Coping with Changes

It is pretty hard when dealing with all sorts of transition that has been taking place in my life lately especially when it comes to the education system.

I was brought up in a rather complicated variety of education system. I started off by attending daily national school. When I turned 16, I was offered a place at a boarding school. As you grow older, you will soon be conscious with what is going on around you. You will become aware of your surroundings. You used to see things laterally, now you can observe things peripherally.

I was offered scholarship to do degree in B. Ed TESL at Warwick University, UK but in order to do that, there was a catch. I was required to attend a two-year foundation programme at a Teacher’s Training College or a ‘maktab’. Things escalated rather quickly when I was finally then introduced to the overrated UK’s humanistic approach.

Now, I am back in the ‘maktab’, regressing and reverting to the old-fashioned system where teachers are trained in a factory. Teachers are products of years of brain-washing regime. This problem does not only persist in Malaysia. It in fact, exists everywhere. Being radical and supportive with more lenient humanistic approach is yet possibly not the best option at this current rate.

Yes, it is tad sad to see what is going on around the education system. Teachers are told to be learner-centred. They need to promote independent learning and foster learner autonomy. Yet, this ambitious ‘slogans’ of ‘we teach children, not subjects’ can be proven to be another fallacy. It is ironic indeed, when the teachers themselves while in the maktab are forced to oblige to lecturer-centred approach.

To certain extent, I believe my dear lecturers nevertheless trying their best to emulate their partner, Warwick University in maintaining the lecture-tutorial sets of programme. Despite that, it is not enough. Never enough. They try to emulate, to mimic but habits die hard, no? They rebound. I gave them two weeks and the true colour started to emerge. Favouritism is apparent when the same name is being called up again and again.

What’s up with various human capacity? What’s up with power mediation? Hello to the traditional approach. Don’t be surprise if no change will take place in our education system. I bet it is the culture. Punctuality is nothing for any of us to be surprised of. Lecturers turning up 20 minutes late? There is no excuse for such thing to happen. Preaching professionalism and ethics. If ad hominem fallacy is practiced in my life, I will obviously choose to refuse to listen to any of the things told by these lecturers.

I tend to agree that there is no perfect education system. Nothing is ever close to perfectness. Research is continuous and sometimes even the UK’s system try to adapt the traditional approach. It will all come back to this. It depends on whom we are trying to please. Stakeholders? Employers? Or the students themselves. However, where are we heading? Basic ethics are not covered. Let us just talk about moralities. Being so-called humanistic whilst practicing double standard in your class. For example, you say about being more ‘humane’ when evaluating a presentation done by your students. Surprisingly, what you meant by being more humanistic is by bombarding everyone with acidic, demotivating comments.

You can never make a fish climb a tree. One maybe good at public speaking. One maybe better at writing but to impose a correct way to do something? Corrections can only degrade one’s performance. What more if it is done verbally, condescendingly and well…passionately. That is how I will put them as.

We learn about Bloom’s higher order thinking and lower order thinking. Application is what we sought after. Strangely speaking, it is the regurgitating of a fact that is well celebrated here. Where are we heading, everyone?