Is The Government Right in Limiting Student Reading Lists?
Following the scrapping of three American works of fiction from the GCSE syllabus, the classics To Kill a Mocking Bird, The Crucible and Of Mice And Men ,we decided to look into our own Kenyan literature syllabus. There are two predominant education systems in Kenya, one culminating with the IGCSE exams (British system) and the KCSE exams (8-4-4). Students studying the British system will likely be affected by England’s Education Minister Michael Gove’s call for a more nationalistic reading curriculum in the UK. This move directly affects all countries offering the British curriculum. The three books have been criticized as alienating young British minds.
What about our own local system? The 8-4-4 system? For years the government,every year, dictates which three books students would study for their time in high school a system that we, at UP Magazine, think is sorely lacking.
“Its utter nonsense!! I remember I’d get home during the holidays and look over at my brother’s reading list for high school and feel immediately jealous. He was in the British system and his high school had a selection of I think thirteen books meanwhile I was stuck with two books that I found absolutely boring” says John a city resident. According to him the system is responsible for the fact that Nairobi is only just starting to develop a reading culture. Books relevant in the 60s and 70s according to him have for too long dominated the set books of Kenyan high school and its high time that books with a more modern undertone got the same attention. Books like Half of a yellow sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie or No Violet Bulawayo’s We Need New Names should be offered as choices.
Sanaa Arman also agrees with John, “I’ve fairly little knowledge of the 8-4-4 system but I think they need to deviate from generic literature. I love Chinua Achebe and all his works but African lit is wider. There’s always the Chimamanda’s and Achebe’s but little is talked of Ama Ata Aidoo, Nadia Mohammed etc” If you ask a Kenyan student for a list of African authors they will always mention Ngugi, Achebe and Chimamanda Adichie betraying another fault the government’s system has. They’ve reduced African literature down to a limited amount of books that they deem ‘appropriate’ thus reducing the scope of culture and society that students can be exposed to.
Alice Achieng however, disagrees. “I know what guys really want, more authors from majuu. Complete rejection over our own writers, most of my friends who did IGCSE never even thought of doing an African book for their final exam. They would much rather have books by like J.D Salinger who wrote Catcher in The Rye than people like Grace Ogot who wrote The Promised Land a book about the Luo people. How are we ever to expect these kids to learn about their roots when we don’t give them the tools to learn?” she says. She goes on further to laud the government’s choice to keep the reading list limited to three books because that means they offer quality over quantity, that is, a larger reading list would be too dilute with literature preventing the students from truly appreciating them. She also says that the government having hired professionals to look at African literature and choose what books are appropriate for students is in a better position to choose than a fifteen-year-old student fresh out of primary school.
What’s your take on this? Do you approve of the British government’s move to slash those three books from their list? Do you think the reading list for Kenyan students doing 8-4-4 should be made longer? What books do you think Kenyan students need to be studying?
