Absurd and ridiculous, Voon says of move to use imported textbooks
KUCHING: PKR Women national vice president Voon Shiak Ni describes the Education Ministry’s move to buy only imported textbooks as a measure to improve English proficiency in schools starting next year as ‘absurd and ridiculous’, questioning if the move would replace the role of teachers in teaching the subject.
“In summary, we wish to register the people’s voice that the importation of textbooks from overseas cannot replace the role of teachers in improving the level of English proficiency in schools.
“We will not be able to revive English proficiency if there is no political will to introduce English as the medium of instruction in schools like before,” she said in a press conference here yesterday.
Voon was responding to the Education Ministry’s recent announcement that it will buy imported English textbooks to implement a curriculum aligned with the Common European Framework of Reference for Language (CEFR) next year.
According to Deputy Education Minister Datuk P Kamalanathan, pre-schoolers, Year One and Year Two pupils, Form One and Form Two students will be the pioneers of the new curriculum. The books to be used by the students reportedly were expected to be priced between RM78 and RM135 each.
“So are parents required to purchase expensive books to improve learning of English in schools? The ministry needs to be reminded that as parents, we need more practical and realistic approach to revive the level of English proficiency for our children.”
In noting that English proficiency level had dropped since the introduction of many policies over the past 20 years, Voon said the Education Ministry must ponder on the ‘flip-flop’ policies and to chart the necessary to revive English proficiency in the country.
“English proficiency dropped because our education policy did not support its usage.”
On top of that, Voon said there was also a need for the Education Ministry to explain on the National Education Blueprint (NEB) which was drawn up in 2013 that cost taxpayers a staggering amount of RM270 million for a programme to train 7,500 teachers from 1,800 schools nationwide to improve English proficiency.
“What is the rate of achievements by the ministry for this programme after the programme ended in 2013 and why are parents now expected to spend more on imported textbooks again this time on the same issue that is ‘to improve the level of English proficiency’?”
Voon said the sudden change in the curriculum for English also made people wonder whether the ministry had been doing the right thing all this while.
“To make matters worse is that the government is spending taxpayers’ money like ‘water’ for trial and error measures. All of us know how many education policies have failed and we need to be aware that with each education policy, we are putting at stake our children’s education and education standard.”