A survey of the educational system of the Philippine islands by the Board of educational survey, created under acts 3162 and 3196 of the Philippine Legislature.

44 EDUCATIONAL SURVEY OF THE PHILIPPINES

As the Commission's investigation progressed evidence of the outstanding deficiency in language instruction in the schools constantly
accumulated. Furthermore, the evidence pointed more and more to the
inability of teachers and principals to write and speak English as the
chief cause of the pupils' deficiency. An examination of letters, notes,
lesson plans, blackboard directions, and the like prove that principals
can neither write nor speak English smoothly and correctly. They
have moderately good vocabularies but little control over them in discourse. Chapter I presents elaborate illustrations of the types of
errors which are very common among the teachers. They illustrate
the impossibility of securing a high-grade product from pupils until the
command of English by the teachers is raised materially above its
present level.
The measurements of instruction show that the Philippine schools are
succeeding in certain aspects of their work moderately well. In the
primary school pupils develop marked ability to comprehend spoken
English. Apparently this ability is sufficient to carry them through
the ordinary language necessities of this generation of adult life in the
Philippines. They learn to speak English with sufficient clearness to
make themselves understood either by other Filipinos or by Americans,
but with an accent, tonal expression and rhythm that are thoroughly
Malay. They learn to recognize correctness and incorrectness in
written English as well as do American children but they cannot use
the language fluently and correctly in writing or in oral speech. In
receiving dictation and in spelling in English they almost equal American children. All of these are definite achievements of the publicschool system. They will be considered more fully in succeeding
sections.
The children learn to manipulate number processes and to use them
in solving arithmetical problems reasonably well, considering the fact
that all oral instruction has been given in a foreign language. Chart
No. VIII in Chapter I, furthermore, is convincing of the fact that
Filipino children have sufficient intellectual capacity to take on the type
of education which is now current in modern nations. Grade for grade,
Filipino children master the art of arithmetical computation as well as
do American children. The important role of language in Philippine
schools is apparent in this achievement. No reading is involved in the
learning of this skill. An interesting illustration of the influence of the
foreign-language handicap is revealed in the results of the reasoningarithmetic tests. Grade for grade Filipino children are about three
quarters of a year behind American children. In paragraph reading
they are about two and a half years behind. The test results establish