HAVING been a teacher for many years in a school with a very large percentage of ethnic minority children, I am much mystified by the granting of £25,000 to teach these children their 'mother tongue' (LET, July 25).

All the children have parents and/or older brothers and sisters who have been through the English education system and all are, by birth and, therefore, parental choice, British citizens.

On entering school, all the children are fluent Punjabi, Urdu, etc. speakers; this being the language which they use at home.

I have yet to meet any who do not understand their 'mother tongue.' A few children have some understanding of English and a fortunate few are bi-lingual, because their parents are very keen for them to progress and take full advantage of the education offered.

In order to help the children to understand their native language and, therefore, make progress, schools have to employ additional bi-lingual support staff.

At the age of five or six, the children go after school to the mosque; first, for religious instruction and often later on for instruction in Arabic, in which the Koran is written.

Now, it seems that a grant is needed by the mosques to teach the children the language which they speak from birth.

If these British citizens require extra funding for staff to help them learn their native language and extra grants to help them learn their 'mother tongue,' one wonders how they manage to communicate at all and how there can possibly be an end to the drain on finances which, we are told, are in very short supply.

Name and address received.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.