A few weeks ago, I read in the newspaper that our government was considering to abolish the UPSR and PMR examinations. Therefore, our children will have only SPM and STPM before they move on to enter the universities. I was very upset of these news. I know it didn't effect me so much because I don't have anymore younger children but what about my grandchildren. On the way to work on the next morning, I was thinking and thinking. What is going to happen to our future generation. I remembered when I was in the primary school and secondary school. I had to sit for standard 5 exam, SRP/LCE and SPM before I proceed to do my matriculation. I have many friends from different races, I meant Chinese and Indians. Not only Malay friends. Nowadays, looking at my children, currently they are 18 years of age, they only have malay friends. They have no opportunity to mix around with friends from different races. All these due to the education system that we have currently. Sometimes, I pity them. Most Chinese will attend Chinese school and Indians will go to Tamil school. When our children have to learn in English, many people were against it but as a mother, I can see that my girls have a better English. They have more confident to speak English in the public. As we can see it and whether we like it or not, English is our second language. Most books for references are in English. Job seekers are required to communicate in English. However, when there was pressure from certain group of people that their children could not cope and learned certain subjects in English, rather than looking into the basic of the problems, the government decided to change back to the original Malay language to please these people. Government should have put a lot of thought into these matter and did a survey why some students especially from the rural areas unable to cope with English subjects. From my observation in the school where my nephews and nieces schooling, some teachers who have to teach in English were not good in their English as well. So, how are they going to teach if they themselves are not good. The Ministry of Education should do something about training the teachers to speak English and teach the students accordingly.The respective teachers should be sent to courses to improve their skills. Only skilled teachers are chosen to teach the students in English language subjects. I am a doctor and we communicate in English during our work. I can see some of my HOs and MOs have poor English command. Eventhough there are good but they cannot express their views well. They struggle in their day to day work. They tend to go into the state of depression easily when they see their other collegues can speak English well. Their coping mechanisms also very poor. They have very low self esteem. Frequent modifications in the school curriculum won't give any good to anyone, instead it will do more harm, I think. Normally when changes are made, we need many years to evaluate the outcome of that particular changes and analyse them before new changes can be made for the benefit of all our children and our country indirectly. Changes are only required if they really necessary, not bacause of the change in the leadership in the Ministry of Education or just for the sake of making changes so that people will see it as if we are doing something regardless whether the changes are necessary or not. We should change for the better not for the worse. Regarding the abolishment of UPSR and PMR exams, I personally disagree with that decision. Examination is one of the way for us to assess our knowledge and progress in learning as well as in skill. No doubt examination is one of the stress factor in learning but at least we can know where our students stand in their understanding on certain subjects on top of the daily assessment. Our children need to be taught to cope with stress every now and then so that they will know how to deal with it wisely. Examination will encourage them directly to do better and to set their goal or target. It will give us the measurement of the students knowledge so that certain actions can be instituted to improve the results. Without examination, we have to rely on day to day assessment only. In my clinic, I managed to interview a few students who came for their follow up with their mothers. Majority of these students were so happy if there was no examination. They said they don't have to study so hard until SPM. They don't have to try to get good results because they will be in the same school until SPM. Teachers also have no target. Everybody will become so complesant, happy live and when SPM come, then only the teachers will start to struggle to finish whatever subjects they have have to teach before the exam. Later if the results of the students are not up to the standard, the passing marks will be reduce by the ministry so that the results will look good on paper. You just think what is going to happen to our beloved country in the future. I am scared...How about you?
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