First language. The term is used to refer to one’s native (or main) language, often the language learned in infancy. Dr. Maryanne Wolf, Director of the Center for Reading and Language Research and Professor of Child Development at Tufts University in the US, told her audience that “whatever the first language is, enrich it to pave the way for easier language acquisition.”

Dr. Wolf was one of the plenary speakers at the TESOL (Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages) 2010 conference in Boston, Massachusetts, last March. In that conference, which was attended by more than 5,000 language experts and educators, she told us that we truly understand a language only when we begin to learn a new one. She added that a brain that transmits messages with the use of two languages is always better than a brain that uses only one.

This concept reinforces the new language policy in basic education in the Philippines that endorses the use of multilingualism. Known as Mother Tongue-based Multilingual Education (or MT-MLE), this language policy strengthens the use of two or more languages for literacy and instruction, according to Dr. Ricardo Nolasco, adviser on multilingual initiatives at the Foundation for Worldwide People Power.

Dr. Nolasco explains that everything starts from where the learners are and from what they already know; thus it makes sense to make the beginning learners read and write in their first language (or L1). This first stage becomes the basis for teaching subjects like mathematics, science, health, and social studies in L1. The implementation of the use of L1 as medium of instruction (MoI) in the country’s elementary public schools is given in DepEd Order 74 series of 2009, which recommends the use of the vernacular, or whatever the L1 is, from the 1st to the 3rd grades in public schools. However, Filipino/Tagalog and English remain to be offered as subjects.

It does not mean, however, that Tagalog or Filipino should be relegated to the background. Neither does this imply that it will play a secondary role to the vernacular that serves as L1. Instead, Filipino should remain as the language of national identity, the language that will unify a people who speak close to 170 local languages.

Thus, the L1 of a speech community, either the vernacular or the regional lingua franca, should keep its important role as the medium of instruction for the first three grade levels. After all, these foundational years serve as a critical period for young learners trying to master concepts in the first language before they get exposed to another language, which they are not yet familiar with.

Many studies have been done on the use of the mother tongue for early education. The most recent one done in the Philippines is the Lubuagan Experiment, an educational innovation started in 1998 by Gregory and Diane Dekker, the husband and wife team of SIL-Philippines.

The results of this experiment revealed that there was marked improvement in the performance of Grades 1, 2, and 3 learners in Reading, Math, English, Filipino, and Makabayan after at least 4 ½ hours of daily exposure to Lilubuagen, the language in Lubuagan, Kalinga. The language of instruction is their L1 known as the First Language Component (or FLC) but learners were also exposed to Filipino and English, one hour each day in school.

Indeed, studies have proven that the acquisition/learning of a second language is best facilitated when one has mastered the concepts in L1. Concepts in mathematics, science, and the like when being taught do not necessarily have to be in English. They can be taught using the child’s first language. Terms need not be translated into the first language but the concepts/definitions should be explained in L1. Consequently, the transfer of these concepts to L2 can be expected to come more easily since mastery has been attained and the concepts have been implanted in the learner’s brain.

This should make the learners multi-literate, since they can communicate more competently in oral and written form in the local vernacular, the national language Filipino, and the international language English. They become multi-lingual, because they can now use the different languages in different situations and ably adapt themselves to what the situation calls for in terms of language use. Consequently, they also turn out to be multi-cultural. Having learned the language of the people around them, they can now live and work harmoniously with people of diverse backgrounds and cultures. All these are the goals of multilingualism.

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To know more about multilingualism, interested parties may contact the Linguistic Society of the Philippines (LSP) for possible participation in LSP’s annual conference and general meeting on August 19-20, 2010, at the Ricardo Leong Hall of the Ateneo de Manila University in Loyola Heights, Quezon City. International and local proponents of Multilingualism will be the keynote speakers and focus lecturers. For details, please visit www.lsphil.org.