Salam and dear all,
This post is not related to the current issue of switching the teaching of math and science back to Malay/Chinese/Tamil. Instead this post supports the calls for our students (and lecturers too) to improve their English.
In his article 'Only good teachers can save our country' (The Star, 14th July 2009 available on: http://biz.thestar.com.my/news/story) Choong Khuat Hock wrote:
A Jobstreet.com survey of 3,000 employers revealed that 56% said the main stumbling block when hiring fresh graduates was their poor command of English, versus 0.7% who cited poor command of Bahasa Malaysia as a difficulty in hiring.
In a study of written works of 24 undergraduate construction students Sufi Khairuddin and Khairuddin (Proceedings of MiCRA 2008, pp560-569, IIUM) observed that:
- spelling error is very common,
- students failed to distinguish the differences in usage of words that have similar sounds but different meaning and application, e.g. 'sit' written as 'seat',
- syntax error is most widespread,
- students have serious difficulties in communicating their thoughts in written form.
Examples of errors:
- ... and i felt asleep...
- March spelled as Mac
- ... I have to seat for the final exam...
- ... you will accept my reason and my apologize...
- I promise did not do the same mistake in the future...
- ... I am failed to attend your class in evening session...
- ...I would like to seek your apologize for not attending...
- ...I would like to apologize you because not informing you that I've...
I hope students make use of the opportunities, while on campus, to improve their command of English.
Wassalam.
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