A non-profit organisation will be rolling out a pilot project for Form 2 students in the wake of concerns that 16-year-olds are leaving school with a poor command of English. A total of 50 students from about 10 schools will be invited to take part in a competition organised by the National Student Travel Foundation, aimed at improving proficiency and accuracy in writing.

The intention is to widen the competition to all State, private and Church schools in the near future.

We need to build confidence in parents and educators

Each school will have a team of five students who will have to demonstrate their knowledge through the use of anagrams, antonyms, synonyms, rhyming words, phrases and spelling.

The organisers are hoping that through this informal approach students will be given the opportunity to broaden their vocabulary, improve their diction and express themselves better in English.

The two-day competition will be held next March in collaboration with the Department of English Students Associations within the University of Malta. A recent report on the performance of candidates who sat for the English Language Secondary Education Certificate Examinations held last May, flagged inadequate standards of grammar, spelling and punctuation.

In his reaction, Education Minister Evarist Bartolo told this newspaper that the government was looking closely at the successful model adopted by English language schools as one of the possible solutions.

NSTF director Francis Stivala, who is considered the pioneer of English language schools in Malta, said this methodology was based on the concept of the teacher as a moderator whose role is to ensure accuracy.

On the other hand, in mainstream education the accent is more on grammar and imparting knowledge to the students.

As for the causes behind the decline in the standard of English, he attributed this trend to the fact that nowadays the whole population has some degree of fluency in English, whereas before this was limited to a select group.

“When a language is being used even by those not accustomed to it then you get such a decline,” he argued.

In addition, Mr Stivala blamed the lack of reading, saying that the new generation was picking up the language from the wrong sources – people speaking bad English based on a direct translation from Maltese.

“We need to build confidence in parents and educators on the proper use of English, not only through reading but also through role play, especially at primary level,” Mr Stivala suggested.

However, he pointed out that the decline in standards was not limited to Malta, as similar trends were also emerging in other English-speaking countries.