Mr Kunkung Jobarteh, the deputy-permanent secretary, Department of State for Basic and Secondary  Education, has stressed that there is need for  increased focus on the teaching of french in our schools to further develop the interest of students in learning the language.

Mr Jobarteh made these remarks during the closing ceremony of a five-day conference centred on the effective teaching of french. Held at the Alliance Franco-Gambienne, the conference brought together participants from French teaching schools in The Gambia and is geared to further equip and capacitize  french teachers working in a bilingual environment.  

Taking into consideration the importance of French language, Mr Jobarteh also indicated that the motivation of students should be increased to appreciate and realise the advantage in becoming bilingual.

He further challenged teachers and school administrators to inject the french interest in students and called for more hours to be added on french lessons especially in the lower grades were the foundation is built.

For her part, Dr Françoise Chitour of the French Technical Assistance in The Gambia, stated that participants are expected to be able to directly apply in practice the techniques learnt from the five-day conference. She therefore revealed that the Department of State for Basic and Secondary Education has agreed to collaborate and work with the French Technical Assistance in order to open bilingual french public schools in the Gambia. In other words, the success of Shilloh Bilingual Education Center in Bijilo need to be emulated.

She concluded by emphasizing that a first session on primary french tutoring was earlier conducted and more trainings as such will be done to increase the capacity of french teachers in the country.