The Apostle Paul in the King James Bible, being at least bilingual who speaks both Hebrew and Greek, was quoted in his letter to the Corinthians saying, “Yet in the church I had rather speak five words with my understanding, that by my voice I might teach others also, than ten thousand words in an unknown tongue.” This verse is in consonance with the basic education curriculum for K to 3 program wherein the medium of instruction is the language that the young learners use at home in developing life skills and learning other languages, such as English and Filipino, and other areas of discipline in the higher levels of the K-12 program. Additionally, the late Nelson Mandela once said, “If you talk to a man in a language he understands, that goes to his head. If you talk to him in his own language, that goes to his heart.” Therefore, mother tongue is the primary tool in the teaching learning processes that serves as vehicle in shaping the minds and hearts of young learners.
The use of the mother tongue in the early years of education has consistently been recommended by various studies including PCSPE (1970), World Bank (1988), EDCOM (1991), PESS (1998), PCER (2000) and BESRA (2006). These studies somehow anchored the inclusion of Mother Tongue-Based Multilingual Education (MTB-MLE) as an element of the Enhanced Basic Education Program on the use of the vernacular of the learners as part of learning/subject area and as medium of instruction for young learners to easily understand ideas and activities in the classroom. Currently, DepEd uses 19 languages in MTB-MLE: Tagalog, Kapampangan, Pangasinan, Iloko, Bikol, Ybanag, Sinugbuanong Binisaya, Hiligaynon, Waray, Bahasa Sug, Maguindanaoan, Maranao, Chavacano, Ivatan, Sambal, Akianon, Kinaray-a, Yakan, and Sinurigaonon..
Moreover, empirical evidence from bilingual education literature suggests that teaching students using a familiar language of instruction includes the ready construction of schemata for learning and the availability of schema in learning new content (Bloch, 2014; Benson, 2000; Collier and Thomas, 2004). In contrast, using a language that neither students nor teachers understand and use well enough is one of the major reasons for students’ poor performance in primary school in developing countries. It has been documented, for instance, that using a medium of instruction not understood by the learner significantly impedes learning (e.g. Diarra, 2003; Harris, 2011; Motala, 2013; Trudell and Piper, 2014) and their over- all performance in primary school (Bamgbose, 1991), and increases the probability of them dropping out of school (Mehrotra, 1998).
While findings on said studies provide clear cut benefits of using mother tongue as medium of instruction, its inclusion as part of learning/subject area in the K to 3 program poses debatable issues. Furthermore, the definition of "mother tongue" remains a controversial topic, as many parents teach their children English or Filipino at home and some parents belonging to ethnic tribes teach their own dialect other than the commonly spoken language in the area. “Mother tongue,” is interpreted by some as the cultural language, but others as the language taught from birth, regardless of whether it is part of traditional heritage. Without a clear agreement, resistance to the bill and confusion within communities remain.
Consequently, the unprecedented disruptions caused by the COVID-19 to education necessitated the educational institutions to leave the conventional teaching-learning processes and delve to the mandates of the new normal. Hence, the department of education proposed various learning modalities. Those areas with good internet connection may use online distance learning, others may use Television or Radio Based Instructions, while the rest may use self-learning modules. The response of Deped- Tabuk City, based on survey from parents and guardians, is the majority use of self-learning modules.
As the city center of Tabuk is a salad bowl of diverse cultural backgrounds along with 31 subtribes, it is safe to say that the city is a multiculturally diverse community where tribes or groups of people are identified based on their dialects. Having pointed this, it is not therefore unusual for a teacher to find herself handling classes in a public school consisting of children from different linguistic backgrounds. This presents a challenge for the teachers in the K-3 curriculum since assurance of learning outcomes are dependent on the linguistic backgrounds of the learners inline with the medium of instruction. It has become more challenging now that COVID-19 forced us to leave the conventional ways of teaching students where direct mediation from trained teachers has been limited.
Calinawagan (2016) pointed that in one classroom in a public elementary school, the students could have different mother tongues—Maranao, Kankanay, Pangasinan, Ilokano. This could be problematic. The DepEd- Cordillera chose Iloko [as the language of instruction], but teachers encounter difficulties because not all the students speak Iloko. Some are more fluent in Filipino, especially in urban centers, whereas in areas like Barangay Balong in Tabuk City, some use their vernacular apart from the lingua franca ilokano.
To bridge the gap of learning, Calinawagan (2016) recommended that the teacher use the regional lingua franca as the medium of instruction but allot a special time to the speakers of other languages, using the regional lingua franca as a bridge to learning in other languages. The teacher would have to consult with the students and their parents to find out what language the child speaks at home, and to seek the cooperation of the parents in translating lessons into and creating learning materials in the child’s mother tongue. Generally, this may be effective in the conventional teaching- learning process with the presumption that parents have the necessary educational background to assist their children and enough source of income as these two are the major factors that affect learning of a child.
Thus, the implementation of the MTBLE-MLE program in the Self-Learning Modules did not abate the challenges of teachers in Balong Elementary School since some parents only speak in the vernacular which is different from the common language Iloko used in the SLMs. Hence, assisting their children alone in their SLMs may not result in the desired learning outcome.
Additionally, some parents of children studying in the said school did not finish basic education and living below the poverty line. Previous survey by Community Based Monitoring System (CBMS) conducted in 2015 revealed that Barangay Balong ranked 3rd of the 10 bottom barangays with informal settlers, ranked 10th of the 10 bottom barangays with children 12-15 years old not attending high school, and high level of children 6-15 years old not attending school. As to households with Income Below the Poverty Threshold, Below the Food Threshold, and Unemployment Rate, these provided a high-level indicator.
Based on the given premises, we can already draw a picture on what factors affecting the MTB-MLE in SLMs including the restrictions and guidelines being implemented against the spread of the virus. To mitigate such issues, downloaded modules are modified(localization) and simplified(contextualization) to fit the level of understanding of learners since there are some Iloko terminologies that are uncommon in the everyday conversation of the people in Tabuk City that some parents even find them unfamiliar.
Nevertheless, to ensure seamless teaching-learning processes, monitoring is done through phone calls and text messages with the parents or guardians. Apart from that, scheduled home visitations with precautionary health measures are conducted. Other parents, being resourceful, ask help from their neighbors for ideas and translations.
To come to the point, success on the use of "mother tongue" in teaching young learners through Self-Learning Modules (SLMs) truly depends on the ingenuity and innovativeness of teachers in their pedagogy as well as their commitment to the program(Caliwanagan, 2016). Whether it be therefore in midst of pandemic or challenges brought by circumstances beyond the teacher’s control, it is only through commitment of one’s duties and responsibilities can teachers create change in a learner’s development, supplement in a parent’s guidance and support, and serve as model in a community of diverse tongues and culture.
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