The critical pandemic situation and prolonged movement control order (MCO) have forced many activities to be performed at home, including school education for children. This situation calls for an action to create a new norm for the delivery of education and teaching for parents and the relevant ministry. Modulating the syllabus for homeschooling could be a new educational method for various clusters, and levels respectively in order to safeguard intellectual continuity, stability, and sustainability.
When the duty to educate children falls back on parents, the perspective of education should also be changed from concentrating too much just on physical elements such as preparing devices and accessibility, to more of the heightening of intramural knowledge and intellectualness. It is high time that we observe and nurture the seeds of knowledge to its fullest by revamping our education system from focusing on mere superficial understanding i.e. literal-to-lateral acquirements such as pursuing knowledge for the sake of certificates towards valuable and beneficial knowledge, skills and aptitudes.
Recent studies by various institutions have found that the new and younger generation lack vocational and motor-skills, and they suffer psychological insubstantiality as well as spiritual triviality. The invention of a special homeschooling module could help in profiling the Malaysian future workforce and to ensure suitability for an uncertain future job market. During the MCO, we have learned not to have to depend too much on foreign workers to fill the hard, difficult, and dirty jobs which have been left unattended. Thus local youngsters should be encouraged to opt to return to palm oil plantation or the agricultural sector for example as well to take over many of the jobs left by many foreign workers, instead of merely choosing to work as a paid riders in the food delivery sector.
Having experiencied the effects of the pandemic on our socio-economic wellbeing, it is obvious that we are now living in an unpredictable world, be it in work or in life. Succcesful entrepreneurs, businessmen or professionals are the products of hardship, perseverance and passion. The survival of the nation depends on the quality of the people. With passion, we could survive in this tough environment. However passion and perseverance needs to be instilled via experiential learning from the very beginning. We can’t wait for hardship to mould us permanently and any preparation can only make things less difficult.
The agricultural, vocational, and technology-based sectors are the essentials for survival in many environments. Expertise in these areas at the moment belong to a selected small group of people only, when it should, supposedly, be the basic skills of all. The making the new educational module preparation can be expedited by designing an incorporated module for parents to be able attend to the need of their children, especially at the primary and secondary levels.
All educators including the parents who are involved with the new paradigm of online learning must cater and look out for unprecedented opportunities anywhere, anytime and at any pace. A virtual classroom that synergises with parents’ supervision could be the best playing field to encourage resourceful and creative teaching techniques. For subjects like science and mathematis, it should be taught and learned with the readily available surrounding “tools” at home; however, it must be guided by a preset module, as mentioned.
Basic skills needed for day to day living such as cooking, gardening, planting and minor handy home fixing, be it for plumbing or mechanical tasks, are interesting new subjects to be incorporated into the homeschooling module. This can prepare children with passion and natural talents in some non-academic skill sets, for a wider scope of potential future career. The use of diverse and comprehensive online videos might help to uplift as their passion and motivation thus making it a natural learning process. For example, we can produce outstanding chefs by the children learning online on how to cook bake or prepare foods.
Technology wise, our local talents are not really known as inventors but rather as users. With proper guidance, our children in the primary and secondary levels who are hooked on online games for example, can be turned into game developers, programmers or graphic designers if we know how to motivate them towards the right direction. Thus again we need a group of experts to craft a new module for homeschooling.
The relevant experts at the higher research and education institutions need to design a new attrative module for homeschooling as well as to make proposals to the Ministry of Education. Apart from being an online content provider, they can also provide better insights for the future via consultations with others. Agencies, industries and ministries could help provide opportunities for the new method of education, such as homeschooling education, which ultimately can contribute to the progress of the nation.
In summary, a profession that normally requires a couple of years to master, cannot simply be left unattended for parents alone to adapt to. Parents need clear guidance on how to help teach their children and those who have not been exposed to homeschooling, may find it very challenging. Give everybody a chance to prepare themselves with a basic module on homeschooling; and those who are already in the field should be able to contribute for a better future.