Give your personal view on the above issue, "How Teaching Is Changing".

We have seen many changes in Malaysia’s education system such as the change of
PMR to PT3, the introduction of Higher Order Thinking Skills (HOTS or better known as KBAT)
and the change on the colour of school shoes. Our ex-Education Minister, Dr Maszlee Malik,
has decided to implement black school shoes for every public school. He actually came to that
decision after receiving complaints from mothers who claimed that white school shoes get dirty
too easily. Parents may also need to spend a lot of money to maintain white shoes with shoe
whitening. But these are all the changes most of us are aware of because they have been
happening over the recent years.
20 years ago, teachers could go back as early at 2:30 p.m. said one of a veteran
teacher. She recalled a time when teaching was a half-day job because after school, teachers
could go back by 2:30 p.m. Back then, they also had more time and were able to focus on
teaching their students. However, teachers nowadays have to stay back till 4:00pm. The teacher
mentioned that they are given work that they did not even sign up for. For example, clerical
work. To add to that, they also have to attend co-curricular activities and meetings
Another teacher remembered when she was studying in school, there were a lot of
interaction going on because students got the chance to be role models and teach each other
different life skills. But based on what she observes now, students have lost their people skills.
Instead of learning from each other, schools are now about competition to see who’s on top.
The exam-oriented culture in Malaysia has caused a lot of unnecessary stress for students.
Before this, teachers could cane their students when they made mistakes but now they
can only be caned with their parent’s permission and the really severe cases are handed to the
discipline teacher. This may be a safety precaution because there are teachers who can be a bit
too much. One time in Malacca, a kindergarten teacher pushed a student off his chair roughly.
Admittedly there have been some cases of teachers abusing students and it may be good to
have the parents to oversee the punishment process.
Throughout all these years, our education has changed in many aspects. What will not
change is that the best teachers must use their character, creativity and inspiration to trigger
students’ desire to learn. We should let students use search engines through devices, just like
how we used those encyclopedias those days to get information.