Leave teachers alone

Leave teachers alone!

Azly Rahman

‘Educate! … but first, we must educate the educators.’ - Frederich Nietsche

'Teach your children according to the (changing) times they live in.' - Prophet Muhammad (PBUH)

My weekend was spent thinking about poverty and education, and the shape of Malaysian education to come, particularly as we await maybe yet another new educational blueprint to go public, preferably after the 13th general election, depending on who wins.

Will our children become great thinkers and good and tolerant Malaysians? Or will they become good labourers in the international labour system and continue to be more sophisticated racists?

This is how powerful education is as a contested terrain.

Having been an educator and a student of transcultural philosophies for almost two decades, I find the practice of educating constantly shifting whereas its core remains stable.

After teaching close to 50 courses (in the field of education, politics, civilisation, arts and humanities, philosophy, language, international relations, American history and cultural studies) and developing more than 20 graduate courses, I am still learning what Malaysia is trying to do with its  educational system.

Today, I have a perspective to share with its education minister and with the thousands of dedicated teachers. I am fortunate to have practised the gentle profession of teaching in two different worlds - Malaysia and the US.

My analysis of Malaysian education is that we seem to borrow too much without thinking, and like the late 1990s Smart Schools project, we seem to achieve many different types of successful failures in our educational reform effort.

Teachers, the labour force in the world of knowledge capitalism, become subdued, silent, and silenced followers of the whims and fancies of state mandates. We love hype more than substance. We love intoxicating ourselves with buzzwords. We bully our teachers into working hard and not allowing them time to grow and become ‘reflective teachers’.

What if we teach teachers to empower themselves by becoming good and creative curriculum designers? What if we give them a less teaching load, less students, less bureaucracy, less political preaching and less time to prepare for school visits by wakil rakyat and Yang Berhormat who may not have any sense of what the daily toil in a classroom is like?

What if we stop wasting their time on non-teaching matters and let them grow as teachers? When teachers are free from these mental imprisonments, they can then become liberators of our children's imagination.

What if we try all these? Miracles can happen in our classrooms, I believe.

Over the weekend, I picked up an important book on curriculum and education, Conelly and Clandin's ‘Teachers as Curriculum Planners’, a text for my reading at Columbia University back in my doctoral days. As I finished reading it, I asked this question: ‘When will our teachers become masters of their own destiny, helping children become makers of their own history?’

The book provides perspectives which are not entirely new to teachers involved especially in the ‘Whole Language’ approach to teaching. Tools such as journal writing, biography, picturing and document analysis are among those which have been in use in Language Arts in addition to a range of other tools in the domain of creative movement, reading, writing, media and speaking which are personalistic in nature.

The authors have essentially tried to contextualise the principles and strategies within the field of emerging curricular practice partially using the rhetoric of postmodernism. Refreshing, perhaps, is the authors' Gestalt and transcendental analytic approach to curriculum planning they call the ‘rediscovering of curricular meaning’, framed to include the learner, teacher, subject matter and the milieu.

The strength of the work lies in the comprehensive range of suggestions on how to create an inclusionary and meaningful approach to such a rediscovering which in turn would scaffold learners' construction of knowledge. It is thus constructivistic in approach permeating all levels - from administrators to learners.

I find the idea relevant to our realisation of the terms ‘situated cognition’ wherein teachers are also required to define their philosophy and exercise their reflective ability so that they and the learners are together subjectivity knowledge; echoing the Lebanese poet Kahlil Gibran's idea that ‘... your children are not yours… they come out of you but not of you’ and ‘… children are like arrows of which you are the bow which launch them’ and in Socrates' idea of the innateness of knowledge in the human being.

Teachers as meaning-makers

Teachers, in this postmodernist context, are ones who live in a shared milieu but do not necessarily claim monopoly to knowledge, for in Arthur C Clarke's words, ‘the future is a different world … they do things differently’.

For learners, we are preparing them for a future which, in fact, is a present consisting of an archived past. Through apprenticeship and guided participation, learners appropriate knowledge, skill and understanding of ‘situations’ via scaffolds erected by teachers. Learning then becomes situated, dynamic and transformative.

Reading the underlying assumptions of Conelly and Clandin's work, I could sense a strong undercurrent of complexity and chaos theory, anti-foundationalism, subaltern narratives and reflexivity and futurism as strands. If I could envision the results of many decades of mass deployment of their strategies in all schools, something such as below would develop:

State-mandated curriculum would be transformed in character; from one of ‘rock logic’ to one of ‘water logic’ in nature in which fluidity in growth and shifting grounds in its parameters will be the feature.

Within the disciplines, knowledge will be organic, mutative, and morphic, much more than inter-disciplined. An analogy of this organic-mutative-morphic nature of knowledge construction, deconstruction, and reconstruction (the ‘Brahma-Shiva-Vishnu’ nature of things in Hindu philosophy) would be the three-dimensional pattern created out of Artificial Intelligence - generated patterns derived out of mathematical equations as in the Mandelbrott set manifested within the paradigm of Chaos and Complexity theories.

The water logic transformation as such can give birth to (Thomas) Kuhnian paradigm shifts, which would be characteristic of integrative, comprehensive and complex systems based upon the principles of ‘perpetual transitions’.

Scenarios of change

Since state-mandated curriculum legitimises the state and hegemonises over the minds of those being schooled (echoing the claims of Theodore Adorno and Antonio Gramsci), decades of ‘water logic’ transformation of bodies of knowledge (especially in the area of ‘soft ideological sciences’ such as social studies and history) can soften the state and pave the way for its dissolution, echoing Thomas Kuhn's idea that paradigms will shift when contradictions can no longer be contained. Just as capitalism within a particular nation can no longer carry its own weight and therefore had to transform into imperialism.

Such a dissolution of the postmodern state can then set the stage for peaceful revolutions which can give rise to the leadership of the techno-mystics as such dreamed of by Socrates and Plato who saw the beauty of the republic governed by philosopher-rulers.

Perhaps the nature of world politics will change if the most powerful nations on the face of our Spaceship Earth are governed by techno-mystics who will then spread the message of goodwill through the use of technology towards moral ends and through the sharing of creative products in altruistic ways.

Wouldn't there be beauty in looking at a perfect world, one that would be ruled by those who have understood the ancient Persian maxim, ‘I wept when I had no shoes until I saw a man with no feet’?

Managers of virtue (curriculum implementers, principals, teachers, curriculum committees) will become de-centered and ‘empowered by being dis-empowered’ by the postmodern possibility of personalistic interpretation of knowledge constructs while freedom will exist for the individual to make his and her history to demystify power and to deconstruct invented realities.

All these can help create a positive atomisation of society as a critical, creative, futuristic and life-long learning organic entity. Everyone can then find their own meaning for living and truth within themselves and achieve wisdom in their own lifetimes.

The ‘McDonaldnised’ idea of state-legitimated schooling for economic development and social advancement can be transformed into the notion of learning as living and living as learning with the ‘truth always out there, within and everywhere’.

Perhaps the notion of 'Trust no ideology’ (with the greatest apologies to the makers of ‘The X-Files’!) can be the dominant idea of the age. Such comments as above thus reflect the link between the ideas proposed in Conelley and Clandin's work and the possibilities which can emerge if we look at these from speculative philosophical and futuristic perspectives.

A teacher's vision

I have provided a scenario based upon the principles of futurism (trend analysis/scenario- building) from which ideas when extrapolated can perhaps predict changes.

Just as the postmodern perspective can provide us with tools to critically analyse modernity and modernism, Connelly's and Clandin's suggestions - which are postmodern in character - can provide educators with the means to build scenarios of living, learning and creating which must be made more and more humane.

The idea of growth, then, can be looked at not necessarily as one spiraling upwards and acquiring more and becoming material in the process but would mean to live, to simply live and to continually ask the ontological, epistemological and axiological questions of living. In short, to reflect upon Kung Fu Tze, for we may then continue to live with questions and to ask the ones which are simple.

For, echoing Socrates, aren't the simplest questions the most profound?

Teachers unite - you do not have anything to lose except your chains of boredom and dying creativity.

---

DR AZLY RAHMAN, who was born in Singapore and grew up in Johor Baru, holds a Columbia University (New York) doctorate in International Education Development and Master’s degrees in the fields of Education, International Affairs, Peace Studies and Communication. He has taught more than 40 courses in six different departments and has written more than 300 analyses on Malaysia. His teaching experience spans Malaysia and the United States, over a wide range of subjects from elementary to graduate education. He currently resides in the United States.

(Source: http://www.malaysiakini.com/columns/184481 )

Pelaksanaan MBMMBI pada tahun 2012

surat siaran ini perlu dibaca bersama dengan pekeliling SPI 12/2011(http://www.scribd.com/doc/72361300/SPI-12-2011-Pelaksanaan-MBMMBI)
Surat Siaran KPM Bilangan 6 Tahun 2011

Let a Root remains as a Root: Issue on PPSMI

Tulisan ini dibuat bagi menjawab persoalan PPSMI yang sehingga ke hari ini, masih banyak orang keliru apa tujuan dasar ini diketengahkan. Secara tuntas, saya mengulas kenapa tujuan yang salah akan mengelirukan; baik dari aspek falsafah dan pelaksanaan; dan sudah tentu tidak akan mencapai kebenaran dan kejayaan!

Let a Root Remains as a Root

Pelaksanaan MBMMBI (bulan 12/2011)

SPI 12_2011 Pelaksanaan MBMMBI

Kenapa kami bantah PPSMI

Artikel ini telah diterbitkan pada 20/3/2009 di sini.
Rasanya, masih ramai yang tidak jelas dan perlukan pencerahan semula...

< Ini bagi menjawab pihak yang mendakwa bahawa tindakan kementerian untuk mengubah dasar PPSMI ini adalah semata-mata kerana desakan yang emosional. Sebenarnya, tindakan penukaran dasar ini telah mengambil kira semua perkara, termasuk soal kepentingan bahasa inggeris dalam kemajuan >

<Alternatif kementerian adalah memperkenalkan dasar MBM-MBI adalah menjawab isu ini.>

<Siapa sebenarnya yang emosional?>

1) Harus baca e-book ini untuk memahami secara tuntas asas bantahan PPSMI ini.

2) TERLALU RAMAI yang SALAH FAHAM- ASAS bantahan PPSMI ini; Mudah sekali dipengaruhi oleh media dan khabaran berita pihak ketiga (pernah dengar modul telefon karat?)

http://www.scribd.com/doc/13099777/eBook-Mengapa-Kami-Bantah-PPSMI


3) SIASAT setiap perkara secara halus dan jelas; kemudian, tetapkan pendirian supaya tidak terpengaruh dengan mainan politik kepartian yang jelas memihak. Dengan kata lain, diri kita harus punya pendirian dulu.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Fikrah-
Penegasannya- bertindak secara jelas; dan dilihat jelas.
Mencari kebenaran perlu berdasar ilmu dan bukan emosi.

Polemik Hudud: Ramai Generasi Muda Islam Positif

POLEMIK HUDUD: RAMAI GENERASI MUDA POSITIF

Angkatan Belia Islam Malaysia (ABIM) memandang serius polemik perundangan Hudud yang berlaku pada ketika ini. Menilai respon-respon yang dikemukakan oleh pelbagai pihak semenjak kebelakangan ini, ABIM menggesa perundangan hudud tidak dijadikan sebagai polemik  oleh mana-mana parti serta pihak yang mendulang populariti politik semata-mata. Jika keadaan ini berterusan, ABIM khuatir akan tercetus persepsi negatif terhadap keluhuran dan integriti masa depan perundangan jenayah Islam di negara ini. ABIM berpandangan bahawa usaha ke arah undang-undang hudud boleh dan harus dilaksanakan melalui kehendak politik yang kuat  dengan mengambil kita penafsiran dan pindaan semula terhadap sistem perundangan yang sedia ada. Persoalannya ialah bila ia akan mula dilakukan secara sistematik dan serius?

Justeru, alasan dan persepsi yang mengatakan perundangan Hudud tidak sesuai diamalkan tidak seharusnya diketengahkan secara semberono tanpa mengambil realiti dan arus perubahan yang berlaku di kalangan umat Islam. Banyak kajian ahli akademik dan perundangan yang telah menggariskan mekanisme ke arah pelaksanaan sistem perundangan jenayah Islam termasuklah pendidikan dan perundangan dan bagaimana sistem  sedia ada boleh dimanfaatkan serta diperkasakan ke arah pelaksanaannya.

Dalam konteks ini, ABIM ingin merujuk kepada hasil kajian (turut disertakan sekali) bertajuk Values Dreams Ideals Muslim Youth In Southeast Asia: Surveys in Indonesia and Malaysia (terbitan 2011) yang dilakukan Merdeka Centre, Goethe  Institute dan Yayasan Fredrich Naumann baru-baru ini. Dalam temuramah yang dijalankan ke atas 1060 orang responden belia Islam, kajian itu mendapati majoriti  belia Islam mahukan perundangan jenayah Islam diamalkan secara meluas di negara ini termasuklah pelaksanaan hukuman sebat untuk kesalahan minum arak (92.4%), hukuman mati untuk kesalahan membunuh atau Qisas (92.5%) dan 71.5% bersetuju untuk hukuman potong tangan bagi kesalahan mencuri.

Walaupun tidak konklusif tetapi kajian ini memberi indikasi jelas bahawa generasi muda dan belia Islam di negara ini mempunyai persepsi yang positif terhadap pelaksanaan perundangan jenayah Islam. ABIM yakin melalui pelaksanaan program pendidikan dan penerangan yang lebih sistematik serta road map yang jelas ke arah pelaksanaan hukum hudud, masyarakat akan lebih jelas dan tentang hakikat sebenar pelaksanaan hukuman hudud yang menekankan keadilan dan menolak syubhah atau keraguan.

Pengalaman telah membuktikan bahawa sistem Islam seperti sistem perbankan dan muamalat Islam yang suatu ketika dulu dilihat dengan kacamata negatif telahpun berjaya menawarkan alternatif kepada sistem kewangan dan perbankan konvensional di Malaysia. Perkara yang sama juga dilihat tidak mustahil, bahkan harus dilihat dalam aspek positif apabila merujuk kepada konteks pelaksanaan sistem perundangan jenayah Islam. Justeru ABIM berpandangan adalah tidak wajar jika ahli politik Islam  bersikap apologetik terhadap sebarang kritikan serta penentangan yang diketengahkan oleh pihak-pihak tertentu baik bukan Islam mahupun di kalangan umat Islam sendiri.

Dalam erti kata lain, perlaksanaan perundangan Islam pada ketika ini serta masa depan tidak hanya bergantung kepada kehendak politik (political will)  para pemimpin politik semata-mata. Sebaliknya, kehendak umat Islam perlulah dihormati serta diterjemahkan menerusi mekanisme politik yang ditetapkan. Merujuk kepada konteks perlaksanaan hukum Hudud di Kelantan, kebebasan seharusnya diberikan kepada kerajaan serta rakyat negeri terbabit untuk melaksanakan tatacara perundangan yang ingin diamalkan menerusi lunas-lunas demokrasi seperti pungutan pendapat serta referendum.

Ini merupakan praktis dan amalan normal dalam masyarakat yang matang demokrasinya. Jika itu kehendak rakyat, tuntutan perundangan jenayah Islam dilaksanakan di negara ini harus dihormati. Walaupun begitu, masyarakat bukan Islam tidak seharusnya berasa khuatir dan takut kerana undang-undang ini hanya membabitkan mereka ya ng beragama Islam sahaja.  Di samping itu, perundangan Islam juga menjamin serta memelihara hak serta kebebasan orang bukan Islam untuk mengamalkan budaya hidup masing-masing.

Dalam hal ini, ABIM semenjak penubuhannya pada 1971 telah menyatakan komitmen serta sokongannya terhadap perlaksanaan undang-undang Islam di negara ini. Justeru sudah tiba masanya ia dijunjung serta diletakkan di tempat yang sewajarnya bersesuaian dengan status Islam sebagai agama Persekutuan.



MOHAMAD RAIMI AB RAHIM

Setiausaha Agung, Angkatan Belia Islam Malaysia (ABIM)

(Sumber :

http://www.abim.org.my/component/content/article/6-laporan-aktiviti/250-polemik-hudud-generasi-muda-positif-terhadap-perlaksanaannya.html )

Selamat berpuasa

Selamat berpuasa.

Puasa itu menahan lapar dan dahaga serta perbuatan yang boleh membatalkan puasa dari terbit fajar sehingga terbenamnya fajar berserta niat. Sementara kategori puasa terbahagi kepada puasa awam, puasa khusus, dan puasa khusus yg khusus. Hamba Allah terbaik adalah mereka yang sentiasa berusaha untuk mencapai kategori puasa pada tahap yang terbaik, dan bukan sekadar menahan lapar dan dahaga. dan yang penting, tugas-tugas kekhalifahan diteruskan. Jika tidak, dalam bulan puasa ini juga kita akan tergolong dalam orang yang membuang masa. Bukankah syarat bagi orang yang memelihara masa mereka adalah orang beriman, beramal soleh, dan berpesan dengan kebenaran dan kesabaran. Inilah tugas khalifah Allah yang tidak kunjung sudah sehingga akhir hayat kita. 

Menetapkan contoh

1) Apa yang berlaku disekeliling anak-anak, murid-murid adalah daripada sekeliling mereka. Apa yang mereka lihat, apa yang mereka dengar, dan apa yang mereka rasakan dan simpulkan daripada itu semua, akan menjadikan mereka siapa pada masa hadapan.

2) Pendidik bukan sahaja pada guru di sekolah, ibu-bapa juga adalah pendidik pertama di rumah, dan pada seluruh kehidupan kanak-kanak. Apabila mereka membesar, persekitaran mereka juga akan menambah dengan rakan sebaya yang berpengaruh akan memberi contoh popular kepada mereka. Biasanya, yang popular itu, sering tidak yang sepatutnya. itu yang menjadi masalah!

We can make a Difference

Just brilliant!


"All that's necessary for the forces of evil to win in the world is for enough good men to do nothing." Edmund Burke.

MAHKAMAH HATI!

MAHKAMAH HATI!

(Petikan daripada artikel Ust. Pahrol Mohd Juoi)

Bukankah kita sering diperingatkan,  berani kerana benar, takut kerana salah? Benar itu menjadi sumber keberanian. Salah itu punca ketakutan. Jangan dibiarkan hidup dalam ketakutan, akibat terus menerus melakukan kesalahan. Bersalah menimbulkan rasa bersalah. Rasa bersalah itu sangat menyeksa selagi tidak ditebus dengan maaf dan taubat. Bersalah dengan manusia pun sudah cukup meresahkan, apatah lagi bersalah kepada Allah.

Mahkamah pengadilan itu ada tiga. 

Pertama, mahkamah di dunia, yang mana saksi, pendakwa dan hakimnya adalah manusia seperti kita juga. Kekadang, dengan kebijaksanaan dan kelicikan, mahkamah dunia ini dapat diperdayakan. Telah sering kali yang bersalah terlepas, sebaliknya yang benar pula terhukum. Justeru, masyhurlah kata hukama, tidak ada keadilan yang muktamad dan mutlak di dunia ini. Jerung sering bolos, bilis sahaja sering di gilis.    

Kedua, mahkamah di akhirat, yang hakimnya Allah yang Maha Adil. Di sana nanti, yang benar akan terserlah, yang salah pasti kalah.  Akan ketara segalanya walau bagaimana pandai sekalipun bersilat kata. Tidak payah didatangkan saksi atau pun barang bukti kerana apa yang ada pada diri akan “hidup” untuk menjadi saksi. Kulit, tangan, kaki dan segala anggota akan bercakap. Rupa-rupanya “body” yang kita jaga, elus dan belai kini, akan mendakwa kita di mahsyar nanti. Dan di sanalah nanti akan tertegak keadilan hakiki.

Ketiga ialah mahkamah hati. Saksi, pendakwa dan hakimnya adalah hati sendiri. Hati kecil yang sentiasa bersuara walau cuba dipendamkan oleh tuannya. Protesnya  terhadap perlakuan dosa sentiasa bergema dalam rahsia. Fitrahnya akan menjerit. Itulah jeritan batin yang mampu menghantar pemiliknya ke penjara jiwa yang lebih menyakitkan.

Ya, dosa boleh disembunyikan daripada pengetahuan manusia, tetapi tidak akan mampu disembunyikan daripada Allah dan hati sendiri. Kita mungkin mampu menipu manusia, tetapi kita tidak akan mampu menipu Allah dan diri sendiri. Jadi, ke mana lagi kita ingin menyembunyikan diri ketika dipanggil untuk dibicarakan di mahkamah hati? Setia masa, setiap ketika dan di setiap suasana hati kecil akan bersuara. Tidak tega dengan kesalahan, tidak rela dengan kemungkaran.

Dosa itu derita. Kerana yang salah atau dosa itu sangat memberi kesan pada jiwa. Bila kita berdosa hakikatnya kita melakukan dua ‘perlanggaran’. Pertama, perlanggaran ke atas fitrah hati yang tabii. Kedua, perlanggaran terhadap Allah, zat yang Maha Tinggi.  Dua perlanggaran ini sudah cukup meragut ketenangan.

Jangan dilawan fitrah sendiri yang menyukai kebaikan dan membenci kejahatan.  Fitrah ini adalah kurniaan Allah, yang dengannya seseorang boleh menerima pengajaran dan didikan. Jika fitrah sukakan kebaikan itu disubur, dididik dan dipimpin, maka jalan hidup akan harmoni dan bahagia. Sebaliknya, jika fitrah yang baik itu dibiarkan, diabaikan apatah lagi jika ditentang, maka tidak akan ada lagi kebahagiaan dan ketenangan. Jadi, hati-hati menjaga hati, agar hati itu tidak mati!

Rasulullah SAW sangat arif tentang hakikat ini. Justeru, apabila beliau ditanyakan, apakah itu dosa? Baginda menjawab:

“Dosa adalah sesuatu yang menyebabkan hati kamu resah dan kamu tidak suka orang lain melihat kamu melakukannya.”

Oleh itu, awaslah wahai diri. Dosa itu adalah racun. Bahananya akan merosak secara perlahan atau mendadak. Kata ulama, mujurlah dosa itu tidak berbau, jika tidak, tidak akan ada siapa yang sudi mendekati kita.

Justeru, sering-seringlah bersidang di mahkamah hati. Selalulah bertanyakan hati kecil sendiri. Hati itu tidak akan berdusta selagi ia tidak mati!

Sumber: (http://genta-rasa.com/2011/06/06/mahkamah-hati-2/)

21st century education

21^st Century Learning / Education / Learners

The idea of 21^st-century education revolves around the notion that education as we have known it for the last 150 years is a 19^th century invention that must change to keep pace with the demands of the present world. Skills taught in schools that were designed to prepare individuals for work and life in the industrial economy need to be rethought and re-engineered to serve the needs of people in this century – dictated by a changing world that has been transformed by technological advances, the “Knowledge Revolution”, a global economy and environmental changes.

The broad thinking around the 21^st century learning acknowledges the need for new “form and function” to be added to education goals. This thinking is informed by a belief that:

·         learning must leverage the affordances of new technologies,

·         employ better pedagogies based on recent research on how people learn, and

·         be cognizant of the characteristics of a new breed of learners.

This does not mean that “basics” and “core subjects learning” need to be done away with. Few will refute, however, that there are several new literacy that need to be taught and several old ones that are not so relevant anymore.

Six Key Elements of the 21^st Century Learning

1.  Emphasize core subjects

2.  Emphasize learning skills

3.  Use 21^st century tools to develop learning skills

4.  Teach and learn in a 21^st century context

5.  Teach and learn 21^st century content

6.  Use 21^st century assessment that measure 21^st century skills

Learning skills include:

Ø  Information and communication skills which include:

·         media literacy,

·         information literacy and

·         ICT literacy.

Ø  Thinking and problem-solving skills which include:

·         critical thinking and systems thinking,

·         problem identification formulation and solution,

·         creativity and intellectual curiosity.

Ø  Interpersonal and self-directional skills which include-

·         Flexibility and Adaptability

·         Initiative and Self-Direction

·         Social and Cross-Cultural Skills

·         Productivity and Accountability

·         Leadership and responsibility

Current 21st-century tools include:

Ø  Information and communication technologies including computers, the internet and other technologies

Ø  Audio, video and other media tools

21^st century context can be created by:

Ø  Making content relevant to student’s lives

Ø  Bringing the world into the classroom

Ø  Taking the student out into the world

Ø  Creating opportunities for students to interact with each other, with teachers and with other knowledgeable adults in authentic learning experiences

21^st-century content includes:

Ø  Global awareness

Ø  Financial, economic and business literacy

Ø  Civic literacy

Ø  Health literacy

Mastery of Core Subjects

Mastery of core subjects and 21st century themes is essential for students in the 21st century. Core subjects include:

·         English,

·         reading or language arts,

·         world languages,

·         arts,

·         mathematics,

·         economics,

·         science,

·         geography,

·         history,

·         government and

·         Civics.

We believe schools must move beyond a focus on basic competency in core subjects to promoting understanding of academic content at much higher levels by weaving 21st century interdisciplinary themes into core subjects:

• Global Awareness
• Financial, Economic, Business and Entrepreneurial Literacy
• Civic Literacy
• Health Literacy

Learning and Innovation Skills

Learning and innovation skills are what separate students who are prepared for increasingly complex life and work environments in the 21st century and those who are not. They include:

• Creativity and Innovation
• Critical Thinking and Problem Solving
• Communication and Collaboration

Information, Media and Technology Skills

People in the 21st century:

·         live in a technology and media-driven environment,

·         marked by access to an abundance of information,

·         rapid changes in technology tools and

·         the ability to collaborate and make individual contributions on an unprecedented scale.

To be effective in the 21st century, citizens and workers must be able to exhibit a range of functional and critical thinking skills, such as:

• Information Literacy
• Media Literacy
• ICT (Information, Communications and Technology) Literacy

Life and Career Skills

Today’s life and work environments require far more than thinking skills and content knowledge. The ability to navigate the complex life and work environments in the globally competitive information age requires students to pay rigorous attention to developing adequate life and career skills, such as:

• Flexibility and Adaptability
• Initiative and Self-Direction
• Social and Cross-Cultural Skills
• Productivity and Accountability
• Leadership and Responsibility

(Source : Dr. Pumadevi a/p Sivasubramaniam, IPG Kampus Raja Melewar, Seremban )