CANDIDATES’ WEAKNESSES

The weaknesses observed include:

1. mother tongue interference which resulted in transliteration;


2. poor expression as a result of wrong concord, poor punctuation marks, wrong use of tenses, poor use of prepositions and articles;


3. failure to grasp the requirements and demands of the questions attempted;


4. inability to construct simple and correct sentences;


5. poor knowledge of idioms and their meanings;


6. illegible handwriting;


7. spelling errors;


8. poor knowledge of the basic rules of English grammar;  


9. mindless lifting of answers from set passages;


10. use of text message abbreviations such as “u” for “you” “d” for “the”, etc;


11. use of long, uncontrolled and ambiguous sentences;


12. inability to infer meaning from the passages;


13.  wrong syllabication of words and wrong use of homonyms and homophones.

SUGGESTED REMEDIES

Candidates should:


1. endeavour to improve on their vocabulary and grammar in English Language through extensive reading;


2. take time to understand the demands of questions before attempting to answer them;


3. read through their works to correct spelling and grammatical mistakes before submitting their scripts;


4. practise essay writing constantly;


5. converse regularly using simple and correct English expressions;


6. try to unlearn what they have learnt wrongly.

Teachers should:


1. spend more time in teaching grammar topics and comprehension skills;


2. in addition to giving their students assignments frequently, teachers should also mark such assignments in order to help students identify and correct their mistakes;


3. pay attention to spellings of words that can be confusing to students both in sound and spelling;


4. devise teaching methods that will cater for the various needs of their students;


5. bear in mind that language is acquired outside of the classroom and learned in the classroom, thus, they should create real-life experiences in the classroom during their teaching sessions;


6. regularly attend workshops and seminars that would keep them abreast of global best practices in the teaching of the English Language.

Schools should ensure that:


1. only qualified teachers are engaged to teach subject;


2. libraries are equipped with relevant books and materials that will aid the students academically.