Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew said so himself in November last year. His insistence on bilingualism has been wrong, causing generations of students to be put off by the Chinese language. [1]
Those remarks sparked off a heated debate over the teaching of mother tongue in Singapore’s public schools, culminating in Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong’s and Education Minister Ng Eng Hen’s recent assurance that the weightage of mother tongue in the Primary School Leaving Examination (PSLE) will not be reduced. [2]
These reassurances come on the heels of an outpouring of concern on the part of parents and educators that diluting the importance of mother tongue in examinations would lead to students neglecting them, and indirectly, paying less attention to their cultural roots.
MM Lee’s flawed bilingualism policy has been blamed for exacerbating Singapore’s brain drain. Many of us have heard stories of people migrating because their children could not cope with learning two languages to a comparable level of proficiency within the confines of such a stressful educational system.
But the recent heated discussion on whether the weighting of mother tongue should be cut in examinations is, in my opinion, missing the bigger picture.
Even though MM Lee has admitted his error, the fact remains that being bilingual is a valuable asset in a globalized economic environment. Concerns about the ability or willingness of our nation’s youths to keep in touch with their cultural heritage are also very valid. These considerations have not changed despite the recognition that the government’s approach to bilingualism has been deficient.
It would be wrong also to think that the flaws in our educational system stop at mother tongue.
People end up migrating with their kids not just because their kid is struggling with a single subject, but because their children are kept under an oppressively stressful learning environment that emphasizes grades and other quantitative measures of performance, and treats those quantitative measures as indicative of a person’s worth.
It is only in recent years that there has been a realization on the part of the establishment that Singapore’s educational system is churning out automatons rather than thinkers, leaders and entrepreneurs, and that this is not good for Singapore in the long run.
Sadly, the discussion about examination weightings do nothing to address the far deeper underlying problems with our education system.
The real question is how to produce motivated students who are imbued with a love for learning, and what changes can be made to the present system so that students and parents do not develop such a strong emotional fixation with grades.
Furthermore, if we are going to start talking about tweaking exam weightings because students find a particular subject difficult, then we will be slowly inculcating a culture of problem avoidance, rather than harnessing the latent creativity of our students through more holistic and sensible educational policies that respect and recognize individuality, and encourage personal intellectual exploration and inquisition.
There is a reason why Singapore has produced a large number of workaholics, but has not produced any Nobel Laureates.
It is because the present educational system encourages parents and students to centre the learning experience around grades rather than around breaking new frontiers.
It is also because the present political system encourages Singaporeans to toe the line, to think mechanically, and to be reactive rather than proactive. This mindset in fact is most prevalent amongst members of the ruling elite — the very body responsible for entrenching such a political environment.
Mark Twain once remarked that we should not let school interfere with our education. Unfortunately, our schools today remain one of the biggest stumbling blocks for individuals seeking a better education.
By: Ng E-Jay
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Headline picture from cctv.com
Cartoon from My Sketchbook.
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References:
[1] Channel News Asia, “Insistence on bilingualism in early years of education policy was wrong: MM Lee“, 17 Nov 2009.
[2] Straits Times online, “No lowering of weightage “, 11 May 2010.
For once I am in agreement with Lee Wei Ling.
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Her article in the MSM today makes a good read and I hope her brother would seriously relook at weightage of MTL by the argument she had given.
SCG,
the ‘variatioms’ are not little children who cannot understand what is clearly and forcefully asserted by Jonno.
It does not mean that if neither of the majority camp wins, ‘the variations’ necessarily benefit. politicised language and cultural policies may have different negative effects for differnt groups. ‘variations’ often prefer not to be casted as government-dependent for cultural upkeep – because they are not. But government does not trust them enough to leave them without hegemonic institutions that will watch over them. See how suffocating this is?
I guess we are not as good as china, taiwan and india and malaysia in terms of native cultures, language width and depth(we need to examine the motivation behind) because we studied simplified versions of languages, also like chinese there is olden books(like gu wen-ancient languagues, cheng yu, yan yu, xie hou yu), they are very culturally cultured and is of good depth at least and knows how to apply human ethics and values and way of the life, but with the commercialization of societies including the language, our next generations will suffer in long term due to weak mother tongue(for example they cant understand certain more complicated language books and therefore cannot comprehend certain important ethical or humane values which builds the person and eventually the society) and we the older generation will suffer also…
i guess because lots of “VIPs” like the ministers, pm, mps or even educational officers they speak or write or is conversant with english only, so this mother tongue policy is to help their off springs rather than help the whole nation.. the motive behind new mother tongue policy is important. conscience again is important…
Just like english is preferred, western medicine is preferred, chinese medicine is not, but the authorities are myopic as chinese medicine is actually can be a good branch to help people and commercialize, maybe a lot of western doctors in singapore and even the authorities got too much interest and control and power and commercial interest, that is why like china where eastern and western medicine is combined, they would biased well towards english medicine.. government should recognize and systemize chinese medicine including mc before CHINA or even taiwan starts to do that as it is great potential, also help chinese practitioners and medicine raise image before other countries or bodies does that.. There should be certain general practitioner or specialist also, since there are cases of “specialist” overcharge..
Chinese practitioner should revamp through their systems and also branding to help themselves……
some contents of poison in chinese medicine is good for curing certain sickness, so the appropiate approved content should be there instead of banning them…
Chinese medicine practitioner should unit including the bodies that control them, hopefully the western medicine is not controlling chinese medicine.
coming back to the issue, the mother tongue like english or tamil or malay should be as heavy weight as english and also more interactive is fine, but verbal, writing, computing, culturally should be explored… We need to examine how to be better than taiwan, chinese, india, malaysia and indonesia NATURALLY without complicating things..
For a suggestion, there should be road or board signs of chinese, malay and tamil along with english to prove importance of mother tongue.
Btw, please buy and eurofighters(i know from internet) for singapore(as it is more superior in terms of speed and defence and fighting) capabilities than f15, f18, f16s f14s), please help ourselves..