What if I tell you that my ideal education system is a teaching method that is totally different from the existing educational system? Will you be willing to give it a listen? Will you be able to accept it? Come and listen, there’s no harm to it. Take it as that you are listening to me telling you my dreams and aspirations.
It is a children-centred education system.
The educational system that we are familiar with is a teacher-centred system. Teachers will get to decide what subjects a child needs to study and how many chapters to read. The textbooks outline sets that each year there will be 10 chapters. Within a year, whether students are smart or less intellectual, they all need to finish learning these 10 chapters. We would need to ask now, if some students are unable to catch up throughout the learning process, or that some subjects are not fully understood, what will the results be? The child brings in doubts that were not answered in time and move on to the next level and study subjects will increasing difficulty, accumulating more of the “I don’t understand”.
Yet in this children-centred education system, there will be none of these rigid frames. What a child learns will depend on his/her learning capability. If a child is able to learn rapidly, he/she will be able to cover 12-13 chapters in a year; for a child who is slow at learning, he/she may only be able to understand 3 chapters in a year. The core value is: children truly understand what they have learnt. In reality, USA and New Zealand are countries that are starting to implement this kind of education system in schools. The course outline is arranged according to the capability of a child. For example, an 8-year old child takes a proficiency test before the school year starts and he can complete mathematics of a 12-year old level but can only understand English of a 6-year old. When he studies in school, he will attend the 12-year old mathematics class and the 6-year old English lessons thus learning together with children of different ages.
Let’s zoom in a little; in fact, isn’t it true that we can see there are foreign language learning centres also followed this system to allocate students to different classes? From these, we can observe that this educational system is workable.
Why is there the appearance of such an education system? First and foremost, we need to think about the initial purpose of learning.
Learning is a process for us to grasp new knowledge and skills. If I have yet to understand the basics and because of my growing age requires me to climb up to classes with increasing difficulty, is it still considered learning? The only way is to follow our children’s footsteps, guiding and teaching them one step at a time which shows the true meaning of learning and to allow children to develop their potential. YelaoShr is founded on this “to build a strong foundation in learning” concept and kick-started with trilingual literacy classes to commence from the most basic parts. Because we know that with enough reading and recognising more words can at least decrease half of the problems faced in studies.
Moving forward, we will talk about this rigid frame that parents set on children.
I remember when I established YelaoShr 13 years ago, I arranged for a weaker 8-year old child in Bahasa Malaysia to start with the basics of suku kata. I have parents hesitantly asked, “Is this really okay?” Why not? Since his fundamentals are weak, then we should work on getting his fundamentals right, only can he progress to higher levels. It is easy to understand this concept but at that moment, we are all held back by the rigid frame of the norm.
I would like to share the education methods I arranged for the children. In the 6 years of primary school, I would let the child excel in the Chinese language whereas the remaining subjects he is only required to pass and hand in the homework given during primary 1. Throughout the one year, his Chinese would have improved to the level of a primary 2 or 3, Chinese classes in the future would allow the child to have full confidence. Next, in primary 2, I would let him do his best in Bahasa Malaysia. The list goes on and on. Parents nowadays are very anxious, hoping that their children will do exceptionally well in all subjects, causing them to send their children for tuition for every subject. At the end, when all subjects are not handled well, the children are stressed, and the parents would feel the same. Based on what I have shared earlier, even if children are not as good in some subjects, parents are not to worry because you will know that everything is in control and naturally you can be relieved of the worries in your heart.
Honestly, a children-centred education system is more suitable for the world. The education system now fixes everyone under the same standards, causing people to be unable to unleash their potential. Even after graduation and stepping into the workforce, there is also a fixed system to follow. This method is perhaps very useful during the industrial revolution of the past as authorities want the people to just follow instructions, to not think and to work diligently. The world is changing and revolving, and everyone has the power to make their own decisions and should be entitled to their own thoughts. If this old people-oriented education system implemented from the top to the bottom, I believe the future world will be a better place because everyone is doing something they love.
In this aspect, YelaoShr is taking one step at a time to hope to influence the teachers and parents around slowly. We believe this is possible. Let us return this opportunity for children to be themselves.
We having a special offer RM98 (4 lessons. Usual price is RM290) for our one-to-one Mandarin, Malay and English programmes as well as abacus mental arithmetic so that your child can experience the fun and unique learning at YelaoShr® Creative Learning Centre. This offer is valid at all 59 centres nationwide.
More info: https://teacheryap.com/voucher/
