Shona

Ms Pam Kudita, who teaches  First Language Shona from Grade 3 to Grade 7, heads the Shona department.  Mrs Chirara teaches the Early Childhood Development (ECD), Grade 1 and Grade 2 as well as the ELP classes and the pupils in Grades 3 to 7 who have Shona as their second language.

• Shona for ECD is mostly games and songs but pupils are also taught basic Shona greetings, e.g. mangwanani - good morning, masikati -good afternoon, and manheru - good evening. 
• Grade 2 pupils are also taught more advanced greetings, for example “mhoroi” - hello, how are you, good night, etcetera.  They learn everyday vocabulary words but sentences are avoided at this early stage.
• Serious Shona work starts from Grade 3 to Grade 7.  The pupils get a lot of vocabulary and they also start constructing sentences.
• Exams start in Grade 3.   Shona marks go on their mid-year and end-of-year reports. 
• We have also introduced “SHONA WORD A DAY”.  The pupils get a Shona word each day as part of their homework and get tested in an inter-house Shona word a day test every term.  Every pupil in the school is tested on the same words. The Grade 3s are very competitive and some of them do better than the higher grades.
• At our cultural evening held every first term the Grade 6 classes get to perform primarily in Shona.  The cultural evening is memorable and is well supported by the parents.