students benefited greatly from use of the mother tongue in terms of classroom participation, self-confidence, bilingualism, and biliteracy. Inadequacies in the model, problems with experimental design and control, and logistical concerns complicate the interpretation of research results; however, the descriptive data in particular provide strong evidence that bilingual schooling may significantly improve educational quality in Mozambique. The study also has implications for conducting educational research in sub-optimal conditions.

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