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Acceptability of Philippine English Grammatical and Lexical Items among Pre-

service Teachers

Article  in  Asian EFL Journal · October 2019

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 Acceptability of Philippine English Grammatical
and Lexical Items among Pre-service Teachers

Joel Mayo Torres

[email protected]
Central Luzon State University/De La Salle University
Science City of Munoz, Nueva Ecija/Taft Avenue, Manila

Ericson Olario Alieto

[email protected]
Western Mindanao State University/De La Salle University
Normal Road, Baliwasan, Zamboanga City/Taft Avenue, Manila

Abstract

Using the Grammatical and Lexical Acceptability Questionnaire (GLAQ), the study aims to
contextualize the extent of acceptance of PhE grammatical and lexical items among 400 pre-
service basic education teachers in state universities in Luzon and Mindanao. It further
determined the difference on the participants’ extent of acceptability when grouped according to
gender, type of high school attended, educational program, and geographical location. Lastly, it
explored relationship between extent of PhE acceptability and number of languages spoken and
perceived English proficiency. Implications to the future of English pedagogy and pre-service
teachers’ curriculum were also discussed. The study poses a challenge among basic education
teachers and language practitioners as regards the measures to be done for PhE’s full acceptance
in the academic context.

Keywords. World Englishes, Philippine English, acceptability, pre-service teachers

1. Introduction

1.1 Background of the Study

First articulated by Kachru (1991), the World Englishes (WE henceforth) model accounts for the
way language is now used by millions of multilinguals taking ownership of English and
changing it to reflect to their own lives. WE is described as “those indigenous, nativized varieties
that have developed around the world and that reflect the cultural and pragmatic norms of their

1

speakers” (Kirkpatrick, 2007, p.3). The introduction of the WE paradigm to Filipino scholars and
teachers of English in the 1990s presented an opportunity to finally resist the dominance of
native speakers’ norms in the classroom (Martin, 2014).

In 2004, Bautista and her team released in full form a number of Philippine International
Corpus of English (ICE) based research that focus on the features of PhE. The collaborative
effort of Bautista and her team enabled PhE to carve its niche both in the local and international
milieu. Martin (2014) claimed that all the 140 publications in Bautista’s 2011 bibliography of
Philippine variety have made valuable contributions in elevating PhE to legitimacy status and
consequently promoting its acceptability.

Indeed there is awareness to an extent of the existence of PhE; however, this does not
necessarily mean that acceptance comes along with it (Martin, 2014). This means that there is a
need to explore acceptance towards PhE. Exploration of attitude towards a language or its variety
can provide information essential for the prediction of linguistics scenes in areas where possible
competition exist (Wang & Ladegaard, 2008 cited in Alieto, 2018). Moreover, there is a dearth
of studies exploring PhE’s acceptability. PhE speakers, as the ones in contact with PhE, are
always part of the equation. Hence, to fully describe the PhE phenomenon, background of its
speakers as well as the context in which it is used is necessary for it is the users and its uses that
determine PhE’s destiny and the direction of its evolution, change and development.

Pre-service basic education teachers will soon be dealing with learners at the grassroots
giving them larger scope of influence considering the more number of learners they will
cater. At this juncture, it is important to note that teachers, as Stafford and Arias (2005)
maintained, play an important role in the learning process of the students. Moreover, Alieto
(2018) claimed that pre-service teachers soon become full-fledged teachers and form part of the
basic implementers of policies; therefore, they are to extent determiners of the language or its
variety to be used in school. Along this line, it is important to note that learners’ acceptance of
language varieties is influenced by teachers’ acceptance at great extent. Being so, teachers’
acceptance towards PhE is an essential factor to consider and study in the continuous quest of
promoting PhE’s acceptance. Hence, the present study aims to determine the extent of
acceptability of the different PhE’s grammatical and lexical items among pre-service teachers.

2

The present study further undertakes to determine the difference on the participants’ extent of
acceptability when grouped according to gender, type of high school attended, educational
program, and geographical location. Lastly, it tries to establish relationship between extent of
acceptability and number of languages spoken and perceived English proficiency.

2. Review of Literature

2.1 Philippine English

PhE as a variety has been an accepted phenomenon. Maria Lourdes S. Bautista worked with
Susan Butler of Macquarie Dictionary in compiling a list of PhE words for inclusion in an Asian
English Dictionary and in 1992, aiming to form an Asian English database, Macquarie started
collecting works of fiction and non-fiction in English, and English language newspapers from
Singapore, Malaysia, Hongkong, and Philippines-Countries which have well-established
varieties of English. PhE has continuously flourished, giving birth to new words which are
popularly and widely used by Filipinos today (Bautista, 2000).

For McKaughan (1993), PhE has emerged as an autonomous variety of English with its
own self-contained system. This system is a system that is understood by many Filipinos, and
has been used by them in different language domains. Bolton (2008) added that since the post-
independence era after 1946, PhE has become a WE variety associated with distinct accent, a
localized vocabulary, and even a body of creative writing by Filipino writers in English.
Borlongan (2011) ardently said PhE does follow AE being undeniably a child of its parent. But
like a typical child of any parent, it has a life of its own too.

2.2 Acceptability of Philippine English

Among the educated class, it is understood the PhE has found its place. Tupas (2006) describes
the educated class as having the economic and sociopolitical innerness of Standard Englishes
within communities of use in any part of the world. Borlongan (2011) is one of those who
promotes the use of PhE in classrooms. He argues for the retraining of teachers, the
development of new instructional materials based on the existing corpora of PhE, and the re-

3

envisioning of instructional leadership in managing innovations in English language teaching in
the Philippines. However, there are groups who do not fully agree on the status of PhE as a
Standard English and consider the former inferior to the latter. For instance, Gonzalez (1997)
commented that the AE is the one that is legitimate and postulated as an ideal, while the PhE is
deemed illegitimate although it can be considered in the local standard.

In the 2006 study of Tupas, which involved seven graduate students pursuing Diploma
in Education and Master in Language Studies, it was found that they had consistently reported
about the difficulty of teaching AE because their pupils bring with them their own way of using
the language that is legitimate on political and cultural grounds. It was also revealed that the
graduate students perceived PhE as unideal model in the English language classroom.

Likewise, in a survey conducted to 185 public school teachers, Martin (2014) found a
large percentage of teachers who reported that their target model of teaching English was the
AE. Using triangulation, enabled the researcher to extract the reasons why teachers preferred
the AE over PhE. Universality, status, and market value of AE were the three cited reasons.

Bernardo and Madrunio (2015) administered Pedagogical Acceptability Test (PAT) to 42

English instructors and 242 students from 10 colleges and universities in Metro Manila to
determine which from the 35 forms of PhE grammatical variants are pedagogically acceptable
and unacceptable. Results show that 16 of the 35 PhE grammatical variants are pedagogically
acceptable. After having identified pedagogically acceptable PhE grammatical features, the two
authors proposed the endonormative pedagogic model reflective not only of AE norms but also
of PhE grammatical and lexical items.
Using the same instrument, Rosales and Bernardo (2017) determined the pedagogical
acceptability judgments of ESL teachers and learners of the 38 items constructed within
acceptable PhE conventions, which participants rated on a six-point Likert scale as to its
acceptability. Results show a slight disparity in the acceptability of some items that turns out to
be more significant items that were otherwise accepted.

4

2.3 Gender and Language Varieties Acceptability

Bilaniuk (2003) claimed that there is complexity in the construct of gender and is a significant
factor influencing language ideology. Moreover, Zhang (2011) claimed that gender as a factor
influencing language attitude has been established and proven true across communities and
culture.

In the study of Milroy and Milroy (1998), preferentiality of women toward the prestigious
norm of language has been established. The same study claimed that while men prefer to learn
the vernacular norm the same attitude is hot held by women. Women prefer learning the
prestigious norm. Corroborating result was yielded by the study of Gürsoy (2013). In the study,
gender difference on language attitude was found as female trainees were significantly more
positive toward English than their male counterparts. Moreover, Vasko (2010) provides ample
evidence that in sociolinguistic studies including a sample of males and females belonging to the
same social class, women usually use fewer stigmatized and non-standard variants than males.
For instance, Wolfram (1969) mentioned that compared to men, women exhibit a greater
sensitivity to socially evaluative linguistic feature. Further, women are more conscious of the
social significance of different linguistic features and use more socially prestigious speech forms
(Poussa 2001, 2006). Bilaniuk (2003) discussed that this phenomenon of language attitude
difference across gender can be explained by the social, cultural and economic conditions
women.

2.4 Geographical Location and Language Varieties Acceptability

Clark (2014) explored the variations in the use of English in creative spoken performance such
as comedy, drama and poetry, as well as in written texts such as letters to local newspapers,
stories and poem written in dialect. Results suggest that there is a growing and conscious use of
English among individuals that identify them with a particular place. They did this by
incorporating into their speech a set of linguistic features drawn from a particular variety of
English. By using features in this way, people emphasize their place of origin over other factors

5

such as age, gender, social class and ethnicity. The author concluded that place of origin is the
most important identity factor.

Everett and Aronoff (2013) presented evidence that the geographic context in which a
language is spoken may directly impact its phonological form. They examined the geographic
coordinates and elevations of 567 language locations represented in a worldwide phonetic
database. Languages with phonemic ejective consonants were found to occur closer to
uninhabitable regions of high elevation, when contrasted to languages without this class of
sounds. In addition, the mean and median elevations of the locations of languages with ejectives
were found to be comparatively high. The patterns uncovered surface on all major world land
masses, and are not the result of the influence of particular language families. They reflect a
significant and positive worldwide correlation between elevation and the likelihood that a
language employs ejective phonemes.

3. Research Questions
The study aims to determine the acceptability of PhE grammatical and lexical items.
Specifically, it answers the following questions:
1. What is the extent of acceptance of the PhE grammatical and lexical items among the
partcipants?
2. Is there a significant difference in the extent of acceptance of the PhE grammatical and lexical
items in terms of participants’:
2.1. gender;
2.2 educational program;
2.3 type of high school attended; and
2.4 geographical location?
3. Is there a significant correlation between the extent of acceptability of the PhE grammatical
and lexical items and participants’ number of languages spoken and self-perceived English
proficiency?

6

4. Methodology

4.1 Research Design

The study utilized the cross-sectional descriptive, predictive nonexperiemental research

design. Johnson (2000 cited in Perez & Alieto, 2018) explained that a with the primary objective
of describing is determined to be descriptive. The current study involves no use treatment or
intervention, but intends simply to describe the variables involve, and no comparable groups
were established hence characterized as non-experimental.

4.2 Research Setting

Two state universities, one in the Luzon area and one in Mindanao, offering teacher education
program were taken as research sites of the study. In each institution, the teacher education
program of Bachelor of Elementary Education and Bachelor of Secondary education are offered,
and the same programs are accredited by the Accrediting Agency of Chartered Colleges and
Universities in the Philippines (AACUP) and Commission on Higher Education (CHED). Both
of the teacher education programs in each university are considered largest in respective areas in
terms of the number of enrolees.

4.2 Participants

A total of 400 participants were enlisted for the purpose of this study. Equal appropriation of the
number of males and females as well as from the two educational programs (Bachelor of
Elementary Education and Bachelor Secondary Education) was done. Moreover, equal number
of participants from Luzon and Mindanao was observed.

Only 48 particpants attended private high schools constituting 12%, while 352
respondents came from public high school making up the remaining 88% of the total
participants. Effort was exerted to equally represent the respondents according to type of high
school attended. However, to no avail was it possible. This means that most of the students who

7

attend state universities taking education degree programs come from the public school system.

For the number of languages spoken, 7 or 1.8% declared that they are monolinguals, 218
or 54.5% disclosed that they speak 2 languages, 139 or 34.8% stated that they speak 3 languages,
31 or 7.8% noted themselves to speak 4 languages, and only 5 or 1.3% determined themselves to
speak 5 languages. With the given data, it can be assessed that majority of the respondents of the
study speak 2 or 3 languages which constitute the majority which is 89.3% of the total number of
pre-service teacher participants.
In the case of the self-perceived English proficiency of the respondents, 91 or 22.8%
claimed that their proficiency in English is intermediate, 124 or 31% claimed to be at the level of
upper intermediate, 60 or 15% disclosed that their level of proficiency is advance, and 125 or
31% stated that are proficient in English.

The choice on the number of participants was based on the guidelines suggested Fraenkel
and Wallen (2009) that the minimum number of participants needed for a representative sample
for descriptive studies is 100.

Inclusion criteria were set to determine qualified participants of the study. One, the
participant must be enrolled in either the elementary education or secondary education program.
Those enrolled in the Professional Education Certificate Program were excluded from
participating. And two, the participants should be at the final year of the educational program by
the time this study was conducted.

4.3 Research Instrument

To determine the level of acceptability of PhE grammatical and lexical items, an acceptability
questionnaire was designed and administered to Bachelor of Elementary Education (BEEd) and
Bachelor of Secondary Education (BSEd) pre-service teachers in state universities in Luzon and
Mindanao. Since the only available instrument on PhE acceptability at the time the study was
conducted was the Pedagogical Acceptability Test (PAT) of Bernardo and Madrunio (2015), the
researchers designed an acceptability instrument for the present study. The researcher-made

8

instrument (Appendix A) was referred as Grammatical and Lexical Items Acceptability
Questionnaire (GLAQ). While PAT was designed to determine English teachers and college
students’ judgments on how much they accept a grammatical item that is illustrative of a
specific grammar rule as a norm in teaching and learning English grammar, the GLAQ
determined pre-service teachers’ judgment on identifying the acceptability levels of PhE
grammatical and lexical items.

The instrument has two parts. In Part I, participants were requested to provide their
personal information. For the second part, the participants were requested to encircle the
number that represents the level of acceptability of the different grammatical and lexical items.

The second part of the instrument is composed of 44 grammatical and lexical

items. Some of the grammatical items were taken from the PAT. Of the six items in the
category of prepositional phrase, five items were adopted and one was added (i.e., based from).
Other items lifted from PAT include those that focus on the distinctive use of verbs, would,
distinctive plural noun forms, use of assure as intransitive verb, unidiomatic verb phrase,
distinctive use of pronoun case, double comparative and unpluralized semantically plural
noun. Items such as with regard, wherein and get-passive were also lifted from the PAT. The
researchers added the following items in the instrument: items on lexical creativity, which
include lexical shift from noun to adjective, verb to noun, lexicalized acronym and brand name,
overgeneralization of affixation; item on split infinitive; items on the use of fewer and lesser
interchangeably; use of between instead of among, bring instead of take; item on word choice
and redundant expression; and the use of will as future marker in the first person. After the
items were finalized, the instrument was shown to two language specialists for review and
comments. The suggestions were incorporated. The instrument was pilot-tested to 30 non-
participants. Cronbach’s Alpha of 0.919 was obtained during the pilot-testing. The Cronbach’s
Alpha value obtained means that the instrument is reliable.

4.4 Procedure

Two letters of request were drafted and sent to the universities identified in this study. The letters
were addressed to the Deans of the College of Education to seek permission for the

9

administration of the instrument. Upon the approval of the request to administer the instrument
to the students, the researchers were asked to meet teachers assigned to serve as coordinator of
the activity. The teacher-coordinators provided the list of students qualified for the study. A day
was scheduled for the researchers to conduct and discuss the nature and purpose of the study.
Letters of consent were requested to be signed by those who were willing to participate.
Afterwards, a date was scheduled for the administration of the questionnaire. On the appointed
day, before the administration of the questionnaire the participants were once more informed that
participation is voluntary and that it has no merits whatsoever in their ratings. Further, the
participants were assured of confidentiality of their provided information. After answering,
participants submitted at will. Upon handing over of the instruments, the researchers checked for
possible missed numbers, double entry and the like which would disqualify inclusion for
analyses.

4.5 Method of Analysis

The raw data generated from questionnaire were tabulated, organized, and analyzed. To
determine the extent of acceptability of the PhE lexical variance, descriptive statistic was
performed. The mean across items was computed, and the mean for each item in the
questionnaire was also determined to identify the lexical items with the highest and lowest
ratings. Table 1 presents the interpretation of the computed means.

Table 1.
Extent of Acceptability Scale

Range Interpretation

3.25 – 4.0 Accepted

2.5 – 3.24 Somehow Accepted

1.75 – 2.49 Somehow Unaccepted

1.0 – 1.74 Not Accepted

10

For the significant difference of the extent of acceptability across gender, educational attainment,
type of high school attended and geographical location, the mean score of the extent of
acceptability of the PhE lexical items was computed across the variables. T-test for independent
sample was used to determine the significant difference.

Moreover, to determine the significant relationships between the extent of acceptability of

the grammatical and lexical variance of PhE and the perceived language proficiency and number
of languages spoken, Pearson Product Moment Coefficient (Pearson r) was used.

5. Results and Discussion

5.1 Acceptability of PhE Grammatical and Lexical Items

Presented in Table 2 is the participants’ extent of acceptance of the PhE grammatical and lexical
items. As shown, the mean (M) of 2.83 with a standard deviation (SD) of 0.306 is interpreted as
“somehow accepted”. This means that the PhE lexical and grammatical items used in the study
are considered by the participants as correct and proper. This implies that the PhE as a variant is
existent among the participants. The results corroborate with that of Tupas (2006) reporting that
PhE found its place among the educated class such as the respondents of this present study.

Table 2.
Extent of PhE’s Grammatical and Lexical Items Acceptability

Variable Mean Standard Deviation Interpretation

Language Attitude 2.83 0.306 Somehow Accepted

However, it can be deduced from the computed mean that the extent of acceptability is not full.
In other words, the respondents do not consider those items to be completely appropriate. The
data reveal that the respondents remain to have certain reservations toward the use of PhE which
may be influenced by the perception of the existence of the so-called “Standard”. It can be
11

further inferred that the acceptance of variants remains limited. The respondents may have
considered it to be acceptable only in certain dimension such as informal discourses. This claim
echoes the findings Tupas (2006) and Martin (2014) who maintained that PhE remains to fall
short from being an ideal model to be taught inside the classrooms. Therefore, although the
variant found its identity, it failed to secure its place inside the classrooms which remain to favor
the use and the teaching of the ‘Standards’ which explains the ‘partial’ acceptance of the PhE
among the pre-service teachers. PhE’s acceptability level among pre-service teachers is still
influenced by AE’s universality, status and marketability. This also relates well with what Tupas
(2006) said that WE, such as PhE, does not have enough symbolic power vis-a-vis AE to enable
teachers to legitimize their own work should they opt for it. WE may be sociolinguistically
legitimate but it remains politically unacceptable to most people and in some discourse type,
especially in the academic or formal written domain.

5.1.1 Items rated with highest extent of acceptability by the respondents

Table 3 provides the items with highest extent of acceptability. Five most accepted PhE lexical
items and phrases are presented.

Table 3.
PhE Lexical Items rated with highest acceptability

Item Numbers Mean Standard Interpretation

Deviation

11. Majority of students nowadays use online 3.48 0.749 Accepted

references to do their papers.

5. Students should learn to cope up with the 3.46 0.831 Accepted

challenges in their studies

23. The president assured free tuition to all State 3.40 0.811 Accepted
Universities and Colleges.

12

16. The number of students enrolled last term 3.34 0.824 Accepted
have increased.

6. Students have different views with regards 3.24 0.421 Somehow

success. Accepted

It can be gleaned from the table that Items 11 (M=3.48, SD=0.749), 5 (M =3.46, SD = 0.831), 23
(M=3.40, SD= 0.811), 16 (M=3.34, SD=0.824) and 6 (M=3.24, SD= 0.421) are rated highest.
However, from the five, only four (Items 11, 5, 23 and 16) were considered “accepted” by the
participants, while Item 6 was only considered as “somehow accepted”. In total, out of the 44
items used in the questionnaire, only four (4) items, which constitute only 9 % of the number of
PhE grammatical and lexical items used in the study, were identified as “acceptable”. Further
analysis of the data reveals that 30 or 68.18% of the lexical variance were identified as
“somehow acceptable”, and 10 or 23 % of the items were considered as “somehow
unacceptable”. There was no item identified to be “unacceptable” by the respondents.

The acceptability of omitting the indefinite article in a majority is also consistent with the
findings of Bernardo and Madrunio (2015) that the feature majority in PhE is more acceptable
than its AE counterpart. Bautista’s (2008) findings, in all the PhE studies she conducted that the
use of articles is problematic for ESL learners, could explain why this item has become
acceptable for the participants.

Another plausible explanation is that majority is seen as a plural noun, hence the use of
the article a before the word majority may seem awkward (Trenkic, 2009). Likewise, the
acceptability of the prepositional phrase (cope up with) also conforms with the findings of
Bernardo and Madrunio (2015) that it has already attained formal recognition and thus can be
used not only in conversation but also in lecture, presentation, speeches, meetings, and other
formal spoken discourse as well as informal written discourse such as blog, email, text and
twitter.

The acceptability of assured can be explained by what Bautista (2008) referred to as the

13

simplification process. Likewise, the claim of Bernardo and Madrunio (2015) that assure is used
as an ambitransitive verb if the object (i.e. us) is often unnecessary, especially when it is
obvious that us is being talked about may also explain why it was considered acceptable by the
participants.

The acceptable use of verbs that do not agree with subjects specifically for those
sentences beginning with expressions such as the number, a number, either and one-third still
has to do with the difficulty of locating or identifying the subjects in those sentences. For these
two sentences - (1) The number of students enrolled last term have increased and (2) A number
of different teaching techniques has emerged, one may consider students and a number as the
subjects for each sentence respectively.

5.1.2 Items rated with low acceptability among the participants

Presented in Table 4 are the five items that received the lowest acceptability level, which are
rated by the participants as ‘somehow not accepted’.

Table 4.
PhE Grammatical and Lexical items rated with lowest acceptability

Item Numbers Mean Standard Interpretation

Deviation

44. Last February 14, I did not do a 1.90 1.055 Somehow Not
valentiney undertaking. Accepted

33. When he heard the news, he OMGed. 1.90 0.984 Somehow Not
Accepted

34. The materials were already xeroxed 1.98 1.09 Somehow Not
yesterday. Accepted

14

 31. He would unsmile whenever that person 1.99 0.967 Somehow Not
passes by. Accepted

32. I have PMed to you the proposal. 2.03 1.087 Somehow Not
Accepted

Items that participants rated ‘somehow not accepted’ are those relating to the overgeneralization
on the use of affixes like in unsmile (M=1.99, SD=0.967) and valentiney (M=1.90, SD=1.055),
lexicalized brand names as in xeroxed (M=1.98, SD=1.09) and lexicalized acronym as in
OMGed (M=1.90, SD=0.984) and PMed (M=2.03, SD=1.087).
This implies that future teachers do not accept those local varieties that extend vocabulary
range by modifying the beginning or ending or root words in order to alter their meaning as well
items that are products of lexical creativity such as lexicalized acronym and lexicalized brand
name to create and understand expression one has never heard before.

5.2 Difference in the extent of acceptance of the grammatical and lexical variance of PhE in
terms of gender, educational program, and geographical location

The mean score of the items was computed and compared across the identified four variables. T-
test for independent sample was used to determine the significant difference in the extent of
acceptability of the lexical and phrasal variants of PhE between males and females, respondents
enrolled in the BEEd and BSEd program, respondents who completed high school in public and
private schools, and those from Luzon and Mindanao.

The data in Table 5 reveal that for the variable gender, the males (M=2.839, SD=0.309)
do not significantly differ with the females (M=2.825, SD= 0.305) in the extent of acceptability
of the PhE grammatical and lexical items as evidenced by the p-value of 0.652, which is greater
than 0.05. Despite the fact that there was no significant difference in the level of acceptability
between male and female participants, it can be observed that males had slightly higher mean
than females. The foregoing result contradicts the findings of Labov (1972, 1990), Wolfram
(1969) Milroy and Milroy (1998), Poussa (2001, 2006) and Vasko (2010) that women are more
sensitive than men to the prestige pattern, and women usually use fewer stigmatize and non-

15

standard variants than males. One possible explanation as regards the incongruence of the
present finding with those of the earlier findings can be based on what Gürsoy (2013) concluded
that despite the fact that previous studies had established gender difference on language use and
attitude towards language, such finding is not universal. Hence, while gender divide in
acceptability of English variants exists in foreign setting it may not be true among Filipinos
especially the pre-service teachers. Meanwhile, the finding supports that of Armandi (2016) that
participants’ attitudes toward a language variety are not mainly affected by gender differences. It
can be deduced that through time, gender difference in language attitude and use has already
been eradicated and the notion that the ability to communicate in a more prestigious language
variety gives one an economic and professional advantage seems to be attractive to both genders
nowadays. This might also serve as their motivation to favor the prestigious variety than the less
prestigious.

Table 5.
Difference in the Extent of Acceptability of PhE Grammatical and Lexical Items across
variables

Dependent Variable Independent Variables Mean SD Sig (2-tailed)

Gender

Male 2.839 0.309 0.652

Extent of Acceptability
Female
of Philippine English
2.825 0.305

Educational Program

BEEd 2.90 0.275 0.000*

BSEd

2.76 0.321

16

 Type of high School attended

Private 2.784 0.257 0.267

Public

2.837 0.313

Geographical Location

Luzon 2.813 0.308 0.263

Mindanao

2.847 0.305
N=400; *Significant at alpha=0.05

For the type of school attended, the data shows that participants, who studied in private
schools during their secondary education (M=2.784, SD=0.257), do not significantly differ with
those who came from public high schools (M=2.873, SD=0.313). The non-existence of
significant difference between those who came from private school and those who graduated
from public school is evidenced by the p-value = 0.652 which is greater than alpha=0.05.
Although it can be noticed that generally, the respondents who completed their secondary
education from public schools have shown higher extent of acceptability toward the PhE lexical
items as compared to those who were enrolled in private institutions during their high school.
The higher mean on the level of acceptability of the participants, who completed their secondary
education in public schools as compared to those from private schools, is attributed to the
intensive English training and exposure students from private school gain, which provides
premium on the AE form, making the students from private institutions less accepting of the
variants. It is underscored that students in the private schools are not only taught and exposed but
also converse to each other in AE, which is not just a preferred variety, but the accepted one in
the school community. This notion is reflected in the discussion of Cruz (2014) that many
parents send their children to private schools because of their impression that private school
students speak better English than their public school counterparts. For him, there is a general

17

impression among parents that Ateneo and La Salle students speak better English than UP
students (to take only the best private and public schools) or that the students in the nearest
private schools speak English to each other, unlike students in the nearest public school who
allegedly speak to each other in the local language. As such, participants who graduated from
public high school are more accepting of the PhE grammatical and lexical items than those who
graduated in private high schools.

Moreover, for the variable geographical location, the data provides that those who were
from Luzon (M=2.813, SD=0.308) exhibit a relatively similar acceptance of the lexical items
with those from Mindanao (M=2.847, SD=0.305). Further, as evidenced by the p-value = 0.263,
there is no significant difference in the acceptability of the lexical items between the respondents
coming from two varied geographical situation. The finding does not support that of Clark
(2014), who noted that there is a growing and conscious use of English among individuals that
identify them with a particular place. This means that in the context of English varieties
acceptability such as PhE, regionalism seems to have no influence. According to Danao (1996),
regionalism is the idea or practice of dividing a country into smaller units for political, economic,
social, and cultural purposes.

From the four independent variables accounted in the study for significant difference,
only the variable educational program was found to have an influence on the extent of
acceptability of the lexical variance evidence by the p-value (0.000), which means that the
educational program is a factor influencing difference in the acceptability of PhE. The findings
further reveal that those enrolled in the BEEd program (M=2.90, SD=0.275) are more likely to
accept the lexical items as compared to those enrolled in the BSEd program (M=2.76,
SD=0.321). This implies that future elementary school teachers are more accepting of the
nativized English varieties than the secondary school teachers. The finding is to some extent a
realization of what Delpit and Dowdy (2002) mentioned that elementary teachers need to accept
the language a child brings into the classroom as an expression of self since rejecting one’s
language can only make that person feel as if he is rejected.

18

5. 3 Relationship between the extent of acceptability of the PhE grammatical and lexical items
and the number of languages spoken and perceived English proficiency

The mean score for the extent of acceptability of PhE was computed. The relationship between
the extent of acceptability of PhE lexical and phrasal variance and the number of language
spoken and self-perceived English Proficiency were determined through the conduct of the
statistical tool known as Pearson Product Moment Coefficient or Pearson r.

Table 6.
Correlation Matrix: Extent of Acceptability and number of languages spoken and self-perceived
English Proficiency

Variables p-values r-value

Extent of Acceptability of PE lexical Number of Languages Spoken 0.059 0.094

variance

Self-perceived English 0.123 0.089

Proficiency

The data shows (Table 6) that relationship between the variables extent of acceptability of PhE
lexical variance and number of language spoken and perceived English proficiency is not
significant as evidenced by the p value, 0.059 and 0.123, which are both greater than alpha =
0.05. This implies that the number of languages spoken and the perceived English proficiency
have no relationship to the extent of acceptability of PhE lexical and grammatical variance. The
non-existence of significant relationship between the extent of acceptability and number of
languages spoken does not support the finding of Wetzl (2013) as regards the encouraging signs
of a possible correlation between increased knowledge about linguistic diversity and positive
language attitudes.

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4. Conclusion

The current study was set out primarily to determine the extent of acceptability of the lexical
variance of PhE among pre-service basic education teachers in Luzon and Mindanao. Based on
the findings, the following conclusions are made:

The most striking finding was that PhE is ‘accepted’, however its acceptance is only to a
limited extent. It can be inferred from the results that there seems to be a clear rationale as to
why participants tend to think and evaluate PhE grammatical and lexical items only as ‘somehow
accepted’. Indeed, AE is still the preferred model. This is not surprising as previous linguists (cf.
Jenkins, 2011; Hundt, Zipp & Hurber, 2015) have already established that placing the inner
circle varieties above other varieties is a very common mindset all over the world since many
people have been taught in the AE framework. Such exposure made people consider AE as the
only correct one. However, it can be noted that PhE variety is acknowledged and has already
gained acceptability, which is a good initial indication for its establishment as a legitimate
variant.

Equally surprising is the finding that there is significant difference in the extent of
acceptability of PhE between would-be elementary and high school teachers. The would-be
elementary teachers were found to be more accepting of the PhE grammatical and lexical
variants. This can be attributed to their training and orientation directed towards leniency of
language use as compared to the high school teachers whose perspective and frame of thinking is
correctness of usage.

Another astounding result is that contrary to established trend in literature that determined
women to be more favoring the prestigious and standard forms (e.g. Zhang, 2011; Gal, 1978;
Wang & Ladegaard, 2008; Bilaniuk, 2003; Milroy & Milroy, 1998) the male and female
respondents in this study had no significant difference in their extent of acceptability of PhE.
Less surprising were the non-significant difference in the extent of acceptability of PhE across
the variables geographical location and type of high school attended. Moreover, there exist no

20

significant relationship between the extent of acceptability and number of languages spoken and
perceived English proficiency.

5. Pedagogical Implications

Culturally responsive pedagogy starts with the premise that race and class matter, and that some
schools fail to send diverse students signals that they belong. To make sure all students feel
valued, the theory goes, teachers need to be aware of their own biases, work deeply to
understand their individual learners, find ways to bring students' heritage and community into the
classroom, and hold all learners to a high academic standard (Quinton, 2013).

Teachers must distinguish between the informal and formal varieties in an objective way
and must accept the learners’ variety as a valid form of communication. The use of the different
varieties can be contrasted. As such, learners may become language detectives, noticing that
most books and tests use the more standard variety of the language, whereas plays, movies, oral
discourse and even dialogue in a work of fiction exhibit more informal forms of the language.
Teachers must point out that one variety is not better than the other but that one is more
appropriate than the other depending on the circumstances (Brisk, 2006).

Prospective basic education teachers should get a healthy dose of sociolinguistics,

transformational grammar, and the history of English. There is a need for them to study the
emergence of dialects and the social contexts from which language standards grow. They should
also learn that unlike the standard meter or kilogram, which can be measured with scientific
precision; there is no single, objective standard language which everybody speaks. They should
be exposed to the concept of language contact, assimilation, and heritage language loss, and that
when schools abandon bilingual education and leave non-English-speaking students to sink or
swim in English-only classes, most sink. And last but not least, they should be taught to regard
their students' language not as something to be constantly graded and corrected, but as an
energetic, highly-competent, continually-evolving form of language, complete with its own
standards and variants.

21

 According to Barron (2009), perhaps the most significant grammar lesson to learn is to
trust our language instincts rather than mimicking some ideal which turns out to be a moving
target. We need to finally abandon the eighteenth-century prescriptions behind and aim for
language that is simply good enough to do the job of expressing whatever it is we need to say.
And when we study language, we should study what it is, not what someone thinks it should be.

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 Appendix A. Research Instrument

Part I. Demographic Profile

Directions: Please check to which applies to you. Please make sure to leave no item unanswered.

Program you belong to: ____BEEd or ____BSEd Gender: ___Male or ___Female High

School Attended: ____Private or ____Public Location: __Luzon or __Mindanao

Number of languages spoken: ___ (Please write in numeral)

Perceived English Language Proficiency:

__Intermediate __Upper Intermediate __Advanced __Proficient

Part II. Extent of Acceptability: The items given below are lexical/grammatical items which are
italicized and bold for easy reference. Please rate the extent of acceptability for each item. Four choices
are provided for each item, to wit: 1 – unaccepted; 2- somehow unaccepted; 3- somehow accepted; and 4
– accepted. Simply encircle the number of choice.

Grammatical/Lexical Items
1. Failure to return borrowed books from the library on time can result to fines and 1 2 3 4
other penalties.
2. Many classic movies are based from popular novels. 1 2 3 4
3. My perspective is sometimes different for your perspective. 1 2 3 4
4. During quizzes, students are asked to fill the blanks. 1 2 3 4
5. Students should learn to cope up with the challenges in their studies. 1 2 3 4
6. Students have different views with regards success. 1 2 3 4
7. There are a number of organizations wherein students can join. 1 2 3 4
8. It’s a more correct answer. 1 2 3 4
9. Students should get involved to extra-curricular activities. 1 2 3 4
10. The secretary attended the meeting in behalf of her boss. 1 2 3 4
11. Majority of students nowadays use online references to do their papers. 1 2 3 4
12. It must be enacted to a law whatever the political cost. 1 2 3 4
13. They left the Philippines before their children entered college 1 2 3 4
14. Students are required to attend the symposium which would be held in May. 1 2 3 4
15. The use of social media have been the most significant change in the last decade. 1 2 3 4
16. The number of students enrolled last term have increased. 1 2 3 4
17. A number of different teaching techniques has emerged. 1 2 3 4

26

 18. Either the students or the teacher know how to open the presentation. 1 2 3 4
19. One-third of the test items was asked during the review 1 2 3 4
20. This method, along with other methods, are applicable now. 1 2 3 4
21. I, together with my other classmate, are attending the symposium. 1 2 3 4
22. That is one of the reason why I chose to pursue my education. 1 2 3 4
23. The president assured free tuition to all State Universities and Colleges. 1 2 3 4
24. In schools, students are taken cared of by their teachers. 1 2 3 4
25. Due to the requirements, me and my group mates are staying in the hostel over the 1 2 3 4
weekend.
26. In pair work, choose the person who you think you could work well with. 1 2 3 4
27. Since its very traffic in Metro Manila, I don’t want to study there. 1 2 3 4
28. Thank you for the invite you sent last week. 1 2 3 4
29. My teacher has that fascination in vintagy items. 1 2 3 4
30. Since I was not responding to his message, he unfriended me in Facebook. 1 2 3 4
31. He would unsmile whenever that person passes by. 1 2 3 4
32. I have PMed to you the proposal. 1 2 3 4
33. When he heard the news, he OMGed. 1 2 3 4
34. The materials were already xeroxed yesterday. 1 2 3 4
35. I will return next week. 1 2 3 4
36. The celebrant did not expect the kind of party given to him during his 45th birthday. 1 2 3 4
37. This is necessarily needed to pass the course. 1 2 3 4
38. The five members divided the task between themselves. 1 2 3 4
39. She tried to quickly finish the book before she had to leave. 1 2 3 4
40. I should drink fewer coffee. 1 2 3 4
41. My doctor advised me to have less doughnut for my immediate recovery. 1 2 3 4
42. He will bring his father to Tagaytay this summer. 1 2 3 4
43. Faculty members are engaged in their respective researches. 1 2 3 4
44. Last February 14, I did a not so valentiney undertaking. 1 2 3 4

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