This is a comment for a blog post http://tsuchong.blogspot.com/2009/03/english-bm.html I just over typed it and decided to post this. No offence Tsu Chong!
You might be a bit out of Science and Math touch. But really,
First, learning them in Malay will limit the range of people who will read the "Malay" papers produced by Local Uni students.
Second if we tell them to write papers in English, then might as well learn them in English early on instead of catching up individually when you're in Uni.
Third, the international community ussually uses English in all the international conferences in Science and Maths, it's easier to mix with people from Oxford, MIT, Harvard, Princeton if you speak the science terms in English.
Fourth, some of my friends here are from Chiense Independant schools, so they had to catch up on the English terms during the lectures and have some difficulty in presentations because of translation problems.
Fifth, the countries like Japan, China, French all have firm foundations in the science in their languages mostly due to their own market of Scientist inside the countries(actually I'm not so sure), but Malaysia is still to young to mimic them, yes, it's a nice dream, but it's still a dream.
Sixth, producing breakthrough papers in English will shock the world better than in any other languages.
Last, Personally I find EST is very helpful for me to switch from Malay to English in Form 6. Now, I'm glad to learn Physics and Maths in English. Really, I personally think that it's better to learn them in English than Malay, mostly out of the limitations of Malay.
1 comment:
You are arguing as if every single pupil would become a mathematician or a scientist.
Teaching science and maths in English can have grave effects on Malaysia. Read my latest blog entry to find out more.
Thanks!
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