GIL research teaching and learning of French

Kumasi, Aug 10, GNA - The Ghana Institute of Languages (GIL) is carrying out a national research into the teaching and learning of French.

The institute is also translating essential information or notices on signboards and plaques into French to promote the learning of the language alongside the official English language. Dr Sebastian Koug Bemile, the Director of the GIL who announced this during the inauguration of a classroom block for the Institute in Kumasi, said the measures would help in shaping a language policy at the basic levels.


The Ghana Education Trust Fund funded the two-storey building containing 12 classrooms and it cost 1.4 billion-cedis. Dr Bemile said the GETFund was also funding the construction of a new campus for the institute in Accra and had also provided a bus and six pick-ups to the school.


"We have acquired 70 acres of land at Shishegu for the expansion of the Tamale campus. We are now poised for urgent development of the infrastructure in order to attract students from northern Togo, Burkina Faso, Mali, Niger and other parts of the world."


Dr Bemille said a GIL campus would soon be opened in Sekondi- Takoradi to run courses during the 2004/2005 academic years to attract students from the Western Region and neighbouring Cote d'Ivoire.

Mr Joe Donkor, a Deputy Minister of Education, Youth and Sports, said proficiency and writing of a language was a tool for people to build on their economic, social, political and cultural activities.


It was therefore essential, he said, for people to take the studies of languages seriously to improve upon their social and economic standing.


Prof Kwasi Kwafo Adarkwa, Pro vice-Chancellor of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST), called for a language policy to promote peace, unity and development among Ghanaians.


Nana Ampofo Kyei Baffour, Asemhene who represented the Asantehene, Otumfuo Osei Tutu II, pledged the support of the Asanteman Council to efforts by the GIL to promote the study of languages.