Saturday, September 18, 2010

MT as bridge language of instruction in SE Asia - report

Just received a link to this 2009 publication, Mother tongue as bridge language of instruction: policies and experiences in Southeast Asia. Will blog more on it later, but for now here's what the blurb says:

This publication, 'Mother tongue as bridge language of instruction: policies and experiences in Southeast Asia,' presents a compendium of language policies, case studies, and general recommendations for mother tongue-based education in Southeast Asian Ministers of Education Organization (SEAMEO) member countries. It provides insights that may further strengthen each country's policies concerning language of instruction as a way to achieve education for all. This book is a result of a consultative workshop organized by the SEAMEO Secretariat and the World Bank for SEAMEO member countries in February 2008.

The workshop aimed to increase understanding of the issues and strategies related to basic education for ethnolinguistic minority communities in Southeast Asia. Above all, this book takes the position that the learners' mother tongue is a bridge to further education, and that multilingualism is a tool for building bridges between people.

Here's the table of contents:

Contents

Foreword
Dato' Dr Ahamad bin Sipon, Director, SEAMEO Secretariat

Chapter 1 Introduction 8
Kimmo Kosonen and Catherine Young

Chapter 2 Language-in-education policies in 22
Southeast Asia: an overview
Kimmo Kosonen

Chapter 3 Various policies in Southeast Asian 44
countries

Introduction 44

The evolution of language-in-education policies 49
in Brunei Darussalam
Gary Jones

Education policies for ethnic minorities in 62
Cambodia
Neou Sun

Regional and local languages as oral languages 69
of instruction in Indonesia
Maryanto

Policies, developments, and challenges in mother 76
tongue education in Malaysian public schools
Ramanathan Nagarathinam

Language-in-education policies and their 84
implementation in Philippine public schools
Yolanda S Quijano and Ofelia H Eustaquio

Language and language-in-education policies 93
and their implementation in Singapore
Elizabeth S Pang

Language policy and practice in public 102
schools in Thailand
Busaba Prapasapong

Language-in-education policies in Vietnam 109
Bui Thi Ngoc Diep and Bui Van Thanh

Chapter 4 Good practices in mother tongue-first 120
multilingual education
Catherine Young

Chapter 5 Case studies from different countries 136

Introduction 136

Mandarin as mother tongue in Brunei 139
Darussalam: a case study
Debbie GE Ho

The mother tongue as a bridge language of 148
instruction in Cambodia
Un Siren

A case study on the use of Kadazandusun in 153
Malaysia
Sandra Logijin

The mother tongue as a bridge language of 159
instruction in two schools in La Paz, Agusan del
Sur, the Philippines: a case study
Yolanda S Quijano and Ofelia Eustaquio

Bilingual literacy for the Pwo-Karen community in 171
Omkoi District, Chiangmai Province: a case study
from Thailand
Wisanee Siltragool, Suchin Petcharugsa & Anong Chouenon

A mother tongue-based preschool programme 180
for ethnic minority children in Gia Lai, Vietnam
Hoang Thi Thu Huong


Chapter 6 The way forward in Southeast Asia: 190
general recommendations
Kimmo Kosonen & Catherine Young

References 196

Contributors 207