Grade 7 Sesotho common mistakes
Grade 7 Sesotho · Understand the traps and how to avoid them.
When answering a listening-comprehension question, the candidate writes a one-word answer (for example just "hoseng") instead of a full Sesotho sentence, or answers in English because the prompt was read aloud and the instruction was missed.
Under exam pressure candidates latch onto the first word they recognise in the audio and write it down before the question is finished. Because listening texts are played once or twice only, they do not hear the instruction 'arabang ka polelo e feletseng' (answer in a full sentence), and switching to English feels safer when they are unsure of Sesotho spelling.
What to do instead
Practise a fixed listening routine: before the audio starts, read the questions and underline the question word (mang, eng, kae, neng, hobaneng). During playback jot keywords only, then after playback convert each keyword into a full sentence beginning with the subject concord that matches the answer (Ke ile ka..., Ba ne ba...). Do ten short audio clips a week with a partner reading the questions aloud first, and always mark yourself on sentence completeness, not just on the correct fact.
The candidate pronounces written Sesotho using English sound values, so 'q' becomes /kw/, 'hl' is split into two sounds, and the three click letters q, c and x are all realised as the same click or skipped entirely when reading aloud or giving a prepared talk.
Sesotho orthography uses letters (q, c, x, hl, ny, ng') whose values differ sharply from English, and many candidates have had little explicit phonics instruction in the senior phase. Reading silently most of the time means the mismatch is never corrected by ear.
What to do instead
Drill the click series separately using minimal pairs: q (alveolar click, as in qala), c (palatal click, as in cela), x (lateral click, as in xa). Record yourself reading a short passage, listen back against a model recording, and mark every click and digraph you flattened. In oral preparation, highlight all click and digraph words in your script and rehearse those sentences aloud three times before the assessment.
In a prepared oral or group discussion the candidate memorises a written script word for word and delivers it flat, or freezes and code-switches to English or Afrikaans for whole stretches when a word is forgotten.
Prepared speeches are often written and memorised rather than rehearsed for delivery, so the learner has no fallback when memory fails. Code-switching happens because the candidate lacks the specific vocabulary for the topic and has never practised a repair strategy such as paraphrasing in Sesotho.
What to do instead
Prepare from keyword cards, not a full script: one card with five to seven Sesotho keywords and connectives (ka lebaka leo, ho feta moo, qetellong). Rehearse with a timer and with a partner who interrupts once so you practise paraphrasing in Sesotho ('ke bolela hore...'). Build a personal topic glossary of 20 words per theme (bophelo bo botle, thuto, tikoloho) and use only Sesotho during rehearsal, so the fallback is a paraphrase rather than a switch to English.
When answering comprehension questions on a written text, the candidate copies a whole paragraph verbatim, or lifts a sentence that contains the keyword but does not actually answer the question asked (for example quoting a description of a place when asked for a reason).
Copying feels safe because the words are visibly from the text, and candidates have not been taught to distinguish between 'find the word' and 'answer the question'. They also lose track of the question type because they read the passage before the questions.
What to do instead
Use the question-first method: read the questions, mark the question word and the required answer type (person, place, time, reason, method), then scan for the relevant paragraph. Answer in your own words in one sentence and check it against the question by restating it ('Potsiso e batla lebaka, karabo ya ka e na le hobane...'). Practise with past-paper-style texts where you underline the exact words that justify your answer and draw an arrow from the question word to the evidence.
The candidate confuses visually similar or semantically close Sesotho words in reading tasks, for example mixing up ho bona (to see) and ho bopa (to create), ho rata (to love/want) and ho rata ho feta (to prefer), or reading 'ha a tsebe' as 'o a tsebe' and so inverting the meaning of a negative sentence.
Senior-phase texts introduce abstract vocabulary and the negative (ha...-e) and relative constructions quickly. Candidates rely on the first syllable and on overall context rather than on the full morphology, and the negative concord is easy to miss because it is a small particle before the subject.
What to do instead
Keep a vocabulary log organised by root, not by list: group -bona, -bonisa, -bonahala, and write each in a full sentence with its negative (Ha ke bone; ha a bone). Before answering, circle every 'ha' and every negative suffix -e in the passage and rewrite those sentences as positives to check meaning. Do a weekly ten-item 'same root, different meaning' quiz with a partner.
In visual-text questions (advertisements, cartoons, posters, timetables) the candidate describes only the words and ignores the image, layout, font size and colour, or answers about the picture without linking it to the text's purpose.
Candidates treat pictures as decoration rather than as evidence, and they have rarely been asked to name design features in Sesotho. They also answer 'what do you see' instead of 'why is it there', because the question wording is not analysed.
What to do instead
Use a three-column analysis grid for every visual text: what I see (image, colour, size), what it says (words), what it is doing (persuading, warning, informing). Learn the Sesotho metalanguage for these features (setshwantsho, sehlooho se seholo, mmala, motsu) and practise writing one sentence per column. In the exam, always add the purpose clause 'sena se etswa ho hohela bareki' or 'ho lemosa batho' to any description of a visual element.
In transactional and creative writing the candidate produces a text with no recognisable format: a friendly letter without address, date, salutation and closing; a formal letter that opens with 'Dumela' and ends with 'Lerato'; an essay with no paragraph breaks; or a dialogue with no speaker labels or punctuation.
Format is taught once and then assumed, and under time pressure candidates start writing content immediately. Many have never seen a marked model of each text type, so they do not know which elements carry marks independently of the language.
What to do instead
Memorise a one-page format card per text type (lengolo la setswalle, lengolo la semmuso, diari, pego, puisano, tlhaloso) listing the compulsory elements in order. Before writing, spend two minutes drawing the skeleton on the answer sheet (address, date, salutation, body paragraphs, closing, signature) and fill it in. Practise three timed pieces per term against a checklist, and self-mark the format separately from the grammar.
The candidate writes the required planning and editing stages as an afterthought or skips them, and submits a first draft in which the same subject concord, tense and spelling errors recur throughout (for example 'Ke ya sekolong' for 'Ke ya sekolong' in the wrong tense, 'ba' used with a singular subject, or 'ho' inserted before every verb).
Planning and editing are perceived as wasted time in a timed paper, and candidates cannot edit what they cannot name. Concord and tense errors persist because the learner has never been taught to check agreement systematically, only to 'read it over'.
What to do instead
Adopt a three-pass editing routine with a fixed checklist: pass one for subject concord (does every verb agree with its subject?), pass two for tense and aspect markers (-a-, -ile, -tla-, -ka-), pass three for spelling and punctuation. Leave five minutes for it and use a different coloured pen for corrections so the marker sees the editing. In class, edit anonymous sample paragraphs and name each error type aloud before editing your own.
The candidate cannot identify or use the noun class system: they give the wrong class for a noun, form the plural with the wrong prefix, or fail to match the subject concord, object concord and adjective concord to the noun class (for example 'bana o a bapala' instead of 'bana ba a bapala').
Noun classes are the organising principle of Sesotho grammar, but they are often memorised as isolated prefix lists without the paired singular/plural pattern or the concord table. Candidates then guess the concord from the meaning of the sentence rather than from the class of the subject.
What to do instead
Build a noun-class table with five columns: class number, singular prefix, plural prefix, example noun pair (ngwana/bana, motho/batho, sefate/difate), and the matching subject concord. Learn it in pairs, not singly, and recite the concord with the example noun until it is automatic. For every sentence you write in practice, underline the subject noun, write its class number above it, then check the concord against the table before moving on.
When answering literature questions the candidate retells the plot of the poem, short story or novel instead of answering the question, and cannot name or explain a figure of speech or the moral lesson, giving only 'e monate' or 'e re ruta ho hlompha batho' with no evidence from the text.
Retelling is the easiest response to produce and feels like it is 'using the text'. Candidates have often discussed the text only in terms of what happens, never in terms of how it is made, so they lack the vocabulary for poetic and narrative devices and for citing evidence.
What to do instead
Answer with the pattern point-evidence-explanation: state your point, quote or cite the line or stanza, then explain the effect. Learn a short glossary of devices with a Sesotho example each (papiso, mothofatso, phetelela, mantswe a bohlokwa, morethetho) and practise identifying one device per stanza in every poem studied. For the moral lesson, always name the character and the moment that teaches it, so the answer cannot be a generic sentence.