Mother Tongue for teaching advocates tell Senate: Don’t scrap law
MOTHER tongue advocates appealed to the Senate not to proceed with Senate Bill No. 2437, which aims to cancel the use of Mother Tongue as the medium of instruction for young learners.
Melchor Orpilla, a Pangasinan language advocate, translator, and historian, said the use of mother tongue or a person’s first language — as supported by numerous studies worldwide — plays a crucial role in the ability of children to learn and understand lessons.
He emphasized that instead of scrapping mother tongue, the senate should advocate instead for the improved implementation of the Mother Tongue-Based Multilingual Education (MTB-MLE).
“Under this approach, teachers can seamlessly transition between languages or shift to different vocabulary to enhance learners’ understanding of their subjects,” he said in an interview.
Orpilla also acknowledged that while there were challenges during the initial implementation of MTB-MLE as the medium of instruction for Kindergarten to Grade 3, the solution lies not in removal but in strengthening the program by allocating sufficient funds, continuous teacher training, and the development of dictionaries, thesauruses, and grammars for various Philippine languages.
Orpilla firmly believes that implementing MTB-MLE can contribute to addressing the high learning poverty rate in the Philippines.
Mother tongue advocates, he said, are planning to hold a dialogue with President Ferdinand ‘Bongbong’ Marcos Jr., to lobby for the retention and increased support for MTB-MLE. (Ahikam Pasion)
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