Teachers’ Perspectives of African Languages in Teaching Mathematics: Is There a Place for Sepedi?

Language and mathematics teaching has been a critical issue for decades. The debate in the African context is on using the mother tongue to teach mathematics or, alternatively, to use English with a more teaching-orientated mathematics register. During an ethnomathematics, indigenous games intervention programme, 14 participants from a rural district in the Limpopo province of South Africa were interviewed regarding the challenges they are currently experiencing in teaching mathematics in the Intermediate Phase (Grades 4 to 6). The medium of instruction at these schools is English in the Intermediate Phase, while in the Foundation Phase, the learners are taught mathematics in Sepedi, which is the mother tongue in the district. In the study, we aim to explore how language influences the teaching of mathematics in the Intermediate Phase. We found firstly that English is a barrier to learning for Intermediate Phase learners even though code-switching is used for understanding. Secondly, the debate developed on whether teachers should use mother tongue in Grade 4 or use English which may give the learners the cultural capital to pursue mathematics through later phases. Finally, there may not be a sufficient mathematics register in Sepedi for teachers to engage learners in deeper mathematical discourse and allow them to understand the mathematical concepts. We recommend that teachers be capacitated to use language in various ways when using Sepedi to enhance teaching mathematics. Future research endeavours will include working with a mathematics register in Sepedi and implementing it in mathematics classrooms.