SENATOR Sherwin Gatchalian filed a measure that seeks to redefine the application of the Mother Tongue as medium of instruction from Kindergarten to Grade 3.

Senate Bill 2457 will amend Sections 4 and 5 of Republic Act 10533 or the Enhanced Basic Education Act of 2013.

The senator said the Philippines is a highly multilingual society and data from the 2020 Census of Population and Housing showed that there are about 245 languages in the country.

However, the Department of Education covers only 19 languages in implementing MTB-MLE or only eight percent of the total languages reported in the census.

Gatchalian said that some of the widely spoken languages such as Boholano, Masbateno, and Kankanaey are not among the 19 languages used by the DepEd in the program.

“I propose this legislation to remedy and seek the faithful implementation of MTB-MLE under the RA 10533 by redefining its application to monolingual classes from Kindergarten to Grade 3,” he said.

“This will result in reverting Section 7, Article 14 of the 1987 Constitution on the Medium of Instructions to be used in key stage 1,” the senator stressed. The section states that for purposes of communication and instruction, the official languages of the Philippines are Filipino, and until otherwise provided by law, English.