BY LEANDER C. DOMINGO
ILOCOS NORTE (August 18)—The enhanced curriculum of Mariano Marcos State University (MMSU) College of Teacher Education (CTE) with an elective course on teaching reading for its elementary education students is expected to contribute to improving the literacy of the country’s early grade learners.
According to Dean Aris Reynold Cajigal of MMSU-CTE, there was a resolution coming from the Region 1 Teacher Education Advisory Council and the Regional Development Council in Ilocos Region for institutions to adopt the inclusion of Teaching Beginning Reading (TBR) in the teacher education program.
He also affirmed that the resolution was further solidified through a joint resolution issued by the Department of Education (DepEd) and the Commission on Higher Education (CHEd) in the Ilocos region.
Cajigal said the integration of this elective course is CTE’s response to the resolution wherein it will start offering a three-unit TBR course in the next semester aimed at addressing the pressing concern on reading among elementary learners in the region.
Dr. Lilybeth Agno, Elementary Education Department chairman, noted that the elective course will equip pre-service teachers with their needs to effectively teach beginning reading to multilingual learners.
“The course aims to develop their knowledge and skills in teaching the subject in the key stage areas, kindergarten up to grade 3,” Agno said, adding that the subject introduces theoretical foundations of reading and explores how reading, literacy and cognitive processes are developed.
“The application of teaching pedagogies, text genre, listening, speaking, linguistics, letter-sound relationship, phonemic awareness, phonics, word recognition, spelling and comprehension, and the different reading approaches applied in Iluko, Filipino and English are also included in the course,” she added.
Meanwhile, Daniel Tapaoan Jr., MMSU information officer, cited the Philippine Informal Reading Inventory by DepEd for School Year 2018-2019 that around 10,000 grade three to six pupils who are unable to read in Filipino and less than 11,000 grade four to six pupils are unable to read in English in the region.
MMSU President Shirley Agrupis said the university as a Center of Excellence in Teacher Education, the offering of TBR will surely contribute to create a highly literate generation.