Chinese or malay Differentiated learning will destroy further the ecology of mother tongue Chinese Over time

Can Nanyang Primary School be a leading light for Singapore’s Chinese language education despite 80% of students speak English at home?

Today 19 th May 2010, the news on Channel eight have been blasting images of people learning Chinese language in Polytechnics . It also said  that mother tongue is alive and well, with student numbers  extending from 80 to 90. Is this true?. It is truthful that if we use this magnifying glass and look at this very small number, it is indeed increasing. From 80 to 90 students, not bad, in a country of 5 million population right? This is a joke .

Try interviewing   someone along  Orchard road, clark quay or even Ang Mo kio  , Very few people speaks Chinese anymore. How can the government blame parents for not teaching their kids  as the government Systematically  kill the Chinese language . Even amongst those people who speak chinese, every sentence is sprinkled with at least 30% of english vocabulary.

Language equals  culture, most linguists agree .

Are we seriously at risk of  sacrificing not only our Mother culture but also to potential economic benefits from knowing one more language?

Lee Kuan Yew has succeeded in diluting Chinese

In a Country where 70% are Chinese and in these Chinese people’s homes , 70% speak English . Out of these people , some swear to  hatred learning about their Chinese heritage.

You call that well? This problem is more prevalent amongst chinese people in Singapore.

Government should sincerely promote mother tongue (not just chinese language)

Like the expression goes, FOCUS FOCUS FOCUS… and begin with the end in mind. If the END is that MTL Mother tongue language standards is further diluted, the efforts to learn it will falter.

Aim high, and you will find a way to do it

Let’s keep the standards, passing grades, rating and ranking high and students will find a way to master the language. And parents alike will pay more focus to it.

The war is not over. The Singapore government has backed off changing mother tongue percentage weight but would still like to promote Differentiated teaching to gradually encroach on the language.  Let all the children study in one single class in a one standardized teaching. If it doesn’t work, it doesn’t work for all. Thus a solution must be found. Rather than the divide and conquer tactics of differentiated learning.

One of the most damning   policy soon to be implemented regarding of differentiated teaching is to TEACH CHINESE using ENGLISH language as a  medium on the pretext of Chinese students from English speaking families  !

Singapore government cannot hoodwink the people about promoting mother tongue while it is killing it and  about how important mother tongue is and yet there is hardly any chance to use Chinese language or Malay or Tamil in routine life.

While we all recognize that English is the common language across races  in Singapore,  We need to learn English well, this is not debatable, but try to Kill Chinese language and we shall be up in ARMS and be counted.  I remember during my grand mother’s time, she spoke different languages to different friends.  Did we have an issue?

In fact we think that in Schools, there should be a compulsory module for Chinese to learn 20 hours of Malay and 20 hours of tamil. And likewise for Malays to learn 20 hours of Chinese and Tamil and for the Tamils learn 20 hours of Malay and Chinese.

How many of our Ministers  can speak Chinese Fluently?

Our members of parliament cannot even speak proper sentences without searching and struggling for words and some of these people run constituencies which has poorer Chinese language in Singapore speaking dwellers. The Malay MPs are better, they at least can speak Malay fluently. We respect them even if they cannot speak Chinese language.

Having such people as MP will only send the WRONG picture about learning Mother Tongue that the RICH and powerful speaks English and those poor and not so educated Speak mandarin Chinese or dialects.

SINGAPORE GOVERNMENT PANDERS TO THE MORE WELL OFF???
There has been argument that 95% of students are okay (as they pass) with the current Mother Tongue language levels at PSLE. So if 95% of the students have no problem, why is the government saying that there is some issue?

Are they seriously trying to win over the parents of the 5% who faces problems with mother tongue? This surely is not MERITOCRATIC, neither is it fair. Maybe the government would have a better explanation.

The excuse that DEMOGRAPHIC CHANGES FORCE CHANGE?

(The local Singaporeans   did not agree  for massive immigration, mind you)

Many times, the government has been saying that with the influx of immigration , they cannot support teaching Chinese at high level , they cannot teach malay at high standard  and tamil at high level . Is this the Singapore we want after being forced to give up 2.5 years of our lives running around in military uniform  almost for free, in the jungle?  We welcome alien talents, but surely the interests of the local population has to be taken care of, above and beyond that of foreign expats and workers. As such people come into Singapore, surely Singapore has to widen the mother tongue to include Hindi and maybe Tagalog and who knows, maybe even some western based languages.

But until such immigrants  become Singaporeans and until they serve national service or it’s equivalent, the Singapore government better listen , or else we will surely show them during the Coming  election, if there is one.

These days, even Nanyang Primary school students hardly speak Chinese even as it was one of the last fortress standing for Chinese education in Singapore

Now, let the DOG wag the tail and not let the tail wag the dog.