Legon Journal of the Humanities, 25

Figure 2 
Language choice in a Mathematics lesson 
Teacher:
Nnipa baanu kyε akutu anan a, obiara benya ahe?
When two people share four oranges, how many will each have?
1
st
 Pupil:
Two 
Teacher:
Nnipa baanu kyε kwaadu asia nso ε?
And when two people share six fingers of bananas? 
2
nd
 Pupil:
Three, three 
Teacher:
And when three people share nine pencils? 
Na nnipa baasa kyε pencil akron nso ε?
3
rd
 pupil:
Three 
The third lesson that the researcher observed was in Religious and Moral Education where 
the teacher taught the “Creation Story” from the Holy Bible. The Bible was read in 
English, after which the teacher narrated the account in Twi. All the questions were asked 
in Twi, and the responses from pupils were mostly in Twi. After the lesson, there was a 
memory verse taught in English. Below is an excerpt of the class session. 
 
 
 
Ansah, A. M./ Legon Journal of the Humanities 25 (2014) 37-57 

---

Legon Journal of the Humanities, 25 
(2014)
P a g e
| 47 
Figure 3 
Language choice in a Religious and Moral Education lesson 
Teacher:
Dɛn na Onyankopon bɔ dii kan?
“What did God create first?” 
Pupil 1:
Star, 
nsoroma
Teacher:
Nna ahe na ɔde bɔɔ biribiara?
“How many days did He use in creating everything?” 
Pupils 2:
Nnansa 
 
 
“Three days” 
Teacher:
Dabi
“No.” 
Pupil 3:
6 days 
Teacher:
Good! 
The teacher narrated the story in Twi after reading from the English Holy Bible, 
because she intimated that biblical English was sometimes difficult to understand. She 
could not read the Twi bible so she read passages in English and then explained them in 
Twi. Pupils gave some one-word answers in English, especially where it was a loan word 
or lexical items which were better known in English. In most of the instances, the answers 
were in Twi. The memory verse was taught in English, because it gave the pupils a sense 
of pride to recite Bible verses in English. During school Open Days and Children’s Day 
in the Presbyterian Church, for example, school children were made to recite English 
Bible verses to the admiration of unlettered parents. For the parents of these school 
children, the ability to recite Bible verses in English was evidence of literacy. 
The three preceding teaching scenarios present language choices in the Primary 
1 classroom. In each case, the teacher’s language choice may be described as unmarked. 
The bilingual strategy adopted by the teacher is what is expected from a Primary 1 teacher 
as per the Government of Ghana’s educational policy on language. The teacher’s speech 
was therefore characterized by codeswitching. The type of lesson also determined the 
teacher’s language choice. In this case, the appropriate language had to be selected in 
order to achieve teaching and learning objectives as seen in the Religious and Moral 
Education lesson. On the other hand, the pupils’ choices stemmed from their competency 
levels in the two prescribed languages of instruction. The institutional factor may be 
likened to Johnson’s situational rule (1975) which stipulates that it is a situation type that 
determines the choice of language. In the classroom situation therefore, the language (s) 
is/are prescribed, and the teacher does not have much control over the language of 
instruction.
Applying the Markedness Model, we can assert that the teacher’s unmarked 
choice of language was dictated by the Educational Language Policy of Ghana. The