Dr Douglas Walatara (23 October 1920 - 2 February 2011) was a notable Sri Lankan lecturer in English and had a number of well known published materials. Some of his works have received coverage outside Sri Lanka and some of his books are available through libraries across the globe, such as the

Australian National Library The National Library of Australia (NLA), formerly the Commonwealth National Library and Commonwealth Parliament Library, is the largest reference library in Australia, responsible under the terms of the ''National Library Act 1960'' for "mainta ...

. Dr Walatara became well known for the " Reconstruction Method" which was a bilingual method that used the student's mother tongue to teach the English language. Some have claimed that this was designed mainly for the benefit of rural children who had difficulty learning English under teachers who themselves “learnt English as a foreign language and for whom English was entirely foreign”.

English Profession

A popular Sri Lankan Newspaper, the

Sunday Times ''The Sunday Times'' is a British Sunday newspaper whose circulation makes it the largest in Britain's quality press market category. It was founded in 1821 as ''The New Observer''. It is published by Times Newspapers Ltd, a subsidiary of N ...

, describes Dr Walatara as having performed with much distinction, the task of educating teachers in the South Asian country. In fact, Dr Walatara led a group of educationists who wanted to teach English through the

Sinhala language Sinhala ( ; Sinhala: , , ), sometimes called Sinhalese ( ), is an Indo-Aryan language primarily spoken by the Sinhalese people of Sri Lanka, who make up the largest ethnic group on the island, numbering about 16 million. It is also the first ...

. This group of educationists included

Jeanne Hoban Jeanne Hoban (3 August 1924 in Gillingham, Kent – 18 April 1997 in Sri Lanka), known after her marriage as Jeanne Moonesinghe, was a British Trotskyist who became active in trade unionism and politics in Sri Lanka. She was one of the handful ...

(also known as Jeanne Moonesinghe) among others. Dr Walarara initially taught at the Sri Lankan Government Training College in Maharagama for over 20 years. Following this, he was a Professor of Education at the

University of Colombo The University of Colombo (informally Colombo University or UoC) is a Public University, public research university located primarily in Colombo, Sri Lanka. It is the oldest institution of modern higher education in Sri Lanka. Specialised in t ...

, Sri Lanka. It has been claimed that he renounced a prestigious position as an executive in the

Bank of Ceylon Bank of Ceylon (BOC; Sinhala: ලංකා බැංකුව ''Lanka Bænkuwa'', Tamil: இலங்கை வங்கி ''Ilangai Vangi'') is a state-owned, major commercial bank in Sri Lanka. Its head office is located in an iconic cyl ...

to take up a role as a lower paid but more fulfilling, job as a teacher-educator.

Early years

Douglas Walatara was the eldest of three brothers born to an Anglo-Indian mother from

Goa Goa (; ; ) is a state on the southwestern coast of India within the Konkan region, geographically separated from the Deccan highlands by the Western Ghats. It is bound by the Indian states of Maharashtra to the north, and Karnataka to the ...

, India, and a Sinhalese father from Colombo, Sri Lanka. He attended

S. Thomas' College, Mount Lavinia S. Thomas' College, Mount Lavinia (abbreviated as STC), is a fee-levying Anglican selective entry boys' private school in Sri Lanka. Started as a private school by James Chapman, the first Anglican Bishop of Colombo, in 1851, it was founded as ...

where he excelled in English studies. In the very early 1960s, Walatara lived in England for a year before returning to Sri Lanka.

References

External links

* http://catalogue.nla.gov.au/Search/Home?lookfor=author:%22Walatara%2C%20D%22&iknowwhatimean=1 Sri Lankan educational theorists Academic staff of the University of Colombo Sri Lankan people of Indian descent 1920 births 2011 deaths {{SriLanka-bio-stub