International Conference on Education Technology and Social Science (ICETSS 2014)

Several Thoughts on Current Chinese Education in the Philippines

Shimin Yang
Science and Technology College, Jiangxi Normal University, Nanchang, 330027, China

Keywords: Philippine language environment; Chinese

Abstract. There is an extremely long contact history between China and the Philippines. Although
Philippine people are more and more interested in learning Chinese and the quality of Chinese
education in the Philippines remains to be improved, the friction between Chinese and Philippine
government, “Philippine” education system of Philippine government, and complicated
multi-language environment are all reasons which results in not optimistic status of Chinese
education. Those problems have seriously hindered the further development of Chinese education in
the Philippines. Based on above problems, this paper proposes corresponding countermeasures for
the purpose of promoting Chinese education to realize reasonable, rich, and occupational
development.

I. Introduction
The non-governmental exchange between Chinese and Philippine people has a long history. In
1899, the 1st school for overseas Chinese – Da Qing Zhong Xi Xue Tang was established, which
marked the beginning of Chinese education in the Philippines. After 1990s, with China’s overall
rapid rising and Chinese government’s great support for popularizing overseas Chinese, the wave of
learning Chinese sweeps across the global. This also causes great influence on Philippine Chinese
education and also causes many new changes compared with previous Chinese education.
Meanwhile, some new problems which hinder the development of Chinese education also appear.

II. Current situation of Chinese education in the Philippines

Currently, there are 207 elementary and secondary schools for overseas Chinese, 3 state-run
Confucius institutes, and 27 colleges with Chinese course set in Manila region. [2] Most of students
in the elementary and secondary schools for overseas Chinese are overseas Chinese students, and
only few non-Chinese students. However, the colleges consists of overseas Chinese students and
non-Chinese students, and the latter accounts for a major proportion.
(I) Property of Chinese teaching for non-Chinese students
While studying for a PHD, the author has mainly investigated and knew Chinese teaching
situation in 5 colleges, including University of the Philippines, Ateneo de Manila University, De La
Salle University, University of the East, and Philippine Normal University. The age of students
varies from 16 to 38, and the students are basically Philippine Malay people. The non-Chinese
students didn’t contact Chinese in the past, and all of them have zero foundation. Currently, there
are only few students who professionally engage in learning Chinese in those colleges, and most
courses are electives. According to the rules of class hours of Philippine higher education
committee, the teaching hours of Chinese are 6 class hours per week; the learning time is little, and
the forgetting rate is high, thus Chinese teachers shall at least spend 10 minutes to review the
content learnt in last lesson in each lesson. Due to lack of Chinese practice chance and large social
environment in the Philippines and advocating for American education, the students pay insufficient
attention to Chinese characters after class, and the phenomenon that the students can speak Chinese
but can’t write Chinese characters often appears.
(II) Lack of language environment, and bad teaching effect
The language environment is an important factor which improves oral Chinese ability. There are
almost one million Chinese people who are born and grow up in the Philippines; if the people with
Chinese origin are included, the quantity can be almost ten million [3]. However, it is a pity that
© 2014. The authors - Published by Atlantis Press 196
young Chinese people are losing Chinese language environment despite of large number of Chinese
people. There are following reasons: 1. Chinese people commonly have good economic foundation
in the Philippines, and most of families employ Filipino domestic workers to bring up their children;
however, due to low wage, local Filipino domestic workers are basically rural women with low
education level; they have poor oral English and commonly communicate with people in Tagalog;
because the children are brought up by Filipino domestic workers, the Filipino becomes children’s
first language. 2. After the second generation of Chinese people in the Philippines get married with
non-Chinese people, those families generally use English or Tagalog as mother tongue for
communication, for the Chinese can’t be used in parents’ daily communication. 3. Due to unequal
treatment on schools for overseas Chinese in the Philippines, most of parents hope that their
children can blend in Philippine society and select to let their children study in Philippine
conventional schools or international schools; in this way, they lose the chance of practicing
Chinese again. Under the restriction of those factors, many young Chinese people can’t or are
unwilling to use Chinese as communication language, and the Chinese language environment is
gradually losing.
(III) Insufficient school-running resources, and weak faculty power
The school funding for Chinese schools in the Philippines mainly depends on the income from
students’ tuition and the donation from Philippine Chamber of Commerce. The Philippine
government almost gives no fiscal subsidies and preferential policies on Chinese schools, and the
social status of Chinese schools in the Philippines have all their goods in the window. Same as other
Southeast Asian countries, the Philippines also faces the problem of insufficient fund and faculty in
terms of Chinese education. Currently, the Chinese teachers in Philippine Chinese schools mainly
consist of teachers and volunteers selected and detached by Chinese Language Council, Chinese
teachers selected from Taiwan Overseas Chinese Affairs Council, and local Chinese teachers in the
Philippines. Except for insufficient faculty, there also exist some problems such as low quality, low
professional degree, unbalanced gender ratio, and instable teaching staff in Chinese teachers. The
shortage of high-quality faculty and unreasonable entire composition has become one of the most
serious problems that Philippine Chinese education faces. [4] Besides, after 2011, the diplomatic
relation between China and the Philippines is always tight; in the beginning of 2014, the diplomatic
relation is up to freezing point, which results in serious shortage of Chinese teachers in partial
Chinese schools. Finally, under the active coordination of Philippine Chamber of Commerce, the
employment crisis is solved through faculty sharing of Chinese schools and employment of Chinese
overseas students in the Philippines. Although the crisis is solved, the new problems also appear.
Many newly-employed Chinese overseas students in the Philippines are employed as Chinese
teachers only due to their Chinese skills, and they have not accepted professional training;
meanwhile, because those students need to learn their own profession courses, it is very difficult for
them to spend great energy and time in researching teaching method and improving teaching quality.
Furthermore, “the rarer a thing is, the more it is worth”; the Chinese teachers lack of competition,
which causes low occupational barrier and no pressure on Chinese teachers, thus the teaching staff
have low educational level and the professional Chinese talents are insufficient.
(IV) Non-uniform teaching materials and old-fashioned teaching method
The teaching effect assessment is a comprehensive assessment system, and it is closely related
with teaching materials, teaching way, and students. Currently, the teaching materials used in
Philippine Chinese schools are diversified, and they mainly come from free books provided by
Chinese Mainland government and Taiwan Province, as well as charged books from Philippine
Chinese Education Research Center, and few schools introduce relevant Chinese teaching materials
from Singapore and Malaysia. Due to subjective selection of founders and sponsors of Chinese
schools, there also commonly exist following situations in Chinese characters in teaching of
Philippine Chinese schools: partial schools use traditional Chinese character teaching materials,
partial schools use simplified Chinese character teaching materials, and partial schools use
combined teaching of traditional and simplified Chinese characters. This mixed phenomenon not
only increases students’ difficulty in learning Chinese, but also results in difficulty in realizing

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uniform teaching quality assessment on Chinese courses, which is disadvantageous for testing
teaching effect and balancing advantages and disadvantages of Chinese schools.
However, in terms of teaching way, due to complex structure of Chinese teaching staff, the
teachers’ teaching way, teaching level, and teaching effect are all different. Some high-level
teachers with rich experience can quickly bring students into Chinese world and realize quick
growth of students’ Chinese level. However, as for some teachers with insufficient teaching
experience, due to lack of professional training of language teaching, they still use traditional
teaching way in Chinese Mainland and regard overseas Chinese students in the Philippines as
Chinese mother-tongue students for teaching, thus resulting in the situation that the teachers talk too
much, but the students practice little; the teaching is dull, and the learning and practice is detached;
there is more mechanical memorizing than flexible use. The phenomenon of “dumb Chinese”
becomes a new difficulty which perplex Chinese educators.

III. Suggestions on countermeasures of improving Chinese schooling level

The Chinese education has existed in the Philippines for hundreds of years, but it still has many
deficiencies. In order to better popularize and inherit Chinese culture, the Chinese education must
face the adversity and seek for countermeasures and strategies to effectively solve the outstanding
problems which hinder the development. The Chinese reform is imperative.
(I) To strive for policy support and expand fund investment
In order to obtain breakthrough development in the Philippines, the Chinese education must
obtain many aspects of support from Philippine government. In recent years, the Philippine
government also has realized the importance of Chinese, and has gradually relaxed the policy of
Chinese education. However, the author thinks that the support is still insufficient, and the Chinese
people in the Philippines of all circles shall unite together to seek for more support from Philippine
government. 1. Invite the government to participate in management, development, and reform of
Chinese schools, and provide certain subsidy and fund to alleviate the schooling pressure of
Chinese schools and make Chinese schools truly become an important member of Philippine
national education system. 2. Seek for the support from Chinese Mainland and Taiwan on Chinese
education; except for keeping original support projects, make full use of provided resources to
improve hardware facilities of Chinese teaching and promote the popularization of Chinese
education in mainstream society and mainstream schools. 3. Borrow ideas from successful
experience of The United Chinese School Teachers’ Association Of Malaysia and United Chinese
School Committees’Association of Malaysia in seeking for equal status for Chinese popularization
and construction of Chinese schools in Malaysia. Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Philippine
Chinese Education Research Center take the lead to organize Chinese popularization and right
protection association belonging to Chinese people in the Philippines so as to seek for more fair
treatment and equal development opportunities for Chinese schools. 4. Expand fund investment.
The Chinese schools in the Philippines are basically privately funded and established, and most of
Chinese schools depend on students’ tuition and limited social denotation to make a simple living;
the most direct and effective method to change the current situation of poor equipments and poor
teaching in Chinese schools is to expand construction investment. The Chinese people in the
Philippines can borrow Malaysia’s successful experience and realize improvement via three steps:
uniting all Chinese people in the Philippines, encouraging the free airing of views, and encouraging
the donation from Chinese people, Philippine associations, and chambers of commerce; utilizing the
social status of Chinese people in the Philippines to seek for economic investment of Philippine
government; uniting the support from all overseas Chinese associations and foundations. Those
methods are used to seek for more available capital for Chinese schools as much as possible.
(II) To enhance construction of Confucius Institute, and cultivate local Chinese teaching staff
To solve “teacher shortage” problem shall be one of effective means for Philippine Chinese
schools to improve schooling level. Although Philippine government has officially launched
volunteer Chinese teacher teaching action since 2003 and the shortage of Chinese teaching staff is
mitigated to some degree, those Chinese volunteer teachers only have 1-2 years of teaching time in
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the Philippines, thus it is unable to keep the consistency of Chinese teaching. Therefore, the teacher
shortage problem can be truly solved only via cultivating local Chinese teachers; in this way, it is
able to have an effective and stable teaching staff.
In 2006, the Philippines established the 1st Confucius Institute -- Ateneo de Manila University
Confucius Institute, and then it established Bulacan State University Confucius Institute and
Confucius Institute at Angeles University Foundation; these three universities all enjoy high
popularity in the Philippines. We shall regard these three universities as the basis to cultivate
high-education background and high-quality local Chinese teachers. Firstly, Chinese Language
Council shall expand the investment on these three Confucius institutes and provide sufficient
policy and fund as well as sufficient number of detached Chinese teachers. Secondly, it is required
to encourage more Philippine students to apply for Chinese major or Chinese elective course;
through tuition waiver, scholarship, and preferential policy for international students studying in
China, it is able to attract more high-quality students. Thirdly, with reference to the successful mode
of “Chinese language 2+2” teacher class established under cooperation between Philippine Chinese
school Chiang Kai Shek College and Fujian Normal University in order to solve the problem of
shortage of Chinese teachers of Chinese schools, we can further expand the opportunities for
Philippine excellent Chinese students to study in China, and make use of Confucius institute
platform and excellent teaching and Chinese environment of Chinese domestic universities to let
Philippine students learn Chinese, know Chinese, and utilize Chinese in a better way so as to lay a
firm foundation for better spreading of Chinese culture and Chinese language in the future.
(III) To uniformly compile teaching materials and optimize teaching mode
Currently, Chinese government shall compile targeted teaching materials together with
Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Philippine Chinese Education Center to formulate a set of
uniform teaching materials which adapt to time development and Philippine national conditions for
Philippine students so as to be good for popularization of Philippine Chinese education reform
results and business training of Chinese teachers.
Accurately positions Philippine “Chinese teaching” as “specific second language teaching which
takes cultivating Chinese teenager’s Chinese communication ability as basis and enriching their
Chinese culture as purpose”. Therefore, in terms of teaching mode, we shall focus on verbal
communication skill training and verbal skill training, insist on essential teaching and multi-practice,
and pay attention to listening, speaking, reading, and writing so as to realize harmonious
development between students’ oral expression ability and written expression ability; meanwhile,
the attention shall be paid to exerting students’ initiative and creativity, enhancing Chinese learning
environment, expanding language input and output, and improving Chinese learning efficiency. It is
believed that the Chinese teaching method will be reformed and optimized through joint efforts of
Chinese educators in the Philippines.
(IV) To increase teacher employment threshold, and establish teacher assessment system
Currently, Philippine Chinese teachers have a low treatment, and the dissatisfaction with
treatment is a major reason which results in large mobility of Chinese teachers. Therefore, in order
to ensure a stable high-quality teaching staff, we shall firstly improve Chinese teachers’ wage and
social insurance treatment. Secondly, we shall implement teaching qualification system, and the
teachers who pass the examination and obtain teacher certification can take the post. The specific
practice can make reference. Thirdly, we can establish teaching assessment system to carry out
monitoring and assessment on classroom teaching and learning through students’ evaluation of
teaching, teachers’ evaluation of teaching, peer’s mutual evaluation, and teachers’ self-assessment.
Fourthly, we can establish a perfect Chinese teacher professional title appraisal system. The
appraisal result of professional title is not only directly related to wage, but also related to various
scientific research project expenditure, further education, abroad exchange and other opportunities
to form a virtuous circle development in which the teaching and scientific research drives
professional title appraisal and the professional title appraisal improves the level of teaching and
scientific research.

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IV. Conclusion
The Philippines is a country of islands, and also a multinational country with open mind.
Through a general survey of about 100-year development process of Philippine Chinese education,
although there is fluctuation, the Chinese education still keeps forward under the joint efforts of
Philippine Chinese people and Philippine Chinese associations. It is certain that there still exist
different problems in construction of Chinese schools; however, with comprehensive
implementation of Chinese education reform, it is believed that all problems will be solved in
practice and development process. In a world, the Philippine Chinese education has a good
development prospect.

References
[1] Shao Jianyin: Past, Present and Future of Chinese Education in the Philippines, [J], Taiwan:
Chinese World (issue 72 of Taiwan Southeast Asian Chinese Education magazine), 1994, 81.
[2] Liao Xinling: Research on Development Status and Trend of Chinese Education in Southeast
Asia [J], Overseas Chinese Journal of Bagui, 2009 (1), 55.
[3] Baibu Baike, Phippine Chinese http://baike.baidu.com/view/490873.htm?fr=aladdin
[4] Luo Qingming: Reference Problems in Philippine Chinese Teaching [J], Overseas Chinese
Journal of Bagui, 1996 (3), 48-52.

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