CHAPTER XVII

VALUES EDUCATION AND

TEACHING LANGUAGE
Andrew Gonzalez, F.S.C.

This chapter concerns how values may be incorporated and imparted through
language education in the Philippine context.

Under our Bilingual Education Policy formulated in 1974 and substantially repeated
in 987, education in the Philippines is conducted in two languages, Filipino (our
national language) and English.

The domains of each language are delineated, with English reserved as the `non-
exclusive' language for mathematics and science in the curriculum, for home
technology and work experience (temporarily), and with Filipino for all other
subjects.

Since content subjects in the humanities have been treated by Dr. Bienvenido
Lumbera, focusing upon literature, I shall confine myself to what is called
Communication Arts in Filipino and in English, under the Secondary Education
Development Program.

FILIPINO, ENGLISH AND VALUES EDUCATION

Before World War II, an American chemical engineer turned linguist and
anthropologist in the Boston area, Benjamin Lee Whorf, proposed the intriguing idea
that the grammar of a language, its structure, affects the way we perceive reality.
Earlier, in the 1920s, one of the great linguists of the United States, perhaps the
greatest so far, Edward Sapir, propounded something similar based on his study of the
way American Indian languages affected the community's thinking and perceptions of
reality. Whorf took up the idea more explicitly by saying that the categories of a
language, arranged in its grammatical system, influenced the thinking of the speaker
using that language. The hypothesis, known in scholarly circles as the Sapir-Whorf
hypothesis, has never been proven.

Experimental studies have, however, been conducted on children of different

linguistic backgrounds to see if the students' performance in certain cognitive tasks
was reinforced or weakened by the explicit grammatical categories of their mother
tongues. While it was found that certain Navajo Indian children proved superior in
spatial thinking in non-verbal tests (the Navajo language has special figure-based
counters), in the Boston area, among students of high socio-economic status families
the same superior performance in testing for spatial thinking was found. If nothing
else, the studies showed that even if there were an initial superiority due to one
language, there are enough compensating factors to make up for any disadvantages on
the part of those who speak another language.
Actually, at present, hardly anyone subscribes to the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis in its
strong form. In its weak form, however, many would accept the fact that language
sensitizes its speakers to certain realities that are important to the speakers of that
language: for example, we have multiple words for rice because it is so important to
our culture; in the same way Eskimos have multiple words for snow because of the
importance of this object for their way of life.

A form of the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis was in operation among the early American
educators during our colonial history, since if one reads the reports of the period,
many Americans felt that only through English could Filipinos learn the democratic
values of government and adopt the practices of democracy. Similarly, some
businessmen among the Americans felt that it was only through English could
Filipinos be activated in the commercial fields and become productive beyond their
traditional agricultural modes.

During the controversy on the teaching of Spanish in the 1950s, one of the arguments
used by the pro-Spanish elements, especially among the Spanish religious orders and
some of the bishops, was that the faith was somehow tied to Spanish, and that if
Filipinos ceased to be knowledgeable in Spanish, the faith would somehow suffer
since in the minds of these people, Catholicism was identified with Spanish and our
Hispanic past.

Among modern theologians in our country, there is now an accepted assumption that
the only way really to integrate Christianity into the warp and woof of the fabric of
Filipino life is to stop using English for catechetical and religious instruction and
instead to use Filipino or the local language. In this way, what the Jesuit psychologist
Jaime Bulatao calls `split-level Christianity' can somehow be obviated and one's
Christian values integrated with one's life so that one need not become merely a
Sunday Catholic.

This explains also why the Spanish missionaries, defying the wishes of the Spanish
Crown, insisted on learning the local languages and using these for preaching and
teaching rather than Spanish. At present, this explains why sermons are more and
more given in the local languages rather than in English or even Tagalog, or why even
in sophisticated Manila homilies are preached in a code-switching variety of Filipino
and English.

I have cited all these developments not to revive the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, but
merely to call attention to a common-sense idea. If one wishes to touch the hearts of
people, one does better in the language of the home more than in a foreign language
that one associates only with official impersonal functions removed from daily life.
Hence, if we wish really to impart values in a class, we would do better using the
local, or at least an indigenous, language such as Filipino rather than English. This
applies particularly to the daily Values Education period under the new secondary
school curriculum and to the religion classes taught in private schools both Catholic
and Protestant. I would make the same plea for our madrasah schools--not to use
Arabic (since hardly anyone speaks Arabic) but to use the mother tongue of our
Islamic cultural communities: Maranao, Maguindanao, Sama, Yakan and Tausug.

COMMUNICATION AND CULTURAL ENRICHMENT

To focus on the actual language arts subjects, the purpose of the Filipino language arts
classes is to teach the structure of Filipino among non-Tagalogs and among native
Tagalogs the standardized variety of Filipino. The letter is still in the process of
standardization and cultivation, of which one facet is intellectualization. Moreover,
after this initial phase of teaching structure, all instruction in one's local language
actually consists of learning to use this language effectively--in other words, for
rhetorical purposes. Traditionally in the field of instruction this is called the language
arts: listening, speaking, reading, and writing. At the same time, both for language use
and ultimately for the knowledge and appreciation of culture, language lessons are
interspersed with literary study especially at the secondary level. Literary study is
both cultural and aesthetic in purpose: one learns more about the language's cultural
matrix as well as the artistic merits of its literary craftsmanship and merit (what we
call appreciation) through the study of language.

Ultimately, the purposes and activities for English as a second language in the
Philippines are similar to the purposes and activities for Filipino. While the initial
work in English language study is the learning of English as a code, English language
study ultimately will involve the creative use of English for thinking and higher
cognitive activities. This goes beyond its use for studying science and mathematics
and for wider communication. At the advanced stage of ESL, one learns about the
cultural underpinning of the language, especially when studying the literature of
English outside of the Philippines as well as Philippine literature in English.

The initial purpose is then communication, but ultimately it should be cultural

enrichment and aesthetic appreciation for both Filipino and English.

In all phases of instruction in language--from communication to rhetorical use, to

cultural and scientific enrichment, and to aesthetic appreciation--there are values
considerations which can be occasions for the human formation of our students.

In communication activities, one can teach the value of proper communication in

human life and the virtues of openness and honesty; in group work the virtue of
cooperation becomes necessary. In rhetorical activities, especially debate, one can
teach respect for facts, the presumption of innocence until proven guilty, the
avoidance of distorting truth, the rules of evidence on which to convict a person, the
ill-effects of rumor-mongering and distortion through transmission, and critical
thinking in general. These elements are prescribed in the DECS Values Education
Program as spelled out in its 2988 policy document, Values Education for the
Filipino.

In using language, one must use it well. St. James counsels us in his epistle: "Even so
the tongue is indeed a little member and boasteth great things" (James 3:5). It can be
an instrument for good or for ill--it can heal divisions but likewise can provoke war.
In the processes of formative growth among our students, especially at the primary
and secondary levels, James's caution for the use of words can become a standard for
language use.

Finally, the study of literature, without becoming preachy and forcing students to find
"moral lessons" everywhere, is an excellent vehicle for the build-up of a "taste" for
literary craftsmanship and artistic creativity, as well as an excellent laboratory for the
vicarious experience in life. So much of what we know about human nature is not
given to us by psychology or sociology, but by literature through prose and poetry and
the different literary genres one learns more about human behavior and human
relations, especially relations between man and woman, from reading novels from all
periods than from any courses on marriage and on psychology.

It is necessary to select the literary pieces well and to form a proper canon of
literature, something that the SLATE (Secondary Language Program for Teachers)
program under PNC has been attempting. Then let the literary selections speak for
themselves without having to be explicitly moralistic. The human and aesthetic values
will come through if the teacher knows how to handle a literary piece well in class.

Specific values may be taught by language use (through communication skills) and
special varieties of language in specific areas (what the British linguists call registers,
Business English, Technical English, Medical English, Computer English, and the
emerging registers of Filipino in different fields). But beyond this language
programming and its implementation become formative elements in the development
of what DECS calls the "core values" of nationalism and pride in the Filipino, on the
one hand, and in global understanding and cooperation, on the other hand.

The importance which the curriculum places on our national language and the
creativity of the classes in Filipino have witness value in themselves. To the Filipino
students they send a message, loud and clear, that our national language is important,
that it is part of our identity and self-worth, a symbol of our national unity, a source of
pride. To me this is one antidote to our "damaged culture" and a way of building up
self-esteem for our nation and of carrying the process of