The Sad Story: The Landscape of English in the Philippines

This is an original article created by Mr. Ariem Venezuela Cinco

Note: Please help me find errors. Thank you. Please comment.

I attended a conference of elementary school teachers in Baguio in May last year. I was not convinced why I was there until I heard one of our roommates confidently said;" Guys, please close the lights and the aircon before you sleep." She was indeed undaunted and never showed any sign of being conscious with what she said. I didn't want to react but my my eyebrows did after deciphering what she just confidently uttered. I did not have the guts to correct her right the very moment she said the one-liner. It actually got me stuck on my bed consternating. I couldn't help but interrogate myself. Is that the kind of English our children learn from the preponderance of teachers we have today? However, I am in no position to claim that our teachers are all the same. Who's to blame?  Let's not point fingers at each other. Instead, let's work together to cure our sick English before it metastasizes to the next generation. Anyway, forget about my whining. Believe me, this wasn't the first instance I heard this kind of English.

Filipinos take pride in their English even branding themselves the best in Asia. Notwithstanding, such belief has long been on the brink of becoming a myth. English in the Philippines has  been dramatically deteriorating. The over-all performance rating of the Philippines in IELTS was 6.69 while Malaysia got an over-all performance rating of 6.71. This figure is based on the result of the research conducted by the IDP Australia. The Philippines lags behind Malaysia in terms of IELTS (International English Language Testing) performance and the sad truth behind this result is that the test group  in the Philippines  was composed of working professionals and the sample test group in Malaysia was composed of university students. Disappointing, indeed.

This deterioration in the proficiency  level of Filipinos in English manifested in their poor performance in International English tests is attributed to some factors such as: the teachers, the learners, the environment, institutions, and the government.

THE TEACHERS. The teachers are the prime role models of our children in school, aren't they? Whatever they do and say are mostly imitated (emulated is a better term I suppose). So, it is implicit that the kind of English our students have today is a reflection of the kind of English our teachers have. Is that a rational argument for me to say? Others would disagree though. The ability of the teachers in English especially in teaching the language greatly affects the English Language Learning of the students. As an English trainer to professionals, it is no longer a surprise for me to meet teachers who still have qualms about their English skills. I once asked a school teacher this question: What do you do? That teacher answered: I am listening to you. I wondered then, since when has listening to me been a job? And then the teacher rephrased it: I am teaching. I asked again: How could you be teaching now? I am your teacher and you are here as my student.

THE LEARNERS. The learners themselves are the prime subjects of the learning process. They should not only be passive receiver of information; instead they must actively process information for them to make their own learning more meaningful. Each learner has its own interest and attitude towards learning, that's why we could not just blame our teachers sometimes when students do not show the progress we expect from them. However, the learners must be properly motivated for them to learn. Exposure and experience are very good multipliers of learning. When I visited one school somewhere I cannot name, I asked one of the students this question: How do you go to school? Do you walk or do you take a ride? The student answered: of course, do you walk. Duh! I was simply caught flat-footed with the answer. I was speechless, for the second time. What about you? I promised to myself not to ask the same question again.  Just kidding.

THE ENVIRONMENT. The environment must be conducive to learning the English language. How can a learner fully develop his English skills if his environment does not allow him to practice or does not give him any chance to learn English? Our schools nowadays have poor learning facilities. When I was still a student, I was also an heir of this deplorable school resources. Poorly written textbooks are actually ubiquitous and I was once a victim of this so I kept on believing that rubber shoes was just fine. Undoubtedly, they have already polluted thousands of young and old minds alike. Our schools and learning institutions except for some, do not actually have the capacity to improve on their English ability. I can attest to this as most of my students are school teachers ( but mind you they are very good in their respective major fields except English). In addition, some schools nowadays are no longer focusing on developing and improving the English skills of the students since we allow the use of multilingual medium of instruction.

THE GOVERNMENT. The government takes on a very important responsibility to improve the standards of education in the country. Thus, it is imperative to say that the government has to take the prime responsibility for providing necessary support the Department of Education needs for it to fully implement measures geared towards the amelioration of the quality of education we get from our schools. In the past couple of years, it was reported that Department of Education marked 80% of Secondary school teachers failed an English proficiency test in 2007. However, the national government projected an ironic, and too good-to-be-true report which showed that there was a significant improvement in the English proficiency among students in 2008. It's just hard to believe though since some call centers in the country were inevitably transferred to other neighboring Asian countries because they couldn't find many qualified applicants to do the job. Statistics show that out of 50 applicants BPO's interview everyday, only two or three would qualify.

For now, what we could do best is not to find a scapegoat for all these sad stories but to find alternatives so we could help improve the standard of English in our country. Everyone should take part in salvaging our ailing English competency. If you think you need help, please call 0916-64.03426

Be an achiever in your very own way.