Starting June 2010, the approach to the teaching of English in high school will be very different from what it is now. This is an attempt by the Department of Education to make the teaching of the English language more effective.
Right now, literature is usually taught only once a week in English classes. The rest of the week, English is taught as a language, with hardly any reference to literature. What English teachers use now are texts written by non-literary writers. Non-literary writers, needless to say, do not win Nobels, Bookers, Pulitzers, nor National Book Awards for the correctness and elegance of their writing. Students right now are not exposed to the best writing done in the English language, since the best writing is done by literary writers. They do not really have an accurate idea of what good English looks like.
The divorce between literature and language teaching happened more than two decades ago, for various ideological and institutional reasons. The reconciliation happened just a few years ago in countries like the UK and Malaysia. In our country, the two fields will finally wed again next year.
In the new curriculum to be implemented next June, all English language teaching will be literature-based.
What exactly does that mean?
Let us look at what the new curriculum expects to accomplish as far as high school students are concerned. At the end of four years in high school, the student is expected to meet this standard: “The learner demonstrates literary and communicative competence through his/her understanding of the different genres of literature and other text types for a deeper appreciation of Philippine culture and those of other countries.”
Each term in this standard needs elaboration.
The first term is the subject of the sentence – learner. The new curriculum is learner-centered, rather than teacher-centered or teaching-centered. Right now, we are interested mainly in how the teacher behaves in class (does she come on time, does she make lesson plans, does she have advanced degrees, does she speak in English, that sort of thing) and in what the teacher does in the classroom (teaching strategies, methods, techniques, and so on). The new curriculum focuses on the human being that is the learner, not on a technology of learning. It is outcomes- rather than input-based.
The second term – literary competence – comes from a classic book in literary theory entitled Structuralist Poetics (1975), by Jonathan Culler. Culler defines the term this way: “Literary competence is a set of conventions for reading literary texts.” The definition implies that literary texts cannot be read by just anyone. A reader has to learn a set of conventions related to the reading of such texts. Such conventions have to be learned; they are not acquired instinctively. By the end of high school, the student is expected to be able to apply the various conventional ways of reading literary texts.
For those not familiar with modern theories of language learning, the third term also needs a lot of explanation – communicative competence. In today’s college courses in English and Filipino, communicative competence is the main goal, but in high school, communicative competence has not really been highlighted, although it is already in the current DepEd specifications for textbooks and teacher training.
The term “communicative competence” was coined in 1966 by Dell Hymes, but it is the definition (since revised) given in 1980 by Michael Canale and Merrill Swain that is usually used.
The National Capital Language Resource Center in Washington, D.C., describes current American practice this way: “Language teaching in the United States is based on the idea that the goal of language acquisition is communicative competence: the ability to use the language correctly and appropriately to accomplish communication goals. The desired outcome of the language learning process is the ability to communicate competently, not the ability to use the language exactly as a native speaker does.” (To be continued)
“WORDS OF THE DAY” (English/Filipino) for next week’s elementary school classes: July 6 Monday: 1. cup/baka, 2. hole/ayaw, 3. burst/habang, 4. form/kasi, 5. frame/ganoon, 6. doubt/buhay; July 7 Tuesday: 1. a/man, 2. hope/daw, 3. fact/kayo, 4. lead/ninyo, 5. nerve/natin, 6. fixed/bago; July 8 Wednesday: 1. bag/loob, 2. lock/o, 3. much/tanong, 4. knife/mangyari, 5. mixed/marami, 6. judge/hanggang; July 9 Thursday: 1. hat/bahay, 2. grip/mata, 3. cart/ho, 4. plough/huwag, 5. where/kami, 6. knowledge/muna; July 10 Friday: 1. fat/agos, 2. blood/abot, 3. nut/abala, 4. point/abay, 5. while/alaga, 6. language/agimat. The numbers after the dates indicate grade level. The dates refer to the official calendar for public elementary schools. For definitions of the words in Filipino, consult UP Diksiyonaryong Filipino.