As stipulated in the Department Order No.31s.2012, otherwise known as Policy Guidelines in the Implementation of the K to 12 Basic Education Curriculum, starting school year 2012-2013, local language or the Mother Tongue will be employed as the medium of instruction from grades 1-3. The Department of Education (DepEd) strongly believes that the use of learners’ mother tongue or the language used at home is the most effective medium of learning, since teaching new skills in an unfamiliar language is a “double burden” for children, because they are learning both the language and the content all at the same time.
The Integrated Language Arts is composed of Mother Tongue, Filipino and English which are focused on the development of literacy and numeracy skills and learning of concepts first in Mother Tongue from grades 1-3 and later transfer to second language (Filipino and English). The macro skills-listening speaking, reading writing and viewing spiral across languages. The ultimate goal is to communicative competence both oral and written in these languages.
With this modifications in the teaching of language from grades 1-3, many teachers and parents were caught in a quandary, asking questions like, isn’t it that Tagalog, which is the local language in many regions of the country, is the base of Filipino, the national language? They wondered why the Filipino subject and mother tongue had to be taught as separate subjects.
Another question they ask is: why is the time allotment in this subject was reduced from the 80 to 50 minutes? Do you think the allotted time for this subject under the K to 12 program will be enough to discuss their lesson?
The mother tongue subject deals mostly on the teachings of the parts of speech, what if the pupils in a particular class are intelligent, should the teachers give additional activities or advance lesson?
In spite of these comments and questions from both teachers and parents, the DepEd has a ready answer for these queries.
For the question why duplicate the teachings of Tagalog and Filipino, USEC Dina Ocampo Cristobal explained that the two language subjects have different descriptions. In the local language, mastery of the pupils of their mother tongue is being done, on the premise that, pupils will be able to master the lesson because teachers are helping them to build strong foundations of their local language which will help them to understand better the second language.
Filipino language teaching is compose mainly of storytelling which will help them to think creatively and critically.
On the question of reducing time allotment from 80 to 50 minutes, the DepEd explain that in the new curriculum there will be more time for the lesson to be explained well, there will be no jam-packed of lessons for the time allotment, instead, teachers will be given more time from 6 years for the elementary to 6 years for the high school, lessons will be stretched out and explained fully within this 12 years schooling. Lessons can be continued the other day without worrying about the time allotment. In short, instead of teachers cramming for the lesson to be finished he/she doesn’t need to worry, he/she can have additional activities.
Wow that the new curriculum is going on its 3rd year of implementation, the questions raised by teachers and parents are lessened. Teachers are flexible and they can always adjust and remedy some challenges while parents are now satisfied with the results exhibited by their children.
Reference: DepEd Order No.31,s.2012, DepEd Issuances
By: Mercelina Q. Sanggalang | Teacher III | Luakan National High School | Dinalupihan, Bataan
