Wayne Malcolm's assertion in his July 3 letter "Inefficient language education" that "in Singapore, people learn English and, in many cases, a dialect of Chinese" is factually wrong. In Singapore, people learn English and a so-called mother tongue, which could be Mandarin, Malay or Tamil, depending on a child's ethnic background. Mandarin might have its roots as a dialect of Beijing, but today, it is the official language of China and one of the four official languages of Singapore.
keith tan
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