2. Learning Goals:
a. identify the problems that arise from multilingualism and its impact to
instruction;
b. define language-in-education policy
c. differentiate overt from covert language policies; and
d. reflect on the existing local language policies and practices.
3. Language-in-education policies are created to proactively
address these problems.
Kosonen and Young (2009) define language-in-education
policy (LEP) as the “legislation on and practices pertaining to
language or media of instruction and languages of literary used
in basic education.”
LEP’s primary concern is to decide on the medium of
instruction that will be used in schools.
4. Specifically, LEP addresses these issues:
1. What languages should be used in schools?
2. When do we start teaching these languages to children?
3.How long should these languages be taught? How many years?
How many hours?
4. Who are qualified to teach? Who should learn these languages?
How will it be taught?
5. OVERT AND COVERT LANGUAGE POLICY
Schiffman (1996, in Shohamy, 2006) classifies language policies in to
two: covert and overt.
“Overt LP- refer to those language policies that are explicit, formalized,
de jure, codified, and manifest.” It is sometimes called as top-down or
explicit policy.
Covert LP- refer to language policies that are implicit, informal,
unstated, de facto, grass-roots, and latent; these covert policies are
also known as bottom-up or implicit language policy.
7. The structural organization of the Department of Education
consists of two main pillars: the central office, which carries out the
overall administrative functions at the national level, and the field
offices, which manage local and regional administration.
The Department is headed by the Education Secretary. Next in
rank are the Undersecretaries and Assistant Secretaries. As
provided by law, the department can have a maximum of four
Undersecretaries and four Assistant Secretaries.
8.
9.
10. Constitutional Basis of Philippine Education
There are three Articles in the Philippine Constitution of 1987 that
deals, directly or indirectly, with the educational system in the
Philippines. These are: Article II, Article XIV and Article XV.
Article II gives the declared policies of the State,
Article XIV deals with education, science and technology, arts,
culture and sports and
Article XV contains provisions for the family and Filipino children.
What are the declared policies of the State insofar as education is
concerned?
11. Some Legal Basis of Philippine Education
1. The 1987 Constitution specifically provides that the “national
language of the Philippines is Filipino and as it evolves, it shall be
further developed and enriched on the basis of existing Philippine
and other languages.
12. 2. Department Order No. 53, s. 1987 entitled “The 1987 Policy of
Bilingual Education” was issued.
The policy on bilingual education aims at the achievement of
competence in both Filipino and English. The policy statement also
emphasizes that “the aspiration of the Filipino nation is to have its
citizens possess skills in Filipino to enable them to perform their
duties and responsibilities as Filipino citizens and in English in order
to meet the needs of the country in the community of nations.”
13. Goals of the bilingual education policy:
1) enhance learning through two languages to achieve quality
education;
2) propagate Filipino as the language of literacy;
3) develop Filipino as a linguistic symbol of national unity and identity;
4) cultivate and elaborate Filipino as a language of scholarly discourse,
i.e. continue its intellectualization; and
5) maintain English as an international language for the Philippines
and as a non-exclusive language of science and technology.
14. Bilingual education means the separate use of Filipino and English
as media of instruction in different subject areas.
Filipino is used as medium of instruction in Social Studies, Social
Sciences, Music, Arts, Physical Education, Home Economics,
Practical Arts and Character Education.
English on the other hand is used as medium of instruction in
Science, Math and Technology subjects.
15. 3. DECS Order No. 11 s. 1987 was issued in the pursuance to
Section 3 of Republic Act No. 8190 known as “An Act Granting
Priority to Residents of the Barangay, Municipality or City
where the School is Located, in the Appointment or Assignment of
Classroom Public School Teachers”.
16. 4. On May 17, 2003, Executive Order No. 210 entitled
“Establishing the Policy to Strengthen the Use of the English
Language as a Medium of Instruction in the Educational
System” was issued by President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo. In
pursuance to this Order, DepEd Memorandum No. 181 s. 2003
was disseminated to the field.
17. 5. EDUCATIONAL DECREE OF 1863:
The decree provided for the establishment of primary
school for boys and girls in each town of the country.
18. 6. ACT NO. 1870 OF 1908:
The law served as the legal basis for the creation of the
University of the Philippines.
7. VOCATIONAL ACT OF1927:
Also known as Act No. 3377, the Vocational Act as
amended by other acts laid the foundations of vocational
education in public schools and made provisions for its
support.
19. 9. EDUCATION ACT OF 1940: Also known as Commonwealth Act
No. 586, the Education Act laid the foundations for the present six-
year elementary course and made provisions for its support.
10. REORGANIZATION ACT OF 1947: The Act placed public and
private schools under the supervision and control of the Bureau of
Public and Private Schools.
11. REPUBLIC ACT 5250 OF 1966: The Act provided the legal basis
for the implementation of a ten-year teacher education program in
special education.
20. 12. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION, CULTURE AND SPORTS
(DECS) ORDER NO. 25 OF 1974:
Popularly known as the Bilingual Education Program of
1974, the Order required the use of English as medium of
instruction for science and mathematics subjects and the use
of Filipino as medium of instruction for all other subjects in
the elementary and high school levels.
21. 13. PRESIDENTIAL DECREE NO. 1006 OF 1976: The Decree was
a legal and formal recognition of teachers as professionals and
teaching as a profession.
14. REPUBLIC ACT NO. 5698: The Act created the Legal Education
Board whose task was to regulate and improve the quality of law
schools in the Philippines in order to stop the increasing number of
examinees who fail to pass the bar examinations given every year.
22. 15. REPUBLIC ACT 6655 OF 1988:
Popularly known as the Free Public Secondary Education
Act of 1988, the Act created a system of free education in
public high schools
23. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION, CULTURE AND SPORTS (DECS)
ORDER NO. 49 OF 1992: This Order serves as the guideline for the
selection of honor students in all public and private high schools. All
these schools were required to choose one (1) "valedictorian" and one
(1) "salutatorian," and to set the limit of the number of "honorable
mention" to one percent of the graduating students.
24. The "eligibility requirements" for becoming an honor student are the
following:
1) No grade below 80 in any subject and no failing grade in any
subject in the first two curriculum years;
2) 2) Completed third and fourth year studies in the same secondary
school;
3) 3) Completed the high school curriculum within the prescribed year;
4) Active membership in two clubs during the third and fourth years in
high school; and
5) Conformed to school rules and policies.
25. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION, CULTURE AND SPORTS
(DECS) ORDER NO. 1 OF 1994:
This Order increased the number of school days to 200 days
(42 calendar weeks) inclusive of examination days for public
and private schools. (This department order is similar to RA
7791 which increased the number of school days from 185 to
200 days.)
26. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION, CULTURE AND SPORTS
(DECS) ORDER NO. 37 OF 1994:
The Order required all Grade VI elementary students to take
the National Elementary Assessment Test (NEAT) that is given
on the 13th Tuesday following the opening of the school year.
The assessment test consists of a battery of tests of the
multiple choice type. There are four subject areas: English,
mathematics, science and heograpiya/kasaysayan/sibika
(geography/history/civics).
27. REPUBLIC ACT NO. 7731: The Act abolished the National College
Entrance Examinations or NCEE to give the marginalized students a
greater chance to gain access to college education.
REPUBLIC ACT NO. 7722: Also known as the Higher Education Act
of 1994, the Act created the Commission on Higher Education
(CHED) whose main task is to regulate and develop tertiary
education in the Philippines.
28. REPUBLIC ACT NO. 7796:
Also known as the Technical Education and Skills Development Act
(TESDA) of 1994, the Act's objective was to provide relevant and
quality technical education that is accessible to all and to create the
agency that will manage technical education and skills development
in the Philippines.
29. REPUBLIC ACT NO. 7836 OF 1994:
Known as the Philippine Teachers Professionalization Act of 1994,
the Act made it mandatory for people pursuing a career in teaching
to take the licensure examinations that are administered and
regulated by the Professional Regulatory Commission.
30. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION (DEPED) ORDER NO. 34 OF
2001:
The Order required all public elementary and high school
students to read at least one book in the vernacular and one
book in English per year before they can be promoted to the
next higher level.
32. Learning Outcomes:
a. Understand the four language situations that
could affect a bilingual education policy;
b. examine the Philippine Bilingual Education
Policy document to fully understand its goals,
implementing mechanisms, and challenges encountered
in language education; and
c. write a personal account of your language
education experience.
33. Bilingualism is used to describe the two languages of an
individual. Specifically, it refers to the ability of an
individual to use two languages. On the other hand,
diglossia is a term that used to refer to the use of two
languages in the societal level.
Philippines has two official languages: English and
Filipino. English, also known as the “global language,” is
commonly used for formal and business communication,
while Filipino is recognized as the national language.
34. THE PHILIPPINE BILINGUAL EDUCATION POLICY
(BEP)
Bilingual education in the Philippines is defined
operationally as the separate use of Filipino and English
as the media of instruction in specific subject areas. As
embodied in the DECS Order No. 25, Pilipino (changed to
Filipino in 1987) shall be used as medium of instruction in
social studies/ social sciences, music, arts, physical
education, home economics, practical arts and character
education.
35. English on the other hand is allocated to science,
mathematics and technology subjects. The same subjects’
allocation is provided in the 1987 Policy on Bilingual
Education which is disseminated through Department
order No. 52,s. 1987.
36. The Policy is as follows:
a. The Policy on Bilingual Education aims at the
achievement of competence in both Filipino and English at
the national level, through the teaching of both languages
and their use as media of instruction at all levels. The
regional languages shall be used as auxiliary languages in
grades I and II. The aspiration of the Filipino nation is to
have its citizens possess skills in Filipino to enable them
to perform their functions and duties in order to meet the
needs of the country in the community of nations.
37. b. The goals of the Bilingual Education policy shall be:
1. Enhanced learning through two languages to
achieve quality education as called for by the 1987
Constitution;
2. the propagation of Filipino as a language of
literacy;
3. the development of Filipino as a linguistic
symbol of national unity and identity;
4. the cultivation and elaboration of Filipino as a
language of scholarly discourse, that is to say its
continuing intellectualization; and
5. the maintenance of English as an international
language for the Philippines and as a non-exclusive
language of science and technology.
38. c. Filipino and English shall be used as media of
instruction, the use allocated to specific subjects in the
curriculum as indicated in the Department Order No. 25, s.
1974.
d. The regional languages shall be used as auxiliary
media of instruction and as initial language for literacy.
e. Filipino and English shall be taught as language
subjects in all levels to achieve the goals of bilingual
competence.
39. f. Tertiary level institutions shall lead I the continuing
intellectualization of Filipino. The program of
intellectualization, however, shall also be pursued in both
elementary and secondary levels.
g. The department of Education, culture and Sports shall
cooperate with the National Language Commission which
according to the 1987 Constitution, shall tasked with the
further development and enrichment of Filipino.
40. A. Early Childhood Education
The two official languages, Filipino and English
are used as the media of instruction for the 5-year
old children in the preschool education. However,
these children have already developed their first
language at home but they did not learn this
language by formal instruction. They acquired it
from their family members and adult interactions.
This is the language that the children used for basic
communication at the earliest ages, thus may be
considered as the child’s thinking language.
41. The next dominant languages learned at this level
are Filipino and English. In many instances, the
children from the non-Tagalog areas learned these
languages simultaneously, thus producing
childhood bilingualism that emerges naturally
through classroom activities in learning
communication skills: listening, speaking, reading
and writing. They also learned numeracy, sensory
perceptual, socio-emotional, motor and creative
skills in either Filipino or English.
42. Observations of teachers show that they
predominantly used the local language in most of
the lessons so that children specifically in non-
Tagalog areas understood what to do or the
teachers translated the Filipino and English words
to the local language. Likewise, children tend to
answer in mixed language using the local language
and Filipino or local language and English (BEE
Monitoring Report – 2003 to 2005).
43. B. In the Primary Grades
Children used Filipino as the medium of instruction in
learning Civics and
Culture (Sibika at Kultura) in Grades I-III,
Geography, History and Civics (Heograpiya,
Kasaysayan at Sibika) in Grades IV-VI, Makabayan
which includes Character Education, Music, Arts
and Physical Education in Grades I-VI, Home
Economics and Livelihood Education (Edukasyong
Pangtahanan at Pangkabuhayan) in Grades IV-VI
and Filipino as a subject in all grade levels. On the
other hand, children learned Mathematics (Grades
I-VI) and Science (Grades III-VI) in English as the
medium of instruction and learn English as a
subject in all grade levels.
