Dr. Portia P. PADILLA

Board Member

I am an associate professor in the College of Education at the University of the Philippines Diliman. I have taught different levels/kinds of students, in varied settings/contexts -- from preschool to university, individual to class, regular and remedial, and formal and non-formal. In recent years, I was involved in the mother tongue-based multilingual education reform in the Philippines, particularly through curriculum writing, trainers’ training, and instructional materials development. I have likewise engaged with professional and non-government organizations in their efforts towards teacher training and the promotion of reading in schools and communities. I have investigated reading comprehension and metacognition among children with and without dyslexia, metacognitive reading and academic performance among distance education students, reading among urban poor children, and the qualities of well-loved storybooks. Currently, my primary research explores multilingual reading both cross-sectionally and longitudinally. I am also working on a tri-country project with colleagues in the UK and India on supporting bi/multilingual children’s oral language development in aid of literacy acquisition.