Singapore has a bilingual education policy, where all students in government schools are taught English as their first language. Students in Primary and Secondary schools also learn a second language called their "Mother Tongue" by the Ministry of Education, where they are either taught Mandarin, Malay, or Tamil. English is the main language of instruction for most subjects, while Mother Tongue is used in Mother Tongue lessons and moral education classes. This is because Singapore's "bilingualism" policy of teaching and learning English and Mother Tongue in primary and secondary schools is viewed as a "cultural ballast" to safeguard Asian cultural identities and values against Western influence.