Lyonpo Norbu Wangchuk said the education ministry will not be able to consider the National Council’s recommendation to teach Bhutan History in Dzongkha. He said past experiences have proved it to be a not very effective way to teach the subject.
Supporting his claims, the minister shared that students were not able to learn as expected, which became a cause of worry for the parents.
“It turned out to be neither History nor Dzongkha. Dzongkha teachers taught History not as a subject but as a language, while the general teachers who gave a shot at it were not able to teach in a way it was supposed to be taught,’ said Lyonpo.
Based on these past experiences, Lyonpo said the ministry is still not ready to embrace Dzongkha as the medium of instruction for the subject.
But Bumthang MP Nima argued that contrary to what the minister said, not all students had problems with the subject being taught in Dzongkha. He said he had met students who supported it. He added that a research carried out by the Paro College of Education in 2008 came up with the same finding.
“Since most of our students are studying in rural communities, they said they understand the subject better in Dzongkha.”
MP Nima said the shortage of teachers trained to teach the subject in Dzongkha would have been solved by now had the ministry worked towards it. He also said the ministry had earlier mentioned that a feasibility study would be conducted and so asked when it plans to do that.
To this the Education Minister said the ministry has submitted the National Council’s recommendations to the Royal Education Council to start with the preparatory works.
