Balancia Lhara A.

BEED 2-C
SC8

This is called promises of MTB_MLE because it can develop a strong foundation in

their mother tongue language before adding additional languages. Children with a
solid foundation in their mother tongue develop stronger literacy abilities in the
school language. Their knowledge and skills transfer across languages. This 7
items are enables to the learners to use both or all their languages for success in
school and for lifelong learning. In terms of cognitive development, the school
activities will engage learners to move well beyond the basic questions to cover
all higher order thinking skills in Mother tongue which they can transfer to the
other languages once enough Filipino or English has been acquired to use these
skills in thinking and articulating thoughts.

1. Literacy- We only learns to read once. Learning to read in the mother tongue
develops skills that transfer to reading any other languages. Comprehension in
reading other languages only occurs after oral proficiency has developed such
that vocabulary of the written Filipino text is already part of the learners’ spoken
vocabulary.

2. Prior knowledge- Engaging learners in a discussion of what is already familiar

to them using the home language and culture enables better learning of the
curriculum through integration and application of that knowledge into current
knowledge schemes.

3. Cognitive development and higher order thinking skills (HOTS) - Using the
learners’ mother tongue provides a strong foundation by developing cognitive
skills and comprehension of the academic content from day one. The knowledge,
skills, attitudes, and values gained through the mother tongue better support
learning of other languages and learning through other languages later.

As learners articulate their thoughts and expand ideas, both language and critical
thinking are strengthened. MTBMLE cultivates critical thinking through talking
about ideas in the familiar language. When teaching only in the Filipino, critical
thinking is postponed until Filipino is sufficiently developed to support such
analysis.

4. Strong Bridge- MTB-MLE provides a good bridge to listening, speaking, reading,

and writing the Filipino, English (L2, L3) of the classroom using sound educational
principles for building fluency and confidence in using the other languages for
lifelong learning. Reading in the Filipino is only introduced after basic Mother
tongue reading fluency and Filipino oral proficiency are developed.
Comprehension in reading the Filipino occurs after the development of that
spoken Filipino. Once sufficient oral and written proficiency in the Filipino are
developed, a gradual transition to using the Filipino as medium of instruction can
progress without the L1 support.

5. Scaffolding- In Filipino teaching, the Mother tongue is used to support learning

when the Filipino is not sufficiently developed to be used alone. The Mother
tongue is used for expression and the teacher facilitates the development of the
Filipino to enable learners to adequately express ideas in the Filipino. In this way,
the Mother tongue strengthens the learning of the Filipino by supporting the L2
development for communication.

6. Teaching for meaning and accuracy -Decoding text requires accuracy, while
comprehending texts requires decoding skills within a meaningful context. Both
meaning and accuracy are important, but in classrooms that teach only Filipino,
there is often primary focus on accuracy until the L2 is sufficiently learned. This
delays actual meaningful learning until the Filipino can support that learning.

7. Confidence building and proficiency development for two or more languages

along the following macro-skills (listening, speaking, reading, writing, and viewing)
for both meaning and accuracy.