A framework for designing a

Philippine-English-based
pedagogic model for teaching
English grammar

Bernardo, AS and Madrunio, MR

RE-CAP:
Endonormative Stage
• The endonormative stabilization stage is the fourth
stage in Edgar W. Schneider's dynamic model of
postcolonial Englishes. In this stage, speakers of
English in a particular region or community begin
to develop their own norms and standards for the
language, independent of the norms and standards
of British or American English. This process is
often driven by a desire for cultural self-reliance
and a sense of national identity.

• The endonormative stabilization stage is a sign

that a particular variety of English is becoming
increasingly autonomous and self-sufficient. It is a
significant milestone in the evolution of
postcolonial Englishes.
I. Introduction
“English – the means the
Americans used to teach
[Filipinos] via the mass
media, the arts, social,
business and political
interaction – continues to PRECOLONIAL PHILIPPINES HAD WITH MORE THAN 100 LOCAL
A WEALTH OF INDIGENOUS LANGUAGES SPOKEN BY THE
be a strong thread that LANGUAGES. THIS WEALTH, DIFFERENT ETHNIC GROUPS IN
binds the two nations” HOWEVER, WAS
CHARACTERIZED BY DIVERSITY
THE COUNTRY, EACH OF WHICH
HAS ITS OWN LEXICON, SYNTAX,
(Espinosa, 1997, para. 5). AMONG THE MANY ETHNIC AND PHONOLOGY DISTINCT
LANGUAGES WHICH, IN TURN, FROM THOSE OF THE OTHERS,
WAS A HINDRANCE TO THE LANGUAGE SITUATION
EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION PRIOR TO THE COLONIZATION OF
AMONG THE DIFFERENT THE AMERICANS WAS COMPLEX,
INDIGENOUS GROUPS. TO SAY THE LEAST
Gonzalez (1997, p. 3)
describes the rapid
acquisition of English
in the Philippines as ECONOMIC AND THE TEACHING OF THE EAGERNESS OF
“an unprecedented SOCIOLOGICAL,
PARTICULARLY THE
ENGLISH AND ITS USE
AS A MEDIUM OF
THE FILIPINOS TO
LEARN AND ADOPT A
success,” FILIPINO PEOPLE'S
RECEPTIVENESS TO
INSTRUCTION LANGUAGE WHOSE
STATURE, BY
OUTSIDE INFLUENCES ASSOCIATION TO ITS
COMBINED WITH WESTERN COUNTRIES
THEIR LACK OF OF ORIGIN, WAS
CULTURAL ACCORD GAINING
DURING ITS PROMINENCE
COLONIZATION
• Bolton and Butler (2008) maintain that while the
American colonization of the Philippines did not
involve massive settlement of the colonizers and the
use and teaching of English was achieved by a small
number of teaching cadres, the Americans’ attempt at
establishing the first system of universal education
through English was a notable success.
• … As a result of the spread of English through the
school system and its use as the sole medium of
instruction and perceived value in public venues, a
local variety of English was born – Philippine English
(PhE, henceforth).
 THE PHILIPPINE CLEARLY SHOW THAT IMPLY THAT THERE IS A
LOCALIZED AND
ENGLISH STUDIES PHE HAS ITS OWN INDIGENIZED VARIETY OF
ARE USEFUL IN UNIQUE STRUCTURES ENGLISH THAT APTLY
REVEALING THE AND FEATURES MIRRORS THE
PHONOLOGICAL, PROPAGATED BY THE SOCIOLINGUISTIC AND
SOCIOCULTURAL REALITIES
MORPHOLOGICAL, CIRCLE OF EDUCATED IN FILIPINO SPEECH
AND SYNTACTIC FILIPINO SPEAKERS. COMMUNITIES
VARIATIONS IN PHE.
… untenable to say that the English presently
used in the country is exactly the same
English transported and transplanted decades
ago and the same English spoken elsewhere
…

PhE is not the PEJORATIVE “Taglish” or

“Broken English” or “Carabao English” but
the “educated Philippine English,” i.e., the
English used by competent Filipino speakers
of the language in formal settings (Bautista,
2000a), “the type of English that educated
Filipinos speak and which is acceptable in
educated
 The distinctiveness of Philippine
English as a linguistic variety has
also been paralleled by the literary
creativity of its novelists, short story
writers, and poets, who have
produced – and continue to produce –
a substantial body of writing in
English, aimed not only at domestic
readers but also at the international
audience for world literature in
English. (xi)
Proposed
Endonormative
Pedagogic
Model
What remains as a
challenge?
…the establishment of a standard,
endonormative model that can be
used in teaching and recognized as
being on the same level as other
established varieties, such as
American, British, and Australian
Englishes
2 important points
according to Borlongan
(2011)
1. that PhE is a variety with
distinctive features; and
2. is self- regulating and that it has
achieved what Schneider (2003,
2007) describes as
endonormative stabilization.
 Other challenges posed:
1. a local model that underpins the English
language instruction in the country has not been
mapped out;
2. relatively little has been researched about the
development of a homegrown teaching model;
3. the teaching of English in the Philippines seems
to be based on an exonormative model, AmE in
particular

…PhE is the or one of the models unconsciously or

disavowedly employed suggesting that it has become
Filipinized and it is likely to be satisfactorily
different from standard American English.
Purpose of Proposed
Pedagogic Model
1. the local variety of english may be considered as an
integral part of the framework for an institutionalized
model
2. may rouse the philippine linguistic landscape to gradually
move from what schneider (2003) calls “fossilized
development” since until now
3. a local pedagogic model for teaching english is also
deemed crucial in codifying the local variety.
4. apart from addressing the discrepancy between the
theoretical norm and the actual use of the language, may
provide learners a great deal of exposure to different
varieties of english
5. issues material to teaching english as an inner-circle variety
may be clarified
6. may aid english language teachers and learners in
recognizing the pluralistic nature of english across the
world today
“It is vitally important that notions of
superiority of one variety over
another be weeded out of students’
minds before they are turned loose to
practise their profession. The former
axiomatic idea that any Inner-Circle
variety was ‘better’ in all formal and
functional ways than any non-Inner-
Circle variety has been empirically
invalidated, but still persists. (p.
125)”
 It is good to note that the WE
paradigm has had positive impact on
various aspects of English language
teaching and learning and that there
is, at present, a heightened reception
of local or regional norms and
models (Gill, 1993).
Physical design of the proposed endonormative pedagogic model
Physical design of the proposed endonormative pedagogic model
 Which is correct?
With regards to… With regard to…

When does it becomes “regards”?

Best regards, Kind regards,
The pedagogically tested proposed endonormative model for teaching English grammar
The pedagogically tested proposed endonormative model for teaching English grammar
A major factor militating against the adoption
of non-native norms is the ambivalence
between recognition and acceptance of such
norms. This, in turn, is linked to the question
of attitudes. On the one hand, non-native
norms are seen as an expression of identity
and solidarity, while, on the other, there
continues to be great admiration for native
norms. Quite often, people know of features of
non-native varieties and can even see the
utility of such features in the sociocultural
situation, yet they are reluctant to accept the
logical conclusion that such recognition
implies a replacement of the native norms they
have come to adore. (p. 5)
CONCLUSION
•What this paper has proposed is a
framework for designing a local-variety-
based model for teaching English grammar
and a specific case in which the framework
is applied - something that is missing in the
literature as far as teaching English grammar
endonormatively is concerned. This paper
offers a general blueprint for designing a
Philippine-English-based pedagogic model
for teaching English and its application has
led to significant findings.
CONCLUSION
•The results hint at the fact that there
are PhE grammatical features that deserve
formal recognition and that there is no
reason to be afraid of them, i.e., formally
teaching acceptable grammatical features
of PhE may no longer be regarded as
‘forbidden’ and ‘illegal.’
CONCLUSION
•The PhE-based model proposed in this
paper describes how language is actually
used and accepts the patterns a Filipino
speaker of English actually uses and tries
to account for them.
CONCLUSION
•Overall, it is fair to say that PhE
thrives in ESL classrooms, and a good
number of PhE grammatical variants are
now deemed PEDAGOGICALLY
ACCEPTABLE to be a model for
teaching and learning English grammar
CONCLUSION
Data obtained signify that American or
British English alone may not even be the
best possible assemblage of linguistic
features available and that it is the
pedagogical acceptance of the educated
users of the language that determines how
standard a specific variety is.
CONCLUSION
[PhE] grammatical structures have gained
formal recognition – an indication that not
all are afraid of Philippine English and
that Philippine English may also stoutly
stand as a model for teaching, not only
with respect to pronunciation and
vocabulary but also with respect to
grammar. This echoes that Filipino
speakers of English are open to new ways
of “linguistic thinking” and to different
ways of looking at the varieties of English.
Reference:
Bernardo, A., & Madrunio, M. (2015). A Framework for Designing a Philippine-
English-based Pedagogic Model for Teaching English Grammar. Asian Journal of
English Language Studies, 3, 42–71.