L’évaluation des pratiques didactiques de la lecture en français au niveau I du cycle primaire au Cameroun.

Abstract

This survey aims at assessing teaching and learning didactics practices of reading in French in class one and class two of primary school in Cameroon. Primary education encounters difficulties related to failure in early learning, mostly because of lack of reading skills. In this light, PASEC statistics (2015-2015) brings out that 70.4% of students find themselves below the sufficient threshold, because they cannot reach the expected level in reading. And as an instrumental, even transversal subject, reading conditions the learning of all other subjects. So, the lack of acquisition of reading skills is revealed to lay students open to a short school life, as they fail continuously. Investigations carried out in the field show that there are closer links between reading practices in classroom and student skills. This survey is therefore suggesting to evaluate teachers’ practices by questioning those able to promote acquisitions in reading. The following question is worth asking: what practices can promote the acquisition of reading? We suggest comparing the declared practices and the practices in force in the classrooms. To meet this objective, we chose an exploratory descriptive approach, combining a quantitative and qualitative method, involving 56 teachers. In order to evaluate teachers' practices, we used a questionnaire, accompanied by three direct observation sessions and a documentary analysis which both made it possible to triangulate the data and to reach empirical saturation. The data collected was subjected to descriptive analysis using SPSS software. The results indicate that there are closer links between teachers' practices and students' skills, and that there is a huge gap between what teachers report and what they practice in the classroom. They find it difficult to align themselves with innovative practices and rather make the choice of those that are out-of-date. These results have an implication in the success or failure in reading among students. Hence the urgent need to constantly renew the practices prescribed by the Government of the Republic of Cameroon.