Dialect, Error and the Red Pen: Salma's Monsoon Draft
In a Class 8 Malayalam classroom in a coastal panchayat in Kasaragod, 36 students speak a regional variety in which 'ഞാൻ പോയി' is often realised as 'ഞാൻ പോയ്', 'എന്തിനാണ്' as 'എന്തിനാ', and the negative is pronounced with a distinctive intonation. The teacher has begun a unit on descriptive writing. In her first draft, Salma writes a vivid three-paragraph description of the monsoon sea using this variety. The teacher marks fourteen forms in red as 'അശുദ്ധി' and writes 'standard Malayalam only' on the page. Salma stops revising after the second draft. The unit test contains a 10-mark formal letter. Two parents tell the teacher that the school is 'destroying our language', while a colleague insists marks must reflect 'correct Malayalam'. The department has asked for the term's writing assessment plan.
1. Distinguish dialect features from genuine errors in Salma's draft. What should the teacher mark, and why?
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Dialect features are systematic and rule-governed. The forms 'പോയ്' for 'പോയി', 'എന്തിനാ' for 'എന്തിനാണ്' and the local negative intonation are consistent within the community and do not impede meaning. They are register variation, not 'അശുദ്ധി'. Marking them as impurity confuses a social judgement with a linguistic one and teaches the child that her home language is defective.
Genuine errors would be inconsistent spellings of the same standard form, wrong case endings where meaning breaks down, missing subject-verb agreement in a formal sentence, or punctuation that makes the sentence ambiguous. These are about meaning and consistency, not accent.
Practical marking policy for the draft:
- Mark content, imagery, paragraph structure and vocabulary choice as the primary criteria.
- Do not red-pen dialect forms in a creative draft; instead note them neutrally in the margin.
- Add one focused editing task: rewrite two sentences in formal register for the letter genre.
- Teach the metalanguage of register: 'home variety', 'school standard', 'formal written Malayalam', rather than 'pure' and 'impure'.
This preserves Salma's motivation while still making the standard register an explicit learning goal. The red pen of fourteen marks was disproportionate to the one thing being assessed, which was descriptive writing.
2. Design the term's writing assessment plan so that both creativity and register control are judged fairly.
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Principle: separate the constructs. Creativity and register should not be scored in the same mark.
Plan over the term
- Portfolio (40%) - three drafts of descriptive and narrative writing in the student's own variety. Criteria: sensory detail, organisation, vocabulary range, revision evidence. Dialect forms are not penalised.
- Register task (30%) - a formal letter or notice. Criteria: format, salutation and close, standard morphology, punctuation. Here the standard form is the explicit target and is taught before it is assessed.
- Editing task (15%) - a short passage in the home variety to be rewritten in formal Malayalam, with the changes explained in one sentence each.
- Reading and response (15%) - comprehension of a literary text with one personal-response question.
Rubric discipline
- Each task carries its own criteria sheet, shared with students in advance.
- Use a three-band scale with descriptors, not a single impression mark.
- Provide a model: show a paragraph in the home variety and its formal rewrite side by side.
- Moderate with a colleague using three anonymous scripts before marking the class.
Why this is fair: Salma's descriptive talent is rewarded, and her control of formal register is separately taught and separately measured. The assessment no longer punishes her identity for a skill she has not yet been taught.
3. How should the teacher respond to the parents and the colleague who hold opposing views?
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With the parents: Thank them for raising the issue and affirm the home variety as a resource, not a problem. Explain in concrete terms: 'Salma's description of the sea was excellent. I will not mark her home speech as wrong. I will teach her the formal style needed for letters and examinations, because that is an additional register, not a replacement.' Show the two-column example of a dialect sentence and its formal version. Invite a grandparent or local writer to contribute a story in the local variety to a class magazine; this makes the school's respect visible.
With the colleague: Avoid a public argument about 'correct Malayalam'. Reframe the disagreement as a question of purpose: 'Which register is the task asking for?' Agree that formal writing needs formal morphology, and agree that a creative draft is not a formal letter. Offer to co-moderate three scripts. Point to the department's own curriculum aim of using language appropriately across contexts.
Institutional step: Put the two-register policy in the term plan, with examples, so that judgements are transparent to parents and colleagues. The teacher's aim is not to win a purity debate but to keep Salma writing while adding a register. If the colleague still insists, the head of department can moderate using the shared rubric.