MTL review won't dilute standards

A review committee is examining various systems of teaching the subject. -myp



THE mother tongue language (MTL) review will not pander to some students who are unwilling to master their mother tongue because of declining interest, Education Minister Ng Eng Hen said in Parliament yesterday.

A review committee is examining various systems to glean important lessons from the teaching of the subject, and it does not make sense to "spend all that effort" just to lessen its importance, he explained.

Headed by director-general of education Ho Peng, the committee is "not out to dilute the standards", but to set "realistic standards", he said.

The MTL review committee is being set up because the language environment has changed drastically in the past 20 years, he said.

Children have less exposure to MTL today as they are spending increasingly more time using English.

Among Chinese and Indian families, 60 per cent now predominantly speak English at home. This figure is double that of two decades ago. Among Malay families, 35 per cent predominantly use English.

Mr Baey Yam Keng, MP for Tanjong Pagar GRC, sought clarification that the review would not pander to those students who are unwilling to put in effort to master their mother tongue.

Mr Baey was among seven MPs who fired away questions during the 40-minute debate.

"There is a concern that every time we review, that standards will drop. But I think when we aim for proficiency, we have guidelines to use," Dr Ng said in reply to Ms Lee Bee Wah, MP for Ang Mo Kio GRC.

She asked if there would be a further lowering in the standard of MTL, especially that for the Chinese language.

"Some obviously will feel that we ought to (have) higher (standards), some lower. But, educationally, standards are not set arbitrarily," said Dr Ng. "You can make an exam so difficult that everybody fails, but you have to set realistic standards."

He cited Beijing's Hanyu Shuiping Kaoshi, a proficiency system the committee is studying, as one that has transparent markers, such as being able to converse with a native speaker and read the newspaper.

Opposition MP Low Thia Khiang quizzed Dr Ng about pegging MTL teaching and assessment standards to a changing language environment, which will be "weaker generation after generation".

"Will we one day realise that perhaps the only realistic standard then would be to require the student to be able to write his own name in Chinese?" Mr Low said.

Dr Ng replied that while Singapore's best and brightest should be as good as native speakers in China and Taiwan, he was not keen on a homogenous system that ignored the changing landscape.

Ministry of Education professionals are in discussions with their counterparts in China and other countries that offer Chinese as a mother tongue language to set appropriate standards, he said.

The review will set the blueprint for MTL teaching for the next 10 to 15 years, he said. By the end of the year, the committee will have come up with a revised curriculum for the lower-primary level.

It will show, with exam formats and textbooks, examples of how the curriculum would look at each level.

Wed, May 19, 2010
my paper

By Rachel Chan