Official chides teachers over lenient marks
By Azaraimy HH

Dato Paduka Hj Suyoi delivering his speech at the opening ceremony of the English Language Teaching Conference.

Acting Minister of Education, Dato Paduka Hj Suyoi, has chided some teachers who gave good marks to students despite obvious grammatical errors. He linked poor exam performance to the poor command of English language as he spoke at the opening of the English Language Teaching Conference yesterday.

The two-day English Language Teaching Conference with a theme "Raising Standards" jointly organised by Centre for British Teachers (CfBT) and the British Council started yesterday. It is being held at the Civil Service Institute (IPA) at the capital.

Among those who also attended the launching ceremony were Mr Gerry Liston, Director of British Council (Malaysia) and Mohd Arif Bell bin Abdullah, Chief Executive of CfBT Education Services (B) Sdn Bhd as well as government officials, teachers and participants.

Dato Paduka Hj Suyoi in his speech said, the theme is most appropriate to the Ministry of Education. He said the ministry has been talking about how to raise standards in English language - in PMB Level the percentage of credit passes averages only 36.64 per cent for government schools for the last 5 years.

"The percentage of Brunei-Cambridge 'O' Level English Language credit passes has remained at 12.8% for the government schools over the same period", he added.

"Our concern, however, is more than just the English language. We are concerned with raising the standard of education as a whole to meet the needs of our students while fulfilling our nation's goals and aspirations," he said.

He added, "Since English language has become the medium of instruction for many subjects, except for the teaching of Malay, Religious Knowledge, Physical Education, Arts & Crafts, etc, one cannot expect to raise the standard of education without raising the standard of English language in schools."

In his opinion, students cannot follow well the lessons being taught in the classrooms if they have poor command of English and keeping their work and notes tidy and doing all the work assigned may not cut it.

"It is one thing to sit through all the lessons in English and quite another in re-producing, during the exam, what has been learnt," he said.

He added, "But teachers are as guilty as well. I have seen teachers varyingly giving good marks to student's work despite obvious grammatical errors'.

"In the end, students enter the examination halls with a false sense of security. They are in actual fact unprepared for the exam and for the rigours of using the English language - to understand the questions, let alone to answer them".

Courtesy of Borneo Bulletin