Current issues of education

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Battling the classroom shortage

By Patricia Esteves | Updated April 9,

2009 - 12:00am (Philippine Star)

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MANILA, Philippines - Forty-five-year-old banana vendor Lilia Pangilinan is

worried that come June this school year,

her eight-year-old daughter Milliyah will

be placed in an evening shift again.Lilia, who lives in a shanty with four

other children, lamented Milliyahs

evening schedule in a public elementary

school last year since she alwaysstayed up late at night to finish her

assignments or study for exams. The

night schedule was also taking a toll on

the young childs stick-thin body, andthe girl had to walk home alone at night

because her mother could not fetch her.

With more students enrolling in and

transferring from private schools, public

schools are forced to implement a three-

shift schedule for elementary and highschool students in some Metro Manila

schools.

Education secretaries have come and

go, but all have agreed about the real

problem of classroom shortage.

According to the Department ofEducation, the current student-

classroom ratio is 100-to-1 in single shift

and 50-1 in two shifts.

Former education secretary Juan MiguelLuz said in the past that to hold a singe

shift, the ideal situation for every

classroom in the country meant a

shortage of 74,115 classrooms. To goon a double shift using classrooms twice

a day to accommodate 50 students per

class, the shortage is 6,832. This

shortage necessitates a third shift to

accommodate more students like

Milliyah.

This school year, in preparation for theinflux of students, the Department of

Education has allocated P1.7 billion for

the construction of new classrooms and

repair of old ones. It hopes to meet its

target of 1,690 new and repair of 1,282

classrooms all over the country.

In tune with the Education for All

program, one of the key points under

the governments 10-point agenda,President Arroyos school building

project has built 396 classrooms;

congressmen and senators, 1,740;donations of overseas-based Filipinos,

500; DepEd and DPWH, 450; and 116

classrooms from the Federation of

Filipino-Chinese Chambers ofCommerce and Industry Inc. (FFCCCII).

President Arroyo has just recently

donated P35 million to the FFCCCII for

its school projects, and signed EO 284authorizing the federation to conduct

fund-raising for its Operation Barrio

Schools project, likewise exempting

donors from taxes.

The government admittedly said it

needs the help of private organizations

and foundations to address the issue of

building more classrooms for thegrowing population of elementary and

high school students in public schools,

especially in remote parts of the country.

FFCCCII vice chairman for mediaWilliam Tieng told the STAR they havebeen donating classrooms since 1955,
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having constructed 4,000 school

buildings (of two classrooms each) and

10,000 classrooms at half the estimated

cost. The FFCCCII is the first to start the

two-classroom school building donations

through Operation Barrio schools.

We hope to build 11,000 classrooms to

help improve the learning of

schoolchildren, We feel that by helping

in the education of the youth, we will

bring forth a new generation of educated

Filipinos, he said.

The Angelo King Foundation Inc. (AKFI)

also builds not just classrooms but

whole buildings/ learning establishmentsfor poor students, in line with its

philosophy that providing for the poor is

synonymous to teaching them how tofish and fend for themselves.

In San Miguel Elementary School,

Tarlac, the principal and teachers hold

fund-raising activities to raise money fortheir school needs and augment funds

for the improvement of their school.

Both local government units and private

sector In Nueva Ecija are joining forcesto add more classrooms in public

schools in the province, said Jess

Lorenzo, a public education

development advocate in Nueva Ecijawho also works with the San Isidro local

government.

These examples of cooperationbetween local government units and theprivate sector, and among teachers,

barangay personnel and parents in the

community is doing much to inspire

other communities to get to work andshare what they can to improve the

public school environment. Last year,

soldiers and military personnel put aside

their guns to repair and refurbish many

public schools.

With stakeholders concerted effort,

greater commitment from thegovernment and the private sector,theres hope in winning the battle over

classroom shortage and other education

woes.

English vs. the Mother Tongue?

By Rachel C. Barawid

February 26, 2009, 10:06am

The Manila Bulletin

We have become a nation of fifthgraders! remarked Josefina Cortes,dean of the University of the East (UE)Graduate School and former UEpresident. The sad results of a literacysurvey conducted in 2003 furthervalidate her assumption.

Of the 57.59 million Filipinos aged 10 to

64 years old chosen as respondents forthe Functional Literacy, Education andMass Media Survey (FLEMMS), 5.24million Filipino could not read and write,while 7.83 million could not read, writeand compute. Worse, the same surveyfinds that 18.37 million Filipinos couldnot read, write, compute andcomprehend!

The survey also reveals that the

illiteracy rate among the poor is evenmore alarming, with one out of twopeople (46%) not being able tounderstand what they read.

In an effort to address this, some solonshave consolidated their pertinent bills tomaximize the use of English in schools


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and be able to produce more globallycompetitive graduates.

GO ENGLISH!

House Bill 5619 (Consolidated English-Only Bill by Cebu Reps. Eduardo Gullasand Raul Del Mar and Camarines SurRep. Luis Villafuerte) aims to strengthenand enhance the use of English as theMedium of Intruction (MOI) from theelementary to tertiary levels. Currentlyon its third and final reading, the billseems set to be approved with some202 of the 238 members of the Housebacking it up.

However, Valenzuela Rep. MagtanggolGunigundo claims his MultilingualEducation (MLE) and Literacy Bill(House Bill no. 3719) is the betteralternative to the English Bill. Stronglysupported by the academe, governmentand private organizations and linguisticexperts from the University of thePhilippines and the Linguistic Society ofthe Philippines, Gunigundo vows to stopthe passage of the English Bill by

seeking to convince other solons of themore beneficial merits of the MLE.

Under the English Bill, English, Filipinoor the regional/native language may beused as the teaching language in allsubjects from preschool to Grade 3. Butfrom Grades 4 to 6, all levels in highschool and college, English shall bepromoted as the language ofinteraction in schools, as well as the

language of assessment in allgovernment examinations, all entrancetests in public schools as well as stateuniversities and colleges. If enacted, theBill is said to supersede Department ofEducation (Deped) Order No. 25sBilingual Teaching Policy.

Under the MLE bill, students in the pre-school up to Grade 6 will be taught intheir first language or L1. This includesthe teaching of subjects like math,science, health and social studies. As

they develop a strong foundation in theirL1, the students will be graduallyintroduced to the official languagesFilipino and English orally and then inthe written form. English and Filipino,meanwhile, will be taught strongly asseparate subjects.

A press release from Gullas officereasoned out that students skills in theEnglish language have weakened withthe more prominent use of Taglish (ablend of English and the local dialect).

Mounting global unemployment due tothe worsening economic slump hasmerely underscored the need for ourhuman resources to be proficient inEnglishthe worlds lingua franca inorder to stay highly competitive in the

job markets here and abroad, Gullassaid in the press statement.

Students and Campuses Bulletin wouldhave wanted to hear more and straightfrom Gullas, also an educator, but wewere given the round around by his staffand the solon himself.

GO MOTHER TONGUE!

Gunigundo downplays Gullas reasonthat using English as a medium ofinstruction improves English proficiency

as mere popular belief.

How can you defend on anecdotal gutfeel when there is empirical data culledby linguistic experts not only inPhilippines but also in the US, Europeand Africa, that show this is the way todo it. If you really want the Philippines to


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have a high functional literacy, lets usethe regional languages, the mothertongue of the children in giving them theeducation that they need. No amount oftextbooks, classrooms, teacher training

and computers will lift the quality ofeducation if youre using the wronglanguage, Gunigundo explains.

Dr. Ricardo Ma. Nolasco, associateprofessor, UP Department of Linguistics,has long been a proponent of the MLEcampaign, even teaming up withGunigundo in pushing for this bill inCongress.

The issue of language in education inthe Philippines is a learning issue and avery urgent one. Filipino children are notlearning because they cannotunderstand what the teacher is saying.The language in school is not THEIRlanguage. We are pushing for the use ofthe mother tongue in the elementarygrades in order to develop the childscognitive skills and to provide a solidfoundation towards learning in Filipinoand English in the higher grades,

stresses Nolasco who is also a boardmember of the Linguistic Society of thePhilippines and the adviser formultilingual education initiatives of theFoundation for Worldwide People PowerInc.

There are currently over 150 dialectsaside from the Filipino language that arebeing used as the first language ofmany young Filipino children. Studies

also reveal that it normally takes 12years for a child to have a strongfoundation in his first language that willfacilitate the acquisition of a second,third and fourth language.

That is what we want. We want ourcountry to deliver quality education to

the Filipino youth and the best way to dothis is by using the first language of thechild. Why are we demoting the regionallanguages? Are we saying the regionallanguages are inferior to Filipino and to

English? That only English is thelanguage known in this world that candeliver knowledge in math and science?Thats not correct. Our language is aliving lingua franca, its not a puristicFilipino that were talking about. Itsuniversal and embraces so many wordsincluding Chinese and Spanish.

Moreover, he says being proficient inEnglish is not a sign of a well-educatedperson.

Even formerUS president GeorgeBush committed a lot of grammaticalsyntactical mistakes during hispresidency, and hes a native Englishspeaker. Kung English lang talaga angway to go up for social nobility, eh didapat ang mga Americano ang no. 1 salahat, he adds.

Nolasco adds that this innovative

approach to learning will produce multi-literate, multi-lingual and multi-culturallearners who can interact harmoniouslywith people of various culturalbackgrounds.Through MLE, Nolasco points out thatchildren will be more encouraged to takean active part in the learning processbecause they understand what is beingdiscussed and what is being asked ofthem. By using their own language, they

will be able to articulate their thoughtsand express themselves better.

Moreover, Nolasco says MLE will alsoempower the teachers as they becomefluent and adept in the local language,as well as the parents who will be moreinvolved in the education of their


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children because they all speak thesame language. MLE, thus, brings theschool and its programs closer to thecommunity.

NOT JUST CONVERSATIONALLANGUAGE

While many cant seem to see the pointin still learning in the language theyalready know, Nolasco clarified thatwhat they may refer to is theconversational or everyday languageused for daily interaction. Thisconversational language, he explains, isquite different from the academic andintellectualized language needed todiscuss more abstract subjects.

According to studies, it takes one tothree years to learn conversationallanguage but four to seven years tomaster the academic language underwell resourced conditions. It also takestime to develop higher order thinking(HOT) skills and this depends largely oncognitively demanding curriculaespecially from Grade 4 onwards, he

says.

According to him, the use of MLE is alsoexpected to spur the second languageindustry, decentralize graft andcorruption in the making of materialsand teaching of methodology and willultimately, revolutionize the thinking ofmany Filipinos whose reasoning skillswill be further developed.

DepEd to develop learning aids indialects to boost mother-tonguemultilingual education

By Rainier Allan Ronda | Updated

December 1, 2011 - 12:00am)

(THE PHILIPPINE STAR)

MANILA, Philippines - The Department

of Education (DepEd) will allocate more

funds for the development of learning

aids and materials in the various

dialects as it seeks to bolster mother

tongue-based multilingual education inpublic preschools and elementary

schools all over the country.

Education Secretary Armin Luistro said

the development of the learning

materials will go full speed ahead

especially with his release of guidelines

on the use of funds to develop learning

materials for schools offering mother-

tongue-based multilingual education

(MTB-MLE).

The languages used for instruction and

learning under the MTB-MLE includeIloko, Pangasinense, Kalangoyan,

Kapampangan, Sambal, Tagalog,

Minangyan, Bikol, Hiligaynon, Aklanon,

Cebuano, Waray-Waray, Chavacano,Yakan, TBoli, Surigaonon, Adasen,

Bunungan, In Laud, Maranao and

Maguindanaon.

Mother tongue-based educationprescribes the use of the language

learners speak at home or in their

respective provinces in delivering

lessons and in classroom discussions.MTB-MLE is implemented from

preschool up to Grade 3 and in the

alternative learning system. He said

producing educational materials that

suit the specific needs of learners willresult to better learning outcomes.

Luistro explained that DepEd came up

with the guidelines to synchronize and

decentralize the production of

indigenized teaching and learning
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materials as well as in the monitoring

and evaluation of the MTB-MLE.

Local and international studies show

that the use of the learners mother

tongue or the language used at home isthe most effective medium of learning.It is the easiest way for children to

access the unfamiliar world of school

learning, Luistro explained.

Educators say that when the use of

mother tongue is discarded in favor of

an unfamiliar language upon the

childrens entry into grade school, the

learners lose interest in their studies

because there is a disconnect in thelanguage used at home and in school.

Based on DepEd Order 90, the types of

learning materials to be developed arestory books in big and small book

formats; flash/activity cards using letters

and numbers; basic sight words (grade

level words and picture dictionary) andthematic picture chart for oral literacy.

The guidelines also specified that 50

percent of the allocated funds should go

to the development and reproduction ofthe teaching and learning materials; 20

percent for monitoring and evaluation;

15 percent for research and 15 percent

for transportation.

DepEd piloted the implementation of

MTB-MLE in school year 2010-2011 in

879 public elementary schoolsnationwide. As of November 2011 some2,288 field officials, non-government

organizations, local government units,

parent-teacher-community associations

and teachers have been trained toensure the effective integration of this

initiative into the curriculum.


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