Salvaging Mandarin education in Singapore through community

Abstract

Singapore is a multiracial nation with a majority ethnic Chinese population. Since its independence in 1965, it has adopted an ‘English-knowing’ bilingual policy to achieve economic, social, and political objectives. For the past two decades, there has been a rapid increase in the percentage of ethnic Chinese Primary One students coming from primarily English-speaking families. This has caused the government to move the teaching and learning of Mandarin in a new direction. Mandarin has only become a less-taught language after 1979, causing a shift in home language for the primary school students. Acknowledging this sociolinguistic change, the government adjusts the curriculum and places emphasis on the complementary role of community-based learning. One needs to take into consideration the changes in sociolinguistic profile of this multiracial nation to appreciate the rationale of how the less-taught language–Mandarin has been managed.