For more than nine years, I have been deeply interested in metacognition as it applies to the art and science of teaching. I have also been involved in taking non-professional teachers and training them to be both content area experts and more than adequate teachers in the classroom. This can be a tough endeavor as people like to teach in non-traditional schools for a variety of reasons and some are not always interested in becoming teachers qua teachers. Worse are those who feel being a subject matter expert is enough because as long as they’re talking, the students must be learning, right?

Pushing metacognitive techniques in the classroom has been modestly effective, but more so for the individuals already familiar with the skills needed to be a more than adequate teacher. However, teaching metacognitive engagement is notoriously difficult because the techniques are so course and subject specific. Going beyond the basics and hoping those attending the workshops can apply the information isn’t really the best approach either.

I decided to use the notion of relevancy with the standard materials on metacognition to see if that made any difference in the reception and application of the notions behind metacognitive engagement by my faculty. The results were stunning and many who were reluctant before or who had shown clear lack of creativity in implementing the techniques got excited. The more they got excited, the more good reports I heard from the faculty members and their students.

by Steve Wyre, EdD

Read more @ http://www.facultyfocus.com/articles/faculty-development/the-importance-of-relevancy-in-improving-student-engagement-and-learning/

My students have taught me some invaluable lessons during my first two years as a college professor. I’d like to share three of the most important ones here. They aren’t new lessons and I didn’t use any unique methods to learn them. I collected data midsemester from students, I talked with them, and I looked closely at what was happening in my classroom. The lessons were there for me to learn, and taken together they have helped me think more clearly about what I want my students to know and do, and who I want them to become. They are lessons that have made me a better teacher.

Assumptions about students can be dangerous
I have learned from students that new learning can be overwhelming. Many students have great difficulty when challenged by rigorous coursework. This is especially true when the course includes activities and assignments that require students to demonstrate their knowledge. For most of their school years, success in and out of the classroom has been relatively easy for many students. When challenged by rigorous coursework, they experience fears that can be paralyzing. For some students these become insurmountable obstacles.

I complicated the problem with my assumptions about their skills, knowledge, and dispositions. There was a gap between students’ actual knowledge, skills, and attitudes and what I expected of and from them. That ended up frustrating everyone. I learned I couldn’t make assumptions about their knowledge, skills, and dispositions, and instead had to investigate what they knew and were able to do. Not doing so compromises the learning process, but with support most of my students find a measure of sustainable success.

by Candice Dowd Barnes, PhD

Read more @ http://www.facultyfocus.com/articles/teaching-and-learning/lessons-learned-from-my-students/

Gee Mojina & Elixer from Sabah

KOTA KINABALU: The 7th Kota Kinabalu Jazz Festival will be held from June 14 – 15 at the covered tennis court of Sutera Harbour Resort here.

Performances start from 7pm till 11pm.

The event is featured on the Sabah Tourism’s calendar and has become a signature music event in Kota Kinabalu.

“The festival is a collaboration of the Rotary Club of Kota Kinabalu and the Society of Performing Arts.

“And, funds raised for the festival are for charitable projects of the club such as the medical outreach avoidable blindness projects or improving clean water for rural communities, among others”, says Jack Ong, the festival’s organising chairman.

This year’s festival features more international bands from as far as Canada, Italy, Australia and Philippines.

Among the bands performing at the festival this time around are Moscow Fish from Canada, Humanfolk and Mia Palencia in Good Company from the Philippines and Sabah’s Gee Mojina & Elixer.

Read more @ http://www.newsabahtimes.com.my/nstweb/fullstory/69278

Jong said the number was very high and has put Malaysia as the number one country in Asean for having the highest number of diabetics and sixth in the western pacific region.

“That is not an achievement to be proud of and we must all work together and help educate the public on the importance of prevention and maintenance of the disease,” he said.

During the 4th National Diabetes Conference here Friday, Jong said compared to 2006 where only 8.6 percent adults in Malaysia had diabetes, the most recent study done in 2011 showed 15.2 percent adults were diabetic.

Also present at the conference was Director of Medical Development department in the Health Ministry, Datuk Dr Azmi Shapie and the Malaysian Diabetes Association (MDA) President, Professor Datuk Dr Ikram Shah Ismail.

Dr Ikram Shah said Malaysia had surpassed the World Health Organisation’s estimation of 807,000 diabetics in 2025.

He added that diabetes was a chronic disease that can be prevented and for those affected, diabetes can be managed to delay or prevent its complications.

Meanwhile, Dr Azmi advised Malaysians to prevent, manage diabetes and its complications by maintaining a healthy lifestyle and making better choices in their diet.

He added that blindness, kidney failure, gangrene leading to amputations and heart disease are complications that can be prevented by making better choices and having a balanced diet.

Read  more @ http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2013/6/14/nation/20130614132745&sec=nation

RIGHT across the education  system there have been efforts to develop potentialities of individuals to the fullest, as there have been efforts to build the nation.

There have always been the twin efforts to use the education system to focus on individual competencies, for the sake of the individual, and for the sake of the nation.

Beyond basic literacies of reading, writing, numeracy, and moral development, there are other literacies.

Of the new literacies, information communication technology (ICT, or digital literacy) is considered most important.

Over the years, particularly from the 1990s, Malaysia has invested abundantly to ensure that Malaysians are IT literate.

At the school level across the education system, there are the groupings of core subjects related to the fundamental literacies.

Schools and universities offer communicative foreign languages such as Japanese, Mandarin, French, German, Thai and Vietnamese as well.

Actually, if there are positive attitudes towards other people, languages and language learning, Malaysians have the opportunity to be polyglots. The opportunities in Malaysia are much more than available to those in relatively homogenous, monolingual nations.

Over two decades ago, a compulsory course on Islamic Civilisation was offered in universities. The curriculum revision led to the formulation of a new course on Islamic and Asian Civilisation.

The focus is on civilisational knowledge, with emphasis on the great civilisations, and dialogue on the future of civilisations.

With the expansion of higher education and the implementation of the policy of democratisation of education, there has been an increase in the number of graduates.

The powerful leaders of industry and employers as a whole gave feedback that graduates are lacking in what has been termed soft skills or global skills.

The response by the government to the challenges of unemployment, particularly of public university graduates, was to provide undergraduates with soft skills while they are studying or to continue to provide them such soft skills after they have graduated.

The compulsory subjects across the school system into tertiary education are different levels of Malay, Islamic Studies, Moral Education, and Malaysian Studies.

The ongoing revisions of the compulsory subjects to become the general education subjects at university level leads to the emergence or reemergence of such subjects as Ethnic Relations, Employability Skills, Presentation Skills, Community Service and Curriculum, Entrepreneurship, Critical and Creative Thinking, Study Skills, Psychology and Interpersonal Relations, Personal Development Skills, Personal Financial Planning Skills and even Stress Management Skills.

The offerings are somewhat like the Liberal Arts offering without clear and integrated philosophy regarding the compulsory subjects, as well as the electives.

Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department Datuk Paul Low said the country needed to move towards a more “disclosure kind of government”.

“Firstly, while information concerning national security should be protected, there are some countries like India that do well with having freedom of information.

“Secondly, as the Government, we should admit to our mistakes and not deny them,” he said during a discussion titled “Growth and Compe­titiveness in Malaysia: A Blueprint For Sustainable Transformative Development”.

The discussion was one of the sessions under Skrine’s 50th Anniver­sary Conference at the Sime Darby Convention Centre here yesterday.

Low said the Government needed to take responsibility for its mistakes and rectify them.

“However, we have quite an unforgiving public and this, too, must be corrected,” he added.

Low said he still needed to examine how he could push for better access to information for Malay­sians.

On improving education standards, he said politics must be completely removed from the education system as it was an impediment.

“We must also make sure teachers are better trained and give them higher salaries,” he said.

On the improved standard operating procedures (SOPs) for police lock-ups nationwide, Low said any improvement on the current system was good and he commended the police for this.

Bukit Aman management director Comm Datuk Mortadza Nazarene had said police were looking into assigning medical officers to lock-ups and installing high-definition CCTV cameras at lock-ups, which would be monitored round the clock.

During the discussion, Universiti Malaya’s Prof Edmund Terence Gomez said Malaysia needed to have institutional reforms, including allowing the Election Commission and Attorney-General’s Chambers to be independent bodies.

by Yuen Mei Keng.

Read more @ http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2013/6/14/nation/13237266&sec=nation

The relocation is also to enable its joint partner, Golden Wave Sd Bhd (Golden Wave) to enter the site to start construction works on the said terminal and its supporting facilities. Mayor Datuk Abidin Madingkir said initial plans was to relocate the bus operators from wawasan bus terminal to the three proposed permanent sites; the Northern bus terminal, eastern bus terminal and Southern bus terminal. Nevertheless, this was impossible as the terminals are yet to be constructed.

He added that the temporary bus routes which have been distributed to all bus operators associations in the city were then chosen and agreed upon by all the relevant Federal and state agencies.

He also said that the decision was made after a series of meetings in the working committee chaired by him (Mayor) which involves the Commercial Vehicle Licensing Board (CVLB), Traffic division of the ministry of Infrastructure Development, Road Transport Department (RTD), the police Traffic Division, PUSPAKOM and road Transport Department.

Due considerations to all factors, especially the comfort and safety aspects of the users, income of the bus operators and interruptions to the present bus services were taken into account before making a decision of the proposed routes. Other deciding factors which includes the traffic congestion in the city as well as to create minimal changes to the bus services when the KK Public Transport master plan is implemented.

Madingkir said the proposed temporary bus routes, entering and exiting from the city was also tabled at the CVLB meeting chaired by Datuk Teo Chee Kang last year November.

With these temporary routes, buses are only allowed to drop and pick-up passengers at the bus stop located in the city. In addition, the bus operators are not supposed to park and wait at the bus station. Two major bus stations with adequate ‘lay-by’ for dropping and picking-up point will also benefit both the commuters and buses.

Read more @ http://www.newsabahtimes.com.my/nstweb/fullstory/69203

This is in response to de­­­­mands by express bus operators for a 30% fare increase to cover rising costs.

Fomca secretary-general Datuk Paul Selvaraj said the Government lacked a comprehensive and long-term solution to tackle transit issues, adding that the authorities should expect more such episodes in the future.

“We keep jumping from one crisis to another. You may allow a raise now, but it’s a short-term solution. After that, we’re going to wait for the next thing, then it’s back to square one,” he said.

He said operators had been faced rising costs for many years and many had to close shop after they couldn’t cope with the losses.

Selvaraj said some countries maintained transit services by subsidising operators’ costs.

“Their governments decide what the expected revenue is for each route and subsidise them,” he said, adding that these routes would be given to operators which provided the best service.

Islamic Consumers Association of Malaysia secretary-general Datuk Dr Maamor Osman suggested that an independent body be formed to work out the real transit costs and what the Government needed to pay in return.

“They have to look into what the real costs and prices should be,” he said.

by Patrick Lee.

Read more @ http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2013/6/14/nation/13238675&sec=nation

No one will bat an eyelid at the findings of this nationwide study by the university’s communications department headed by Prof Datuk Seri Dr Syed Arabi Idid.

Are we surprised? Hardly.

The reasons are clear enough. Crime has become such a pervasive part of our everyday existence that even if the statistics tell us that there has been a decrease in crime, we will declare otherwise.

We can argue about perception and reality but we cannot deny the real-life happenings that involve the criminals and the victims.

Serious crimes involving the use of firearms seem so rampant that we can be forgiven for thinking that we are truly one of those liberal countries where there is no death penalty for such offences.

And what about the so-called petty crimes? Snatch thieves blatantly carry out their deeds in broad daylight in the heart of the city during rush hours.

Residents who used to enjoy an early morning walk around the neighbourhood are hesitant to do so now because, for these criminals, even a small gold chain is easy money for them.

Even the safety of the home is compromised with incidents of parang-wielding gangs storming into houses to loot and harm.

The Star says.

Read more @ http://thestar.com.my/columnists/story.asp?col=thestarsays&file=/2013/6/12/columnists/thestarsays/13226445&sec=The%20Star%20Says

ACCORDING to Section 3 of the Police Act, the Malaysian police are there for the “maintenance of law and order, the preservation of the peace and security of Malaysia, the prevention and detection of crime, the apprehension and prosecution of offenders and the collection of security intelligence”.

There is nothing in the Act to suggest that the duties of the PDRM are listed in order of importance, but surely it was not chance that has “the maintenance of law and order” as first on the list.

It is only by upholding the law that the police obtain their moral authority to do what they do.

Policemen, both men and women are citizens like us, but they have powers beyond any one of us.

If I wondered around town carrying a gun, apprehending people, locking them up and interrogating them, then I am likely to get done in for possession of a dangerous weapon, kidnapping, false imprisonment and assault.

Not so our men and women in blue.

And the distinction between them and me is that they are authorised by the law to do what they are doing and they are, supposedly, bound by the rules of the law when they do these things.

If there is no respect for the law on their part, then there is absolutely no difference between them and any other ordinary gun-totting criminal or kidnapper.

All the duties that they have, as covered under the Police Act, therefore, must be carried out in accordance with the law.

We are not living in a cheap movie world where the cops have some sort of divine authority to do whatever they want to fight crime.

by Azmi Shjarom.

Read more @ http://thestar.com.my/columnists/story.asp?col=bravenewworld&file=/2013/6/12/columnists/bravenewworld/13226031&sec=Brave%20New%20World