Abstract:
Change over of the medium of instruction to S i n h a l a and Tamil in
1950s made provision to teach English as a compulsory second
language. Even though E n g l i s h has been taught for around half a
decade it has failed to improve the students language proficiency
in speaking and written English. With the introduction of the
mother tongue as a medium of instruction, the students from
different ethnic communities were segregated to S i n h a l a and Tamil
streams i n schools. The children of these communties were
isolated. Hence there was no common medium to communicate
with each other. Therefore the necessity arose to use a common
language i n a l l activities. As a result the Amity Schools Project
was started i n 2001 to build national unity.
To build national u n i t y through learning a second language was
identified by the Amity Schools Project which was later developed
as a strategy i n terms of bilingual policy. The National Education
Commission (2003) has introduced a bilingual policy in 2002 in
Junior Secondary level. The main objective of the bilingual policy
was claimed to acquire a level of English proficiency for higher
education and career advancement. (N.E.C. Report, 2003).
This study is to investigate, whether there is a bilingual policy in
Junior Secondary level and to identify the features of bilingual
programme that has been introduced i n S r i L a n k a .
For the purpose of the study a survey was carried out i n four
leading schools. The survey consists of one hundred and fifty two
students who are i n Grade 8 English medium classes. Among the
four schools, an indepth study was based in two schools. Nine
teachers who teach i n Grade 8 English medium classes of these
respective leading schools were also the participants of this study.
