Singapore’s bilingual education: At risk of losing its unique advantages?
A youth’s analysis on Singapore’s bilingual education and his thoughts on how Singapore can maintain its bilingual edge
Bilingualism has been a cornerstone of Singapore’s education system since independence in the 1960s. Generations of Singaporeans grew up learning at least two languages in schools, with English as the main language and medium of instruction, and a second language that corresponds to the student’s ethnic race — Chinese, Malay, and Tamil — collectively known as the Mother Tongue Languages (MTL). Till this day, bilingualism remains to be touted as one of Singapore’s advantages — as evidenced by Minister for Education Chan Chun Sing’s speech in November 2021. [1]
“In a world, where China, India and Southeast Asia grow in their economic, political and cultural heft, our ability to be bilingual will enhance our ability to understand them, connect with them and stay relevant to them.’
However, with the dominance of the English language across all aspects of Singapore’s society and the “erosion” of the MTLs, there have always been constant debates on the relevance of the MTLs and the need to get more students to be interested in their respective MTL. Despite the many debates on bilingualism, it does not seem as important as other national interests like the “war on diabetes”, the “SG Green Plan” or foreign policy issues.
As a Singaporean Chinese coming from a Chinese-speaking family background, who also studied Chinese Studies at the polytechnic level, these debates definitely concern me, especially when we look at it in the context of the rise of China, prospects of regional integration within the Southeast Asia region, and how foreigners are learning new languages to seize the growing opportunities of the region. These developments can be seen as threats to our unique bilingual education. Students are also seen to be at risk of losing their cultural affinity towards their ethnic race — which was one of the main purposes of bilingualism in Singapore.
In this article, I seek to analyse some of the problems facing bilingual education in Singapore and discuss ways on how we can make our bilingual education “great again” despite the huge challenges in promoting the MTL languages.
Problems of bilingual education in Singapore
Let’s first understand some of the main problems facing bilingual education in Singapore.
English is the most frequently used language at home
According to the most recent Census issued by the Department of Statistics, there has been a significant increase in the use of English as the language most frequently spoken at home. Statistics have shown that the percentage has increased from 32.3% of households in 2010 to 48.3% in 2020. [2]
Other statistics from the Ministry of Education show that 71%, 67% and 70% of the Chinese, Malay and Indian households of the 2019 Primary 1 cohort speak mostly English at home respectively. These statistics have shown that English has become the most frequently spoken language at home, as compared to the MTLs of Chinese (Mandarin), Malay, and Tamil. [3]
This could have been the root cause for some students who find the MTLs as a challenging subject, due to the lack of familiarity with the language and lack of usage in their daily lives.
‘Failed’ MTL incentives and lack of exposure for MTL languages
Incentives meant to encourage the learning of MTL at a higher level have instead become a motivational factor for students to drop the subject in their higher education years. This is especially prevalent among students who have found the learning of MTL to be “torturous” and irrelevant and was only to be used as an advantageous tool for educational upgrading. As echoed in a CNA commentary by Erin Low [4]:
Yet we clung onto this quid-pro-quo system of HMTL, taking it only to reap its dividends after O-Levels, or to get coveted spots in classes and schools.
…it’s no surprise when a student drops the language right after O-Levels. Most of us could hardly wait to wipe clean all the unpleasant memories associated with it.
That’s what many of my classmates did at junior college. With one subject in the bag, we spent afternoons hunkered down in the library doing homework or revising for other A-Level subjects, while the non-HMTL students toiled at H1 mother tongue class.
Also, there is clearly a lack of time allocation for MTL subjects in schools. Taking the primary school curriculum as an example, the Chinese/Malay/Tamil subjects are the only time where students would be exposed to these languages. Taking the pre-university curriculum as another example, only 4 out of 50 hours per week is allocated for the learning of H1 Chinese/Malay/Tamil. [5] This means that pre-university students who did not take the MTL at a higher level would spend the remaining bulk of their weekly school hours studying subjects in English — resulting in an unbalanced exposure time for the usage of both languages.
Lack of time allocation would also give students an impression that the MTL language is not as important as English, since it would only be used during MTL lessons and exams.
Huge difficulty in generating interests in MTL
With English remaining the most preferred language among the younger generation, there has also been huge difficulty in trying to generate interest in the MTLs despite actions taken by the MOE and various organisations.
Taking the Chinese language for example, in 2019, Lianhe Zaobao reported that several organisations have tried to make use of the Mandarin pop culture fever to ignite the interest in the Chinese language among the Singaporean Chinese youths. Well-known Singaporean singers like JJ Lin and Nathan Hartono were invited to be ambassadors of a “Falling in Love with Chinese” campaign targeted at students from the primary, secondary and pre-university levels. [6]
However, a survey conducted by the Singapore Chinese Cultural Centre (SCCC) found that only 8% out of the 800 youths surveyed felt that their love for the Chinese language was ignited by the Mandarin pop culture. [7]
The same survey also found that only 19% of the respondents felt that the rise of China is one major factor that has encouraged them to learn the language well. [8]
These problems have shown that promoting the use of the MTLs remains an uphill challenge for Singapore’s bilingual education system due to the dominance of the English language within the society, and the lack of emphasis, exposure, and interest in the MTLs.
At the same time, while it seems that Singapore is at risk of losing its unique advantage, not all hope is lost as bilingualism will remain the cornerstone of Singapore’s education system. The key question is – what can we do to help Singapore maintain its bilingual edge?
Ideas to maintain Singapore’s bilingual edge
While we tend to say that a friendship/relationship takes two hands to clap, however, we need to take “few hands” to clap — parents, educators, schools, and the MOE to all play a part in ensuring the continued success of bilingual education in Singapore.
What can parents do?
Zhou Weijie, author of a recent commentary on Lianhe Zaobao pointed out that “parents should prevent their child from losing the opportunity of learning languages at the best age”. [9] Indeed, many studies have shown that the best stage to learn a language is during childhood and that it would be increasingly difficult for one to master a language in adulthood. I feel that parents who are more inclined to speak English should refrain from having the mindset that “MTLs are useless” and that they should make an effort to get their child to be exposed to both languages from a young age. It can be as simple as tuning in to Channel 8 on weekend mornings to watch cartoon shows in Mandarin so that their child can get familiar with the language.
There are readily-made and accessible educational resources that parents can access online to support them in getting their children to become bilingual speakers. However, more publicity for these resources is needed.
Likewise, bilingual parents should also make a conscious effort to speak both languages at home and maintain a delicate balance on the use of either of the languages.
Ultimately, parents must refrain from thinking that only schools and educators are responsible for their child’s bilingual education. Schools/Educators would generally hope to see that parents can play their part in helping their child succeed under the bilingual education system.
What can educators/schools/MOE do?
Educators and schools play a huge part in a student’s bilingual journey. Students spend a huge part of their schooling years in schools, and the school could be the only place for some students to be exposed to the MTLs. Therefore, an effective approach by educators, schools and the MOE needs to be adopted to enhance and improve the bilingual experience for students.
As mentioned earlier, student attitudes, ‘failed’ incentives, lack of time allocation, and lack of exposure to the MTLs are some of the problems in Singapore’s bilingual education today. Changing student perceptions on the relevance of the MTLs would be one of the most pressing tasks to be done by schools and the MOE.
#1: Curriculum & Exam Reform
First of all, I feel that the curriculum should be reformed so that students can realise that the MTL subject is more than just another examinable language subject. Students need to realise that the MTL languages are just as relevant as the English language. For example, at the pre-university level, students can be introduced to the different geographical, historical, mathematical or scientific terms in the respective MTLs so that they can appreciate how the languages are just as important as the English language; and link them to future practical applications, for example, studying or working in China/Malaysia/Indonesia/India, and link them to regional opportunities.
For students at the primary or secondary levels, the curriculum can be tweaked to make the language much more relatable to their daily lives. As youth trends evolve quickly, educators can conduct frequent polls to find out what is the current trend among students and incorporate these trends into the MTL curriculum. I have to note that a commendable effort was made in the 2021 Secondary Chinese curriculum, where students get to know about the English transliterations of the Chinese surnames, which is definitely something students can relate to their personal lives. [10]
The MTL exam formats need to be tweaked so that students find them more relevant and applicable to real-life scenarios. For example, for argumentative essays, students can be invited to express their thoughts on recent news or incident in society. Lower-ability students can be invited to come up with a speech for exchange students from China in the Chinese language composition exams, for example, using simple sentence structures.
#2: Reduce reliance on textbooks; embrace educational technology resources and use them effectively
In recent years, the use of educational technology (or EdTech) in classrooms has accelerated due to the Covid-19 pandemic. While Singapore schools continue to use textbooks in the course of teaching, however, I believe that the continued reliance on textbooks in the teaching of MTLs is not effective. Schools and educators need to fully embrace educational technology resources and use them effectively in the teaching of the MTL languages. How can we do so? Let me provide one example from my visit to a foreign language primary school’s English class in Nanjing, China, in 2019.
Despite differences on what defines a second language in both China and Singapore, both countries face similar challenges when it comes to the teaching of a second language in a first language-dominated environment. However, I was surprised to see how the teachers in Nanjing managed to use EdTech resources effectively during the teaching of the English language, without the use of a textbook.
In this photo, primary school students can be seen engaging in a competition for English phrases on a ‘smartboard’ through a specially designed game. The smartboard can also be used for a variety of educational activities, and the teachers shared that it has been an effective tool in enhancing the student’s second language ability.
I understand that similar devices have been installed in some Singapore schools and that students nowadays are issued with a personal learning device. I feel that the MOE should look into how to make use of these resources effectively through various activities in MTL lessons so that the students can be engaged and inspired to learn the languages and become effective bilingual learners. As students are digital natives, the MOE can consider reducing the reliance on textbooks and moving useful learning resources onto an EdTech platform, so that these resources will not become obsolete. There can be a requirement for all teachers to fully utilise EdTech resources in the classroom, and training programmes can be conducted for the teachers as well. Hopefully, these efforts will help to capture the student’s attention and cultivate the love for the learning of the MTLs.
#3: Abolish the exemption of H1 MTLs for pre-university students
While this might sound ‘insane’ for some students benefitting from the system, I feel that exemption from H1 MTLs for pre-university students who have done well in Higher MTL at the O-Levels should be abolished. These students should instead be offered to take the MTLs at the H2 level or choose to do elective modules where students can learn real-life knowledge such as combating disinformation or critical thinking skills in the MTL languages. This would help students move away from an “elimination” mindset (encouraged by the incentives) where MTLs can be dropped and encourage them to think positively about the relevance of the MTLs in society.
While I am not an educational expert and I might not be the answer to the solutions, I do believe that these ideas can at least help Singapore maintain its bilingual edge in some way or another. I also believe that there are always better and more feasible ideas, and I would love to learn more about them too!
Conclusion
As times change and evolve, Singapore’s efforts to maintain bilingualism as the cornerstone of its education system will always remain a work in progress. Nonetheless, bilingualism will always remain a cornerstone in Singapore’s education system and it will continue to anchor Singapore’s national identity (also mentioned by Minister Chan). Everyone can also play a part to help Singapore maintain its unique bilingual edge by encouraging more people to use both languages widely and supporting improvements made to enhance the learning of the MTLs and the bilingual education system. In this way, Singapore’s bilingual edge will not be at risk of losing its unique advantages, and Singapore will continue to be a united society and remain engaged and connected with the rest of the world.
References
[3]: https://www.straitstimes.com/singapore/spore-must-guard-against-losing-its-bilingual-edge-pm-lee
[5]: Curriculum time allocation calculated with reference from the website of Catholic Junior College, Singapore in 2020.
[6–8]: https://www.zaobao.com.sg/znews/singapore/story20191128-1009089
[9]: https://www.zaobao.com.sg/forum/views/story20211225-1226377
[10]: https://www.inspiren.com.sg/blog/the-underrated-new-secondary-chinese-textbook-of-2021-a-review
Note: The photo taken at a primary English class in Nanjing, China belongs to the author. All other photo sources are clearly named in the captions.
