Year One students can choose from five elective languages - The Education Ministry is going ahead with the move to make the elective languages of....

Year One students can choose from five elective languages
By KAREN CHAPMAN
educate@thestar.com.my

PETALING JAYA: The Education Ministry is going ahead with the move to make the elective languages of Arabic, Chinese, Tamil, Iban and Kadazandusun compulsory for all Year One pupils this year.

Under an Education Ministry circular, schools should offer all elective language subjects for 90 minutes per week (three periods of 30 minutes each).

This is part of the Standard Curriculum for Primary Schools (KSSR) which was introduced this year.

The move, however, has caused much confusion among parents.

Education director-general Datuk Abd Ghafar Mahmud assured parents that in the event of a shortage of language teachers in a particular school, teachers can substitute the three periods with the teaching of Bahasa Malaysia, English, Mathematics or Science and Technology.

“The implementation of the elective languages depends on the availability of such teachers for this year,” he said.

An Education Ministry official said district education officers were meeting school heads to find out more about the teacher shortages in schools and collecting data on how the problem could be overcome.

“We are also looking into having schools within the same area sharing language teachers. For example, a Chinese or Tamil language teacher could go from school to school to teach,” he said.

The official said more language teachers were being trained to ensure all 7,695 primary schools in the country could offer at least one elective language.

“Ideally, if a school only offers one elective language but pupils want another one, the school should be able to provide the alternative,” he said.

Some parents have expressed concern that some schools are offering only one elective language and forcing the children to take it up.