Navigating Learning in Filipino: Exploring Students’ Experiences in Developing Learning Skills in Secondary Language Classrooms

Abstract

Developing language-learning skills is central to students’ capacity to communicate, interpret information, construct meaning, and participate effectively in academic and social settings. In Philippine secondary education, Filipino classrooms provide opportunities for learners to strengthen listening, speaking, reading, writing, vocabulary development, critical interpretation, collaboration, and independent learning. Yet students experience these learning processes differently depending on their linguistic backgrounds, classroom participation, confidence, instructional experiences, and access to support. This qualitative phenomenological study explores the lived experiences of secondary students at Eden Integrated School, Isabela, in developing learning skills through Filipino language instruction. Specifically, it examines students’ experiences of classroom participation, the skills they perceive as developing, the difficulties they encounter, the strategies they employ, and the influence of teachers, peers, instructional activities, feedback, and language use on their learning. Participants are purposively selected secondary learners with sufficient experience in Filipino classes to describe their learning processes meaningfully. Data are generated through semi-structured interviews and analyzed phenomenologically through significant statements, meaning units, thematic clustering, textural and structural descriptions, and synthesis of the essence of the experience. The analytical framework focuses on six interconnected dimensions: learning through participation, connecting language with lived experience, navigating linguistic difficulties, developing confidence, learning through interaction, and becoming strategic and independent learners. The study conceptualizes Filipino learning as an experiential and socially mediated process in which language skills develop through meaningful use, reflection, collaboration, feedback, and learner agency. The findings may inform learner-centered Filipino instruction, classroom assessment, instructional-material development, and intervention programs designed to strengthen secondary learners’ communication and learning skills.