MATHEMATICS AND LANGUAGE: CULTURE AND IMPLEMENTATION*

competence in their first language does have an effect on their achievement scores in mathematics. This result is at variance with long-held views in PNG that the first language of students had a negative effect on students ' learning. However, it supports the recent move by the PNG Secretary of Education to encourage the use of non-English language in the first six months of schooling. It is one thing to gather educational data and analyse it in many ways to help tell some story or other; it is another thing altogether for the suggestions arising from such analyses to be implemented in some way in classrooms. Many factors impinge on this implementation phase. Cultural and situational implications have not always been considered at this point of the research process. The manner in which the work in the area of mathematics and language has impacted on different systems will be commented on in the second half of this paper. Mathematics and Language Learning The Situation in Papua New Guinea A common reason which has been given in the past to explain why PNG students have difficulty in learning mathematics is that they are being taught in English, their second (or third, or fourth) language. However, since that is the way the system runs, it is reasoned that every effort needs to be made to develop the students ' facility in English. This line of argument is taken to mean that the students ' first language(s) should not be used when it comes to school learning. Indeed it is argued that the use of the first language or any non-English language, should be actively discouraged. It is believed that the only role these language