Teaching of Tamil language

Needs a radical change at grassroot level. Why? 

Or

A short intro about the

“Art of learning Tamil language with a new technology” 

hi At present 4500 languages are spoken in the world. They are mostly divided into two groups as letter-based languages and sound- based languages . Chinese and Japanese are letter-based languages whereas Tamil is a sound-based language like European languages. Till 18th century Tamil was taught as a sound-based language. In fact, Tamil is structured as a music-based language with ingredients of mathematics and scientific analysis.

Unfortunately, in this century Tamil is taught as a letter-based language with 247 letters and the new learners of Tamil language have to recognise and remember the sound and visual form of each 247 letters. And then they have to recall those enormous number of letters from their memories to read and write the words and sentences and consequently spelling ang grammar mistakes become inevitable.

In fact, in par with European languages, Tamil language has got only 30 sound -based letters. The existence of 247 letters in Tamil language is a misleading concept and teaching Tamil language with 247 letters is absolutely unfair and unacceptable. Moreover, the present generation student’s mindset is entirely different and with a faster outlook. Therefore, it is practically impossible for them to remember 247 different letters and their shapes in order to travel with Tamil language and pass it on to the next generation. 

Moreover, in this letter-based methodology of Tamil teaching, the scope to bring out the gorgeous links between vowel and consonant notes are very very limited including merged sound patterns and the fabulous music links created by Tolkoappiyar associated with the rhythmic grammar structures between the notes and sounds.

Therefore, this is high time we need to move the Tamil language teaching technology from 247 letter-based structure to 30 sound-based structure as par with European languages.

What is known as sound-based letter structure of Tamil language?

The articulation of sounds in any language is known as phonology or the phonetic system. Tamil has a unique phonetic structure based on Oliyans (similar to music notes). A detailed study of Tamil phonology reveals that all Tamil words originate from and are pronounced using only 12 vowel notes and 18 consonant notes. Furthermore, every Tamil word follows a structured phonetic pattern.

Tolkappiyar devised beautiful rhythmic grammar structures about how to spell these vowel and consonant notes; how to merge these notes, how to coin  short, long and syllable sounds to form words and phrases and finally how to bring rhythmic grammatical patterns while joining those words to make sentences, adopting Mathematics concepts and scientific analysis.

From this point of view and in order to restore the classical beauty of the Tamil language, in collaboration with the Professors of Tanjavur Tamil University, Tamil linguistic scholars from USA and through the Directorate of Tamil Linguistics Education (UK) a new curriculum has been devised to teach Tamil as a   sound-based language.

This sound- based curriculum mainly insists the link between the12 vowel notes and the 18 consonant notes since the beauty of the Tamil language and the marvellous grammar structures of Tholkappiar span with the merging of vowel and consonant sounds and how to allot graphemes to those merged sounds. At each and every stage in the curriculum the learner will acquaint with how to extract a vowel note and a consonant note from a merged sound and vice versa. This acquaintance of linked sounds and their extractions are more vital to understand the basic Tamil grammar structures.

This curriculum is completely diverged from the traditional way of teaching Tamil language with 247 letters since this curriculum is restricted with 30 alphabet notes and with their letter shapes and with 10 vowel-sound-symbols only.

Even though The Tamil language has got 12 vowel notes and 18 consonant notes students would not learn all 30 alphabet notes together in this curriculum. Instead they learn them in seven structures.

For example, in the first structure they learn only five consonant notes (ட் -ப் -ம் -ழ் -ய் ) and four vowel notes (அ -ஆ -இ -ஈ ) and their letter shapes. They would also grasp the technique to merge these sounds and how to allot graphemes to the merged sounds using mathematics formulae edifice. They would also acquaint with some permutation, combination techniques to form words using short, long and syllable notes. They would also acquaint with word analysis using scientific technology.

This differentiated curriculum aims to ensure that all pupils:

• grasp the sound link between vowel and consonant notes and based on the link to deduce the merged sounds and to allot graphemes for them.
• able to coin words by themselves by adopting a learning technique with the organised combination of long, short and syllable sounds, using mathematics concepts of permutation and combination.
• apprise with word analysis for each word using scientific technology in order to evade spelling and grammar mistakes.
• acquire a wide vocabulary pattern, an understanding of simple rhythmic grammar structures and knowledge of linguistic conventions for learning skills.
• read easily, fluently and with good understanding and write clearly, accurately and coherently, adapting rhythmic grammatical structure.

In short, this innovative approach would attract more learners, making Tamil as appealing as European languages like French and German.

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