Let us drop the  idea of replacing English with the mother tongue* as the medium of instruction after a highway in English. Instead, let us empower the mother tongue to spearhead beginning reading in the grades, bridge reading skills to Filipino, our national language, and clear the bridge juncture fronting the highway to learning in English.

The mother tongue in eight major languages would be fragmented for use as medium of instruction in different geographical areas. Another limitation is the dearth of teaching materials and library resources needed in school for each mother tongue. Nevertheless, the mother tongue as a whole awaits tapping for initial reading to launch.

Based on experience, an average reader can read the mother tongue in a couple of month’s given a linguistic approach underlying a locally prepared reader. Semblance between the two Philippine languages in “one letter-one sound” symbols speeds up the transfer for reading skills. Once learners decipher the meaning of sound-letter symbols in reading the mother tongue, guided reading in Filipino, preceded by prewriting, games, becomes a cinch.

As mother tongue and Filipino reach the reading bridge approach or juncture, both foresee the learning highway in English and entrust learning in school to English a veteran medium of teaching and learning of course, paving the learning highway in English demands adjustments, reorientation, patience, automation, linkages, and regulation towards earning a formal education.

Empowering the mother tongue therefore calls for sharpening learning medium for beginning reading, installing in it a master scheme to bridge acquired reading Filipino, energizing a cultural asset in early education, and retooling for active membership in a multilingual environment.

By: Gloria P. Lumanglas | Teacher III | Lamao Elementary School | Limay, Bataan