KOTA KINABALU: Educators have been told to change their teaching techniques to win their students’ attention if they refused to learn and be guided.
Universiti Malaysia Sabah (UMS) Professor Madya Dr Hamzah Md Omar, a specialist in teachers training from the university and a former teacher, stated this at the Teknopen Kinabalu 2013 held at the Mini Putrajaya auditorium near here yesterday.
He urged educators not to be afraid to try something new in order to win over their students and get them to enjoy learning.
To garner new ideas and approaches, Dr Hamzah encouraged the educators to read more books and magazines that focused on improvisation.
“I realise however that most teachers are already so busy and have no time to read. But teachers must learn to teach correctly so that their students will learn the correct way,” he said.
He also said that as educators, they must strive to do their utmost best for their students, just as they would for their own children.
Dr Hamzah also discouraged educators from labeling their students, particularly when it came to students who were faring badly in their studies and seemed not interested to learn at all.
“As teachers, our role is to ensure that they move a step up. We must not leave any of our weaker students still in the same state. They have to be further improved, at least a step up the ladder,” he advised.
Another word of advice he gave when dealing with weak students was to view them as ‘angels with dirty faces’.
“Most people condemn these students. The public condemns them, their family condemns them. We have to address the matter by observing them and by learning the methods that would improve their state,” he said.
And when it came to tough cases, he urged educators to make it known to their students that they take teaching very seriously.
“You need to be tough, and you can be stern. With some students, you need to play with them in order to get them to learn,” he said, describing the various modes of teaching and getting the subject across.
Meanwhile, the Education Ministry’s policy planning and research division’s assistant director, Dr Bity Salwana Alias, said that as educators, they have been entrusted to teach every student and that this was in line with the ministry’s approach of developing every student holistically as Malaysians.
She added that the ministry encourages the commitment put forward by educators in providing education to their students and urged them to answer the UNICEF call of ‘education for all’.
“Educators must improve their quality of teaching so that their students will benefit from the hours they spend in school. Research by the Akademi Kepimpinan Pengajian Tinggi (AKEPT) in 2011 found that from observations conducted on 125 teaching sessions at 41 schools throughout Malaysia, only 12 percent of the teaching sessions achieved high standard, 38 percent attained a satisfactory standard. The research showed that from 50 percent observations made it was found that the teaching technique was not satisfactory and failed to attract the interest of their students as the teachers were dependent on passive lecturing when presenting their subject,” she said.