What is a comprehensive language policy for the Philippines?

[Harold F. Schiffman]

Youngblood : Whats the language of our students dreams?

First posted 01:01am (Mla time) Jan 28, 2006

By Pau M. Fontanos
Inquirer

Editor's Note: Published on page A13 of the January 28, 2006 issue of the
Philippine Daily Inquirer


I AM from the Bicol region and the product of a bilingual education.
However, I would like to believe that I came out of it unscathed, without
a linguistic identity crisis. At 28, I know that my mind, heart and tongue
are in their right places. This is probably because I was born to a family
of voracious readers who exposed me to a wide array of literature, from
Bicolano songs and folklore to Filipino showbiz rags and Shakespeare. I
never wanted for books while I was growing up in Iriga town. Reading made
it possible for me to acquire an affinity for language and revel in the
beauty, rhythms and nuances of words.

However, neither my family nor my teachers taught me to think that one
language was better than another. I grew up believing that each language
has its own genius and I am proud that I can speak, understand, read and
write in Irigao, Bicolano, Filipino and English, with equal proficiency.
So it bothers me that some lawmakers (who are presumably more
linguistically schizophrenic than I am) are pushing for English to be the
sole medium of instruction in our schools.

It is not hard to see why they are doing this, considering how much the
call-center business has expanded and the Arroyo administrations intention
to turn every single Filipino graduate into exportable labor. It is
unfortunate that legislation is being used to make Filipinos fit into the
global economy. The proponents of this bill cite the dismal performance of
our students in recent national standardized tests and international
education surveys to show how our English proficiency has sunk. But have
they asked why millions of our elementary and high school students are
performing poorly in standardized tests written in English? Is it really a
question of what they know or is it because they have difficulties with
the language in which the questions are written? Perhaps the reason many
of our students are not doing well in standardized tests in English is
their lack of skills in that language and not a lack of education. We
should be more alarmed if such tests are couched in Filipino and they
still do not make the mark.

And perhaps our students proficiency in English has declined not because
of the incompetence of their teachers or the lack of encouragement to
learn it in their homes. The real reason for this downtrend could be that
our students do not have a sense of ownership of the language. English is
not the language they speak at home, in the street, at work or with
friends, and so they fail to see that they have as much right to it as any
other student somewhere in the world and that it is theirs for the taking.
English remains irrelevant to their lives, and forcing them to learn it
will not make them do so until they themselves decide that they need it
and they want to learn it so they can use it for their own reasons and
purposes. Before they dictate the language of our schools, our lawmakers
should first consider the realities of our students lives and not merely
accept as fact the views of certain sectors that English is good and we
must master it or the world would leave us behind. Language planning must
be ultimately for empowerment. Paolo Freire says educational empowerment
for students comes when, aided by schools, their own consciousness comes
into fruition enabling them to negotiate their learning, collaborate with
their educators, and engage in critical thinking to transform the
realities of their lives.

English as a medium of instruction, like any other language used in the
Philippines, possesses this liberating potential. And this potential can
be unlocked if the government, business and other interest groups overhaul
their mindset that looks at English merely as a source of economic power.
Instead, English should be looked at as language of empowerment that will
facilitate an awakening among our students when they use it to look
critically at their place in the greater political, economic and social
order. Then they can choose whether to use and own the language or not.
The linguist H.G. Widdowson once said: You are proficient in a language to
the extent that you possess it, make it your own, bend it to your will,
assert yourself through it rather than simply submit to the dictates of
its form. Before submitting to the dictates of capitalist interests, our
lawmakers should first guarantee that education remains a social contract
and promote not one language over another but social justice above all.
The celebrated American multicultural educator, Sonia Nieto, reminds
everyone that education must give every student an equal chance to dream.
This can be done by ensuring that the teaching and learning processes and
the language in which they happen actually promote equality through wider
access to schooling, providing genuine access to knowledge, celebrating
diversity and individualism and protecting personal freedoms. The medium
of instruction must in the end aid our students in the process of becoming
persons, not just disposable human capital.

A comprehensive language policy in the Philippines must embrace the truth
that more than 100 languages are spoken in millions of Filipino homes.
Educational practices and policies that accommodate this reality may work
better for our students if we affirm the strengths and not the
deficiencies our students bring from their home languages to their
schools. Literacy learning has been proven to be easiest when instruction
in the students mother tongue is provided first, especially during the
first three grades with option to continue for two more grade levels if
necessary.

Such a highly individualized bilingual program will necessitate heavy
funding from the government. What is needed then to respond correctly to
our students language needs is a national budget that is more biased
toward education and not a law that has the potential to rob our students,
parents and communities of the right to learn in the language of their
choice by prescribing one language as the source of knowledge. When it
comes to educational policies and practices, the government, educational
institutions and political leaders must listen to the students. In
deciding the medium of instruction in our schools, lawmakers should make
sure that our students voices are heard. These voices must speak not only
for urban Filipinos but also those in the regions and rural indigenous
groups. Parents and educators should be consulted, too. And their views
must be incorporated into the decision-making process.

Before we decide what language of instruction will work best in the
Philippines, perhaps we should ask the question: What is the language of
the Filipino students dream? From the answer to that question, the
government, schools and communities can work to create genuine
opportunities for our students to dream by using the language in which
they dream.

Pau M. Fontanos, 28, is a graduate student of language teaching at the
University of the Philippines College of Education in Diliman, Quezon
City.



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