Re: Bernama: Gerakan Urges Return To Teaching Science, Math In Mother Tongue

On Wed, 09 Nov 2005 06:47:19 GMT, Pan <panNOTRASH@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

>On Wed, 9 Nov 2005 08:23:13 +0800, "news.tm.net.my"
><rkumar@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
>>It looks like some people want to go back to the stone age!!!!
>
>Excerpt from the article:
>
>Dr Koh, who is the Penang Chief Minister, said that while Gerakan
>supported the improvement of English proficiency by all Malaysians, at
>the same time it wanted to improve the standard of science and
>technology.
>
>"We feel at primary level the teaching of science and mathematics
>should be conducted in the pupils' respective mother tongue which they
>are more accustomed to -- the Chinese learning science and mathematics
>in Chinese and the Malays in Malay.
>
>
>How is that "going back to the stone age"? It's never made sense to me
>that science and math would be taught in a foreign language. Teach
>English well, by hiring good English teachers to teach English as a
>foreign language. And then, have English schools for those who want to
>go to them.

Yeah, I also don't see why he should say we are going back to the
stone age.

I actually don't think teaching Maths and Science in English is such a
good idea. It probably won't improve one's proficiency in English by
much.

But that wasn't the objective behind the policy. I think the
intention was to improve the students' Maths and Science.

Seems what Gerakan is saying that by using the mother tongue, the
results might be better (?).
.

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