TULAY
Filipino Language Curriculum

The purpose of the TULAY Curriculum is to help learners develop the confidence and practical language skills needed to communicate meaningfully in Filipino. Rather than focusing only on memorizing vocabulary and grammar rules, the curriculum provides opportunities for students to use Filipino in authentic, age-appropriate, and culturally relevant situations.

Through listening, speaking, reading, writing, viewing, and representing, learners are encouraged to:

• communicate with family members and members of the Filipino community;

• strengthen their connection to Filipino culture, heritage, and identity;

• develop an appreciation for the linguistic, regional, and cultural diversity of the Philippines;

• express ideas, experiences, feelings, and perspectives in Filipino;

• collaborate respectfully with learners from different language and cultural backgrounds;

• develop intercultural understanding and participate responsibly in Canadian society.

TULAY recognizes that learners may have different levels of exposure to Filipino. Some may regularly hear the language at home, while others may be encountering it for the first time. The curriculum therefore provides flexible entry points and multiple ways for students to demonstrate their learning orally, visually, physically, digitally, and in writing.

TULAY is inspired by British Columbia’s concept-based and competency-driven curriculum framework. It follows the Know–Do–Understand model:

• Know: the vocabulary, language structures, cultural knowledge, and communication conventions learners develop;

• Do: the curricular competencies learners practise through meaningful communication;

• Understand: the transferable ideas that help learners connect language with culture, identity, community, and place.

The curriculum is organized into four age bands:

• Kindergarten–Grade 1

• Grades 2–4

• Grades 5–7

• Grades 8–12

Across all age groups, learners develop seven shared competencies involving comprehension, communication, collaboration, cultural connection, language-learning strategies, and critical and creative thinking.

I developed TULAY to demonstrate how a heritage-language curriculum can combine practical communication, cultural identity, inclusive assessment, and age-appropriate learning experiences.

The curriculum reflects my belief that language learning should help students feel seen, connected, and capable. It should honour what learners already know while providing supportive opportunities to take risks, communicate, and grow.

TULAY is not an official British Columbia Ministry of Education and Child Care curriculum. It is a locally developed curriculum inspired by the structure and principles of British Columbia’s curriculum framework and adapted for the needs of Filipino learners in a community-school setting.