This study investigated how reading is taught in Botswana Government schools. The findings indicate that inadequate reading instruction by teachers, their inability to model and provide students with research-based proven strategies, lack of reading specialists/coaches in the primary schools, the use of only basal series as the primary texts for reading, were responsible for the presence of many struggling readers and non-readers in the Botswana Government Primary Schools. The study is important in that it will reacquaint teachers with some aspects of the reading process, adequate reading instruction and ability to model reading strategies in their classes. In this regard the Ministry of Education may have to employ reading couches in the primary schools. The paper also recommends, among other things, raising the status of reading by making it a school subject in its right so that it can be examined just like any other school subject.
I n Botswana there is actually no policy prescription as regards the education of the gifted. The nearest thing is a statement in the special education section of the revised national policy that 'the Government of Botswana is committed to the education of all children, including disabled, and therefore will intensify efforts to increase access to education for all disabled' (p. 11). The inference is that such provision as is made in the regular curriculum should suffice for the learning needs of all children. This may not necessarily materialise, as we know that the field of special education has evolved to take care of unusual situations in education. Giftedness among children is one such rare ability and it is imperative that it be appropriately guided towards full manifestation in children. According to Clark (1992) giftedness results from an interactive process that involves challenges from the environment. Bloom (1985) contends that individuals will not actualise their gifts in their respective fields unless there is an interactive process of encouragement, nurturance, adequate education and training. The potentials inherent in giftedness require an enabling environment, and a reading programme can be very rewarding in this regard (Halsted, 1988). Creative reading that involves the highest levels of thinking, filling gaps, making corrections and solving problems has been found relevant in realising learning potential. George (1997), Torrance (1995) and Torrance and Safter (1990) support this point of view. In realisation of the need to make provision for giftedness different strategies have been used over the years, such as acceleration (Davis and Rimm, 1989), enrichment programmes (Renzulli, 1977), creative reading (Torrance, 1979) and more recently literature-based creative reading (Savage, 1994). Literature-based creative reading has the feature that there are no designated textbooks. Trade books, daily newspapers, poems, journals and periodicals are used as the primary materials of instruction. In addition there are regular individual conferences with the teacher, students select what is to be read and the readers' responses form part of an integrated feature of instruction. Also involved is the use of thematic units, reading and writing connection and students' study of authors. Literature-based reading and gifted students in Botswana
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