There are various challenges hounding the K to 12 curricula, including the implementation of the mother-tongue based multilingual education (MTB-MLE) and the spiral progression approach, which the Second Congressional Commission on Education (EDCOM II) will study, officials said.
According to the EDCOM II leadership, the commission is mandated to conduct a national assessment and evaluation which will include, among others, the determination of factors that have contributed to the continuing failure in performance of identified subject areas to meet desired local and international standards.
They pointed out that based on the results of international large-scale assessments such as the 2018 Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), Filipino learners are lagging behind their peers abroad and failing to master basic competencies. Out of 79 countries that participated in PISA, the Philippines ranked lowest in Reading and second lowest in mathematics and science. The EDCOM II’s assessment will formulate proposed reforms, even as the Department of Education (DepEd) is already reviewing and revising the K to 12 curricula.
According to officials, there are two very contentious issues specific to the K to 12 law -- the mother tongue and spiral progression. These are issued that the commission will be studying, since what they are looking at is improving learner performance. In a study by the Philippine Institute for Development Studies held in 2019, it showed that out of 16,287 schools surveyed, only 9 percent conducted the four activities needed to successfully implement MTB-MLE: the writing of big books on language, literature, and culture; documentation of the orthography of the language; documentation of grammar; and documentation of a dictionary of the language.
To ensure mastery and knowledge of skills after each level, the Enhanced Basic Education Act of 2013 or the K to 12 Law (Republic Act No. 10533) mandated the use of the spiral progression approach, where learners are taught simple to more complicated concepts through grade levels in spiral progression.
