SMART SCHOOL REPORT

INTRODUCTION
In the early 1996, the Ministry of Education was involved in intense discussion
about Smart School: the concept and its implications on the Malaysia education system.
Late 1996, the Smart School had become one of the seven flagship application of the
Multimedia Super Corridor. The smart school is a learning institution that has been
systemically renew in terms of teaching-learning practices and school management in
order to prepare the children for the Information Age. The smart school are
reconstructed to fit the globally evolving world of information and technology. In this
world right now, technology play a biggest part of the develop country.
To make sure smart school function effectively, it will require appropriately skilled
staff, and well-designed supporting processes (Lubis, 2009). The main purpose of this
smart school is to create a new learning atmosphere to encourage an active thinking
process. Besides that, this system can encourage students to use a personal computers
(PCs, the internet and intranets as research and communication tools. The smart school
is not only about the technology at the school only. It also about the technology that
interconnecting the smart schools and education technology in district and national
level.
A caveat is documented that take account of the every world of education in that
smart school system itself is still a work in progress and remain open to evolutionary
refinement, including to improve in information technology. The qualities that must have
in smart school system in Malaysia is;
A broad curriculum that considers the different capabilities and needs of all student
A philosophy that says all students can learn if taught, coupled with high expectations

for all student. A school climate that is conducive to learning . Strong and professional
principals and teachers.
AN OVERVIEW OF SMART SCHOOL BLUEPRINT: PROBLEMS
IMPLEMENTATION OF ICT IN SCHOOL & WAYS TO OVERCOME.

OF

1.0 LACK OF TRAINING

It not an easy work to bring about changes in the education system in Malaysia.
We have to face various problems and obstacles in other to make a changes in our
education system. Smart school system also no exception from face a various problem
and obstacles in order to make and bring a changes in our education system. There are
some problem that must be face by our government in order to make the smart school
system run smoothly.
Lack of training is one of the problem that must be face by the government to run
the smart school system. The smart school start in the 1996, which that time we are
lack of professional workers and most of the teacher are not use to the computer and
some of them are afraid to use computer. So we did not have enough skilled workers in
technology that can help the teacher. It make teacher did not get an enough training to
use the technology in their teaching and learning process. Teacher did not be training in
how to use the software. Teacher also did not have much time to training to use the
technology.
The best way to solve this problem is by doing a seminar or course training to the
teacher. So that they can improve their skill in using the technology. Besides,
government can use the school holiday to send all the teacher to the training program or
seminar. So they can know how to use the software and technology inside their
teaching and learning process.
2.0 LEADERSHIP AND TOP MANAGEMENT ROLE
The biggest challenges in order to build a smart school are the top management such
as Ministry of Education (MOE). They want to improve our education system to be
better and effective by implementing the smart school system. So, they prefer to make
all school in this country to be smart school. But, how committed are they? They only
just make an instruction to teachers do as they said but they do not do any action to
make sure all goes smoothly. Teachers who should bear the burden of those afflicted. If
smart schools are not effective enough, they are going to blame teachers but they do
not make any action. The government must take full responsibility on this matters and

do not just let the other parties do the work. There are no constant monitoring from the
top management because they just rely the lower administrative to manage the
progress. And there are no special board at the Ministry of Education established to
monitor the progress of the system from time to time.
Effective implementation of Smart Schools will require all parties to work together
to achieve a goal of the smart school. They do not just expect only teachers need to run
this task. The top management only gives instructions without any help. Therefore, the
top management should come to school to ensure smart school could be done better. If
there is any problem can be solved together. The main objective of Smart School
management is to manage resources and processes efficiently and effectively to
support teaching and learning. To achieve the smart school objective, the management
of the Smart School administrators needs strong and competent professionals and
teachers can explain the aims of the school, leading the teaching at the school and will
get full support from parents and society. They must strengthen communication open
with all parties, allocate resources fairly and wisely, tracking school performance
compared to financial and non-financial objectives, as well as providing school
environment that supports learning. Furthermore, the implementation of Smart School
Qualification Standards (SSQS) monitoring tool to measure the use of ICT in schools
are believe to help the government to monitor the progress smoothly.
3.0 TECHNICAL SUPPORT OR TECHNICIAN AT COMPUTER LAB.
When the government has confidently provided the necessary ICT facilities
needed for the implementation of smart school in the computer lab, damage or
wreckage of facilities will certainly occur. Hence, each computer laboratory will need at
least a technologist if there is any problems occur in other to solve the matter. However,
there are no skilled technicians at almost school in other to solve the problems or
sometimes the numbers of professional technicians are too few compared to number of
schools that they need to manage. Teachers at the school also do not have the
sufficient skilled of ICT knowledge to repair if there are any problems. Because the role
of teacher is to act as a guide on the side or as facilitator that only monitor them. It is not
teachers related field in other to learn on how to manage any problem occurs due to
computer malfunction.
When the government begin to implement the smart school program at school
and provided them with the sufficient equipments, they should also provide together
with human resources. Every smart school should have enough skilled technicians to
repair the software, hardware or even the computer if it is malfunction. Their roles are

responsible to preserve the computer laboratory to be always in good condition and can
be used by students and teachers without any problems. This is because computers are
used to take over the routine and delivering information in the classroom. Hence, it must
be in a good condition in order to be able to access by the students all the time.
Government should establish a college to produce a skilled technician to be sent to
each school. It will also provide employment opportunities to youth who are interested in
these skills. Teachers also need more training on ICT than students because they do
not always depend on technician only. As a teacher also need to monitor and observe
when students used facilities in the computer lab. Teachers should attend a special
course in other to know how to manage the software and hardware correctly so there
will be no problem when it comes to teaching and learning progress in the class.
4.0 LACK OF TEACHERS SKILLS AND KNOWLEDGE IN INFORMATION AND
COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGY (ICT).
The stakeholders include teachers, principals, support staffs, other education
personnel and also parent play an important role in making the Malaysian Smart School
Implementation Plan become successful. Without their support, the plan will be such a
waste without bringing any changes to the educational system in support of the nation
drive to fulfill Vision 2020. This Vision focused on sustained and productivity driven
growth, which only can be achieved by technologically literate.
In modern society, along with the hope of Smart School Plan, it is essential for
Smart School Teachers to realize the important and needs of Information and
Communication Technology ICT to aid their teaching and learning. ICT is an instrument
for the economic and technological development in the 21st century. Teachers can using
information and communication technology to help school students to become better
information users. Thus, ICT has the capacity to provide higher interactive potential for
users to develop their individual, intellectual and creative ability.
Technologies has been adopted in education field however, significant
challenges are preventing widespread effective implementation and cause Information
transfer using ICT. At the starting of this plan, it is identifies that the lack of teacher skill
and knowledge in ICT as the major stumbling block of the smart school. Majority of
school teachers do not have a computing background so they are more comfortable
with instructional strategies that match what they did back then. Most school teachers
lack the skills to fully utilize technology in curriculum implementation hence the
traditional chalk and duster approach still dominate in school pedagogy. Teachers with

IT knowledge can apply computer based-learning and provide multimedia courseware

and collaborative tools like e-mail and groupware make the learning and teaching more
easily. Besides that, presentation of teachers educational materials such as computers,
projector and other video or audio facilities also provided in Smart School to be used
during lesson. If teacher themselves have never used or never being exposed to these
ICT, the new technologies will always seem strange and awkward to use and integrate it
into their learning and teaching session. It has been proved that technologies can
change current pedagogical practices in school which before more depended heavily on
the traditional lecture method.
Next, Teachers ICT self-efficacy also influences their use of ICT in teaching and
learning. Bandura (1986,1997) state that self-efficacy is a belief in ones own abilities to
perform an action or activity necessary to achieve goal or task. (Bandura, 1997). In
simple meaning, ICT self-efficacy is the confident to use the ICT in classroom during
learning and teaching session. Therefore, teachers who has high ICT self-efficacy, they
will tend to use ICT more frequently in each of their activities and practices in class.
Hence, teachers with more experience with ICT have greater confident in their ability to
use computer effectively during teaching session.
This problem is given a much-needed spotlight and it came out with a solution
by training school teachers in Malaysia on educational technologies and the integration
of computers into classroom teaching. This is because teachers need effective tools,
techniques and assistance that can help them develop computer based projects and
activities to raise the level of teaching in required subjects and improve student learning.
Training programs can help teachers to bridge the skill gap along the changes of the
technology. If teachers have the abilities to use and repair the computer and other
appliances, school does not has to hire the technician who has the expertise in
computing. Each teachers should have awareness of the need for teachers training to
become a skilled worker that has special skill, training, knowledge and ability in
managing educational technology like computers to service and repair computer
facilities. Trained teachers show positive attitudes toward technology and more
confident to integrate technology effectively in their classroom than teachers who had
no such training.
The training can be divided into two which are pre-service training and in-service
training. Pre-service training involved trainee teachers during their practicum. They must
develop their IT skills, thinking skill, values education, language proficiency, technology
integration into the teaching-learning process and they must act as guide and facilitator

of learning before become a teachers so they do not face any problem in school later.
Even after they become a teacher, their ICT training did not stop there because they
must participate in in-service training. In-service training has two phase. Phase 1 more
into introduce Smart School concept and goals, Basic IT skills and Core teaching skills
but in phase 2, it is focused on integration of IT into teaching and learning activities,
develop creativity and innovation in leaching and learning activities and management.
5.0 SMART SCHOOL
RESPONSIBILITIES.

PARENTS

DO

NOT

PLAY

THEIR

ROLES

AND

Today, parents do not play their roles effectively as a parent of Smart School
student in their personal charge of childrens learning experiences to monitor their
children progress because they are too busy with their work and their own routine. They
do not realize their responsibilities can bring many effects toward the successful of
Smart School Plan. As a responsible parents that want their children success along with
the modernization, parents should have the ability to access schools public domain
database to monitor childrens progress. They also has to guide, motivate and counsel
their children to use the ICT in leaning process.
Some parents did not give their full commitment to their children in making the
Smart School successful. Mostly, parents refused to give financial support and did not
buy the needs for their children to help them doing their task easily. For example, Smart
School student really need computer to attend their group forum for their long-distance
learning that formed by their teacher.
Government should provide the 1 Malaysia Notebook as a support to the student
that come from moderate family and cannot afford to buy their children a laptop to
overcome this problem. School party also must give explanation about Smart School so
that parents did not misunderstand about the plan and they can give their support to the
children.
6.0 LACK OF TECHNOLOGICAL AND TEACHING MATERIAL IN SCHOOL ESPECIALLY IN
RURAL AREA.

One of the problem faced by the implementation of ICT in education in Malaysia

especially at the rural area is that the facilities, the computers, and the equipment are
very limited. The overall school of implementation of ICT is severely affected as the
schools ICT facilities were not ready. The computers at the rural area also had problem

with old, outdated and slow computers. During this era, we need a high speed
computer to run the educational software with requires latest computer specifications. At
the rural area especially, they have outdated and slow computer and still using 350Mhz
speed processors with 1GB of Random Access Memory (RAM) which are not enough to
run the latest educational software and thus should be replaced with a higher speed of
processors and RAM as example 1.6 to 3.0 Ghz and 2 GB of RAM or more respectively.
Due to the slow computers and therefore take lots of time to open any educational
software, thus, teachers will back to old technique which is writing all kind of information
regarding the subject matter on the whiteboard.
Internet connection is also one of the main problems in implementation of Smart
School. A high speed internet connection has a very high demand for the last 4 years. At
the rural and impoverished area, they have a very slow and unstable internet
connection. Rural and impoverished communities do not have the customer bases to
attract infrastructure investment from the Internet Service Provider (ISP). The ISP
company such as Celcom, Maxis, Digi, Unifi and Streamyx scared if they invest
something which do not give something in return but loss. Till now, rural area still have
sluggish internet connection and thus become a main problem to the implementation of
ICT in smart school. Rural communities usually do not not have so much money and
most of them cant afford an internet connection. So, the only chances is their
sons/daughter to use internet connection is during the school time.
A high speed internet connection is needed to communicate with others around
the globe. If we want to talk or has a press conferences, we can just fire up Skype,
Facebook or any other communication app and hold a video chat. Services such as
Skype have helped people from geographically segmented countries to interact and
share ideas. As such, people are able to share their thoughts and views on matters
affecting the globe. The Internet acts as common global platform where people explore
ideologies and cultures without limitation. A high speed internet connection also enables
us to search information about anything and everything. There are multiple search
engines that have made it easier for Internet users to find information. For example, it is
now common for people to seek for free advice from the Internet on all sorts of issues.
The premise here is that whatever problem you are experiencing, someone will come
for your help. Average internet connection in rural area is slower compared to the urban
area. Due to this condition, government must take action to make sure that internet
connection is getting faster for the oncoming years. Government must urges the ISP to
provide faster internet connection with affordable prices so that students can access the
Smart School content from home thus students can revise their study back at home.

In recent years, education using ICT is exaggerated to a higher degree. Most of

the school nowadays using technology in their daily session classes. Technology
cannot be doubt are the most important element in the formation of Smart School.
Technology plays an essential role to facilitate teaching and learning activities as well as
assisting with school management. Technology alone is impossible to make a Smart
School. But with the help of the improvement of teaching-learning strategies, a topnotch management, and administrative processes, well trained people with enthusiam
for their work can only do that. However, information technology can enable the
transformation of tradisional school to the Smart School. Consequently, a nation-wide
system of Smart School will depend on advancement of information technology at the
school, district and national levels. To acquire the transformation of tradisional school to
the Smart School, a school equipped with those as below might be a great help
eventhough they are still developing especially in rural areas:
a) Classrooms with multimedia courseware and presentation facilties, e-mail or
groupware for collaborative work may be a great help for the teachers to enhance
learning.
b) Computer laboratory for the teaching and learning such as Information and
Communication Technology subject, and accessible multimedia and audiovisual
equipment must be a great opportunity for the students to understand better and
deeper regarding the subjects.
c)Library/ Media Centre with a huge database centre for multimedia access, and
network resources like acces to internet. By doing so, students will be able to search the
information they are looking for and thus will encourage students to stand on their feet
to search for the information that matters and does not only hope the teachers to give
them all related information.
d) Multimedia Development Centre is a good tool for the student to create their
own multimedia materials and catering to varying levels of sophistification. In the
Multimedia Development Centre, students can nurture their talent by making something
of his/her interest such as animations, stop-motion project, posters and others.
e) Studio/ Theater with a control room for centralised audiovisual equipment,
videoconferencing studio, preview room for audio, video, or laser disc material. In this
studio, a videoconferences can be done. Video conferences with the students abroad
enable the students to changes their opinion regarding the subject and thus can widen
the students knowledges and as well as can urges the student to have holistic and high
order thinking skill.

All of those features above are still developing and become better from time to
time but in rural areas and immiseration communities, those features still develops very
slowly and action must be taken for the sake of the transformation of tradisional school
to the Smart School. The solution for this problem is that our government must spend
budget to build the infrastructure as this is the large scale project that may required lots
of money to construct the building equipped with high technology appliances.
Government can also get support from many stakeholders, including all agencies in the
educational system. Government must provide sufficient funds to establish and mantain
Smart School. This is because Smart School is a long term project and we do not want
this project to discontinuous for any reason as the objectives for this project is to
develop the potential individuals in a holistic and integrated manner, so as to produce
individuals who are intellectually, spiritually, emotionally, and physically balanced and
harmonic, based on a firm belief in and devotion to god.
CONCLUSION
The integration of ICT in teaching and learning at school present opportunities
for the teacher-student especially the students to learns more effectively and efficiently.
By integration of ICT in learning, students are more independent to learn on their own
and are not being spoon-feed all of the information by the teacher. Students can also
practice self-accessed and self-directed learning at their own pace. Students know their
capability and limit. By doing self-accessed and self-directed learning, student can
improve and enhanced their learning thus making study more meaningful.
In conclusion, the Malaysian government has made an ambitious and bold
initiative and has laid the foundation for our school children, the future citizens, to
progress towards achieving Vision 2020. It is now up the various stakeholders to play
their part and ensure that the path towards achieving the goals is obstacle-free.
REFERENCES
Lubis, M. A. (2009). The Integration of ICT in the Teaching and Learning Processes: A
Study
on Smart School of Malaysia: 189-197.
Rahil Mahyuddin, Habibah Elias, Loh Sau Cheung, Muhd Fauzi Muhamad, Nooreen
Noordin & Maria Chong Abdullah. (2006). The Relationship between Students SelfEfficacy