As a novice in teaching English in a public school of Philippine setting, I have encountered reading interventions and clinics to aid learners with reading comprehension inadequacies. There’s no doubt that our learners can read and write both in English and Tagalog (and Cebuano). The real challenge is that, learners find it difficult to express their own interpretation and analyses using English (as a second language). In our junior high school, we adopted programs like DEAR Time and Reading Camp. Believing that practice makes perfect, we spend a 20-minute of the first class every Monday to just read whether it’s a magazine or a textbook, in English text or Tagalog or Cebuano with hopes to make learners (rekindle) their love for reading to continue. It is only in school that most learners have access and intentional time to read print media. Kids these days are only interested in digital modes of learning (and entertainment), accessing the internet in their mobile phones and pc’s and watching televisions. Students consider learning more meaningful when they are having fun or entertained. Reading Camp is also offered during summer as remedial classes for those who failed in their language classes (English & Filipino) for that school year. The camp provides worksheets to enhance their (silent) reading ability and comprehension, and short repertoire performances are expected as culmination of the program to assess their speaking skills. If given the time and resources, I’d like to make a research study about the development of the new approach introduced here in 2013 called Basa-Pilipinas ~ a partnership with EDC through USAID, where Mother-tongue instruction replaced English core subjects in the first 3 years of the primary school. “The program reformed reading instruction, improved reading delivery systems, and increased access to quality reading materials throughout the country. On the request of the Department of Education, Basa Pilipinas also tested innovative models for reading remediation and for integrating ICT applications in reading classrooms.” (https://www.edc.org/basa-pilipinas)

I want to know first-hand, make a local comparative study to determine its effectiveness whether its impact has remarkable significance in the analytical approach of reading. Considering our learners in Grade 7 this year, if they have undergone Basa Pilipinas program 7 years ago, would their reading comprehension performance and communication skills now were influenced and benefited from the program? If so, to what extent? Most reading resources they have had in Grades 1-3 were filled with which also include pictures and vernacular translation, an approach that was so interactive defining making visual meaning meaningful. But when these learners come to junior high school, the reading materials has become less with images and translation, thus resulting to one of the factors that cause lack of reading interest and comprehension.

http://www.edc.org/new-approach-literacy-philippines

http://www.usaid.gov/philippines/education/basa-pilipinas