Kimmy Schemy

Besides tutorial center, our company also has a preschool and a grade school. Last Friday, a mom asked me if our formal school offers subjects like Filipino and Sibika, subjects taught in Pilipino (Tagalog), our native tongue.

So, I answered ‘of course’ as we follow the curriculum of the Department of Education. She smirked and said  something about Tagalog subjects being irrelevant since they wouldn’t be used when a child grows up and that we should concentrate on a child’s English proficiency.

I was outraged. It took me an enormous amount of self control not to tell her that that’s what being educated is all about, knowing THYSELF, thy culture and therefore thy language.

Just because I’m an English teacher doesn’t mean I’m turning my back on my native tongue. I love it as much as I love my country. I looked at the woman in front of me and answered as politely as I could that our school tries to train students to be intelligent and responsible future leaders of our country. I don’t know if that was the answer I should have given, but it was the best I could come up with at the time.

I felt sad about the whole thing.. I do believe we should love our language more than that woman did..

One Response to “Messing up with DepEd?”