MERGED: Modern Education, Literacy and English Proficiency

[lightning_mcqueen95]

---

Mas maayo pa kun mo fucos nalang sa English kay sa Tagalog. O maski 75% nga time English ug 25% lang ang Tagalog.. Kay kun mangaply ta English may ipangutana maski ordinaryo lang... paita...

[gnox]

From 1 (lowest) to 10 (highest), what do you think is the literacy rate of Filipinos compared to other Asian countries?

Here is an interesting article that might change your point of view.

heres The Rub
Tails and dogs

By Conrado de Quiros
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 00:28:00 01/07/2008


MANILA, Philippines - I found Education Secretary Jesli Lapus’ analysis of what ails this country’s educational system a most curious one. He is right to say of course that it has reached the utter pits. The curious part is what he attributes it to and how he proposes to solve it.

“The issues confronting us are the result of decades of underinvestment and understatement…. English has had to take a back seat. The reading skills also suffered with many Grade 6 students unable to read.” Many full-fledged teachers can’t speak competent English at all, though most of them can read and write reasonably well in it.

“The defect is oral. So we plan to put up speech laboratories. You won’t learn to speak English unless you hear and say it.”

That view of course is not an isolated one. It is in fact a popular one. It has been repeatedly articulated by Jesli’s boss, the occupant of the Palace by the River, and it has been repeatedly articulated by congressmen whose English is far worse than their Tagalog. Indeed, it has been repeatedly articulated by readers of this paper, whose opinions have appeared in the Letters section. For the strangest reasons. That is so because the most cursory look at our Asian neighbors will show that with the possible exception of countries like Singapore and India, their educational systems are not based on English. Japan’s is not so, China’s is not so, Thailand’s is not so. Yet the distance between them and us in terms of progress is that between government and truth.

The only thing speech laboratories will do is to produce more entrants to call centers. As a solution to our educational woes, it’s not unlike the proposal to solve our basketball woes by looking for ways to genetically engineer taller players. It’s the tail wagging the dog. The easier solution is to shift sports—why we have to be obsessed by basketball I’ll never know. The easier solution is to teach in the local languages—why we have to be obsessed with English I’ll never know.

I grant the problem is more complicated in the latter case. We are the odd man out in Asia in one respect—an all-important point which most everyone fails to mention—which is that while we speak mainly in Filipino (and other local languages), we read and write mainly in English. That is proven by nearly all news and talk shows on TV being now in Filipino and all broadsheets being still in English. All talk shows will instruct you if you are a guest in them to talk in Filipino as much as possible for the benefit of the viewers who are presumed (rightly) to understand it better than English. Yet no broadsheet in Filipino currently exists, notwithstanding several attempts to produce it.

That is a far cry from the situation in other countries where the broadsheets are all in the local languages. And whose circulations run into millions whereas our highest-circulation broadsheet, the Inquirer, runs only to over 200,000. If newspaper readership is a gauge of literacy, other countries are clearly more literate than us. So much for our notion that literacy is naturally linked to English.

I don’t know that the solution is to encourage more Filipinos to read (and write) in Filipino. Though a case can be made for that. No broadsheet in Filipino (currently) exists, but tabloids do, and they have fairly good circulations. More to the point, during the heyday of the romance novels, the locally produced Mills-and-Boone-types in Filipino outsold the English ones by five to one. A best-selling romance novel in English sold only 5,000 copies, its counterpart in Filipino 25,000 copies or more. Filipino has a reading base, but one unfortunately limited to tabloid-romance. Efforts to turn Filipino into the language of analytical discourse, such as through broadsheets, have thus far failed.

Make of that what you will. I leave others to debate in light of this which is the better tack—encouraging Filipinos to read (and write) in English or Filipino. What I would argue strenuously for however is encouraging Filipino teachers and students in particular to talk in Filipino and the other local languages.

The notion of creating speech laboratories to help teachers and students communicate better is the tail wagging the dog. As TV has long found out, the best way is to communicate to Filipinos is to talk in the language they best understand. That is Filipino and/or the other local languages. All the studies on teaching confirm that. You try to teach Math and the other sciences to public elementary school pupils in English and you force them to work doubly hard—trying to grasp English while trying to grasp the Math or science lesson. When you consider that we are doubly impoverished than our Asian neighbors, with most households having no cultural support or reinforcement for spoken English, teaching in English particularly of Math and the other sciences (including the social sciences) is a recipe for academic suicide.

No wonder our kids are performing badly in those subjects compared to other Asians. Indeed, no wonder our kids are dropping out in droves and lapsing back to ignorance (and illiteracy), if indeed they ever progressed past that.

I don’t particularly care whether the kids express mathematical and scientific concepts in Waray or Hiligaynon, in formal Filipino or slang Tagalog, so long as they do, so long as they are able to. That’s what being educated means. The other kind, being able to show off English, just prepares students to become nurses and forklift operators abroad.

In any case, the reasons this country’s education has fallen to the utter pits go beyond the problem of language. Corruption—in mind as well as body—easily contributes more to it. But that is a story best left for another day, and column.

[LytSlpr]

While Mr. de Quiros' views may be sensible and ideal, it is impractical considering our country's current state. It is like asking Jesus Christ to come down from heaven and turn water into wine in front of all the Filipinos, exclusively.

His opinion on legalizing Marijuana is logically more attainable than this proposal.

His idea on this matter will work only if corruption is not present, massive corruption that is. Right now, even if we are relatively and generally are dumb in math and science, "our english", how poor it may be paired with our blue collared skills, is our ONLY edge over other countries in the world and is what is putting food on the table that our government can't.

[giddyboy]

for me it will be 8/10 score.

what de Quiros may have missed is that we are already effective multi-lingual in our approach to teaching and learning. and this is not an obstacle to gaining literacy. Say, in math for example. Our teachers don't only use English but a combination of English and Bisaya so that the students can understand better, thus read and write better.

The problem nowadays, as what de Quiros pointed out, is that many teachers can’t speak competent English at all, though most of them can read and write reasonably well in it.

But somehow i cannot agree with us being obsessed w/ English...We are necessitated to use English.

Also de Quiros said, "Being able to show off English, just prepares students to become nurses and forklift operators abroad."...
what the he has a limited perspective on that aspect...
in my opinion, being able to show off English (the universal language) prepares us to a lot of opportunities be it in terms of employment, business, politics, int'l diplomacy, and other endeavors where ever you are in the world.

And regarding speech labs, de Quirosis said it only produces more entrants to call centers...well, that is also the demand right now but it doesn't only apply to call centers but also good for teachers who can't speak competent English, and a lot of other uses...

as wiki defines 'literacy":

Literacy is considered to be the ability to read and write, or the ability to use language to read, write, listen, and speak. In modern contexts, the word refers to reading and writing at a level adequate for communication, or at a level that lets one understand and communicate ideas in a literate society, so as to take part in that society.

The UNESCO has drafted the following definition: "Literacy is the ability to identify, understand, interpret, create, communicate and compute, using printed and written materials associated with varying contexts. Literacy involves a continuum of learning to enable an individual to achieve his or her goals, to develop his or her knowledge and potential, and to participate fully in the wider society."

The Philippines' literacy rate was pegged at 92.28%, males at 92.10% and females at 92.47%. Literacy was defined by the Census 2000 to be a person 10 years or older, having the capability to read and write. Manila has the highest literacy rate, which was pegged at 98.14%...

[clarkhkent]

i dont know kon pilay akong i rate....cguro 4 na lang....tungod sa nagkadghang studyante....nya walay skwelahan....maau unta to ug tudloan sa mga ginikanan kon wala nag skwela pero pulos man sad busy silang nanay ug tatay....mabutang lang ug wala gihapon...

[seven_segment]

2

[godsaint]

3

[cebu-future]

2.5

[giddyboy]

WHOA!!! WAIT A MINUTE...Literacy rate in the phils is supposed to be at above 90% levels. i can't understand why some of u have such low scores.
Literacy is being able to read & write, no matter what dialect or language you are using...Speaking competent English is another matter.

[yokam]

Literacy and competency are two different things. Literate Filipinos outnumber illiterate the illiterate ones.

Literacy, I'd say about 75-80%
Competency wise (internationally), maybe just about 25-30%, 35% the most.