The Place of Folklore in Primary Curriculum of Language Education and Its Advantages as a Vehicle of Cultural Values

Abstract

The main purpose of this study was to assess the place of folklore in curriculum and its merits as a vehicle of cultural values transmitted to primary children via the four language skills in the curriculum of language education. Different books written by the authorities of the field, Journals, website resources, unpublished articles and the 5th grade student textbook of Oromo language were the sources of information in the study. Qualitative method was employed to analyze and interpret the relevant data. The study revealed that folklore is one of the vital vehicles of cultural values, which have a primary place in language curriculum and a great advantage to mold the behavior of primary children. It has been also imperative to authenticate how the selected folklore genres are compatible with the experience of primary children and enhance the cultural values, skills, knowledge and attitude of the learners prior to integrating them with the language sills. Furthermore, the importance of selecting a variety of folklore genres carefully from all classification of folk life studies and integrate them with four language skills has been evident by the exponents of the field. Moreover, the folkloric contents that are selected and integrated with the four language skills have to be well balanced in their distribution at grade level continued, sequenced and integrated vertically and horizontally in the curriculum materials of the cycle. At the end of this study, the importance of establishing Ethiopian Folklore society (EFS) has been suggested.