By Devi Benedicte I. Paez
Ateneo de Manila University
Paper presented at the 2nd Philippine Conference Workshop on
Mother Tongue-Based Multilingual Education (MTBMLE 2)
held February 16-18, 2012, at the Punta Villa Resort
Sto. Niño Sur, Arevalo, Iloilo City, Philippines
After having been observed in class one day, a Grade 6 public school English teacher pointed out: “Kung hindi ko ituro sa Filipino [ang English], mawawalan ng saysay ang tinuturo ko. Wala pong makakaintindi.” (If I do not teach English in Filipino, what I teach will have no meaning. No one will understand me.) This comment underlies what may be a common source of conflict faced by many Filipino teachers of English today: making English accessible to students while conscious of the obligation to implement institutional policies, such as the English-Only policy, that only seem to marginalize students’ identities, culture, and values.
To read the complete article, click on Paez – English Language Teaching in rhe Periphery Classroom.
