ABSTRACT
This edited volume explores how indigenous knowledges and practices can be instrumental in improving literacy outcomes and teacher development practices in Ethiopia, aiding children’s long-term reading, and learning outcomes.
The chapters present research from a collaborative project between Ethiopia and Norway and demonstrate how students can be supported to think pragmatically, learn critically and be in possession of the citizenship skills necessary to thrive in a multilingual world. The authors celebrate multilingualism and bring indigenous traditions such as oracy, storytelling, folktales to the fore revealing their positive impact on educational attainment. Addressing issues of language diversity and systematic ignorance of indigenous literacy practices, the book plays a necessary role in introducing Ethiopia’s cultural heritage to the West and, hence, bridges the cultural gaps between the global north and global south.
Arguably contributing one of the first publications on early literacy in Ethiopian languages, this book will appeal to scholars, researchers and postgraduate students studying the fields of early years literacy and language, indigenous knowledge and applied linguistics more broadly.
The Open Access version of this book, available at www.taylorfrancis.com, has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives (CC-BY-NC-ND) 4.0 license.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
part 1|51 pages
Challenges associated with early reading competency and teaching practices
chapter 2|14 pages
Challenges of early grade reading competency in Ethiopia
chapter 3|8 pages
Induction of beginning teachers in Ethiopian schools with reference to multilingual pre-school programs
chapter 4|27 pages
Early Grade Reading in Ethiopia
part 2|63 pages
Indigenous literacy practices
chapter 5|24 pages
The contribution of Nibab-Bet (school of reading) for modern schooling
chapter 6|20 pages
Reading instructions in the schools of the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahido Church (EOTC)
part 3|67 pages
Language development