This has been an ongoing Project carried out by the Tongan students in class 5/6T. Tongan language is been taught here as a Community Language.  Brookvale Public School was the first government school where the Tongan language was taught as a Community Language in Australia.

I have found most Australian born Tongan children speak and function in English as their first language,  even the Tongan born children whose families recently migrated to Australia.  After few years of receiving special assistance from the Public Education System, children’s language skills improve in English but their mother-tongue, Tongan is totally ignored, if not forgotten.

One way to tackle this problem is trying to enhance bilingualism (both Tongan & English).  However, due to very limited resources available in the Tongan language, it is a long uphill struggle.

For our children to gather, build up their own vocabulary, then publish it has been a very rewarding experience. Many children will benefit from this project, not just for our children here at Brookvale, but for all interested children and their families in Australia, and the whole wide world.

The Tongan Dictionary Project follows and enhances an earlier Tongan Internet Project published in 1999 to celebrate Tongan National Day at our school. We have received a lot of feedback world wide on this project which provides a unique resource on the internet. These projects are the work of the children themselves with technical help and knowledge provided as assistance.

I have emphasized the inclusion of (‘) the inverted apostrophe whenever  this sound occurs in correctly spoken and written Tongan language.  Fakau’a (‘) is the 16th letter of our Tongan alphabet, which is often left out by many Tongan authors.  Its omission or inclusion in a word  changes the sound and the meaning of a word, for example : uma (upper arm or shoulder) and ‘uma (kiss or caress).

Due to the uniqueness of our language (as any other language), some signs cannot be compensated with any signs used by technology today, for example: _ usually appears above a vowel to indicate a long vowel sound.  Some Tongan speaking people may use double vowels but to avoid confusion with young children and non-Tongan speakers, I have advised against using double vowels in most cases.

‘Ofa mo e faka’apa’apa,
Sisilia L. Tupou-Thomas.