Friday January 29, 2010

LINUS way to promote Bahasa and Maths

ALL Malaysian children without learning disabilities should be able to read and write Bahasa Malaysia, and do basic mathematics by Year Four.

To achieve this ambitious target, the Education Ministry has developed the Literacy and Numeracy (LINUS) programme.

Beginning this year, all Year One pupils will be screened three times a year – in March, June and September – to identify those who do not meet the required reading, writing and counting standards.

Those found to be lacking will be placed in the LINUS programme, or into a special education programme if they have a learning disability.

While the LINUS remedial modules for Year One have been completed, those for Years Two and Three are currently being developed.

According to the GTP Roadmap, close to 17,000 teachers are to be trained to deliver the LINUS modules in a four-month period beginning last November.

These teachers will also be assisted by expert facilitators who are experienced teachers attached to district education departments.

The facilitators will also help tailor strategies to address each institution’s specific literacy and numeracy issues.

In addition, the lowest performing 10% of schools will receive intensive monitoring and supervision by the state and district education departments, the School Inspectorate and the ministry’s Quality Assurance division.

Reports on the results of this monitoring are expected to be produced twice this year to track the progress of children in the programme.

According to the Roadmap, fewer than 30 countries have a 100% literacy rate% but the target was critical as the lack of these skills contributes to the early drop-out of students as failure is “cumulative”.

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