“Ma’am, can I explain that in Tagalog?”
This is the common utterance of my students whenever I ask them to justify their answers during our recitation. And as an English teacher, of course, I encourage them to use English since English is our subject and I do believe in the notion that practice makes perfect.
Tagalog is the mother tongue or the first language of people from Bataan and I do recognize the importance of mother tongue to the foundation of language and many studies have support such. In fact, the K to 12 curriculum had accepted the use of mother tongue till Grade 3 which means that our latest curriculum had recognize the help of mother tongue to reinforce second language learning. That good foundation on the child’s first language is very important on language learning. Just like what the common cliché affirms, “You can’t give what you don’t have.”
However, in the secondary level, the problem arises between expression and the rules and the other one is language barrier. Students participate poorly in recitation because of the said problem. They cannot express themselves well because English is governed by rules or grammar. Moreover, they find it hard to find the correct terms to suit what they want to say.
Furthermore, it is tough to reinforce English language since majority subjects uses or accepts or mix Tagalog as the medium of their instruction even though it must be taught in English language but I don’t want to debate on that matter.
So as an English teacher, proficient encouraging is very important. I, personally, encourage them to answer in English even to though how much erroneous it is. Then after that, it is the teacher’s job to restate their answers in correct English as soon as possible. But don’t forget to recognize such answers. In this way, they will learn English gradually and eventually master it as they keep on speaking using the second language.
Because I believe that the first aspect to be honed from students is their attitude towards learning English language. That learning second language is not that hard, it just takes patience, perseverance, and eagerness to learn to master second language.
By: Lorena A. Manuel | Teacher I | BONIFACIO CAMACHO NATL HS | Abucay, Bataan
