Student teachers in the Philippines are helping struggling young readers make significant gains in literacy while developing their own classroom skills at the same time, according to new research. The study looked at the Tara Basa programme, a structured literacy scheme designed to tackle the country’s ongoing reading crisis among early grade pupils.
Reading proficiency has long been a concern in the Philippines, with international assessments repeatedly showing that many young children struggle with basic decoding, vocabulary, and comprehension. The government introduced Tara Basa as a way of giving pupils extra, structured support in phonics and reading skills, delivered through scaffolded lessons rather than casual exposure to books. The findings were published in ISPCE Bulletin.
Researchers from the Polytechnic College of the City of Meycauayan wanted to know whether the programme could do two things at once. They examined whether pre-service secondary education students who ran the tutoring sessions not only helped children read better, but also grew in confidence and competence as future teachers themselves.
The study involved trainee teachers working across urban, semi-urban, and rural schools, reflecting the very different resources and support available in each setting. Researchers gathered qualitative evidence from reflective journals, group discussions, and interviews with the trainees, alongside quantitative results from reading tests taken before and after the tutoring sessions.
The results were striking. Children improved across every literacy area measured in both Filipino and English, including phonological awareness, phonics, vocabulary, and comprehension. The biggest improvements came in phonics and vocabulary, with children also making solid progress in understanding what they read.
Slightly larger gains were recorded in English than in Filipino, which researchers suggest may reflect children starting from a lower baseline in that language, giving more room for improvement. Writing-related skills improved too, though more modestly, which fits with the idea that composing text takes longer to master than recognising words and sounds.
For the trainee teachers, the experience proved valuable in ways that went beyond the children’s test scores. Many reported growing in their ability to plan lessons and assess pupil progress, while also becoming more committed to teaching literacy as a subject. At the same time, they faced real challenges, including managing classrooms and working with limited resources, particularly in rural schools.
The researchers argue that these findings matter because teacher training and reading interventions are usually studied separately. This study suggests the two can work hand in hand, with structured tutoring programmes acting as both a support system for struggling readers and a practical training ground for the next generation of teachers.
While the study was based on a single group of participants without a comparison classroom, meaning it cannot fully prove cause and effect, the consistency of improvement across every domain and both languages points to a genuine and meaningful pattern of literacy development.
