OBEC to quickly whip up plans to improve Thailand's education system

[wilcopops]

with a focus on instilling morality codes and analytic skills in students. - this sounds like an oxymoron to me

[spidermike007]

Any improvement would be welcome. But my suggestion is to dismantle the system entirely, and rebuild it from the ground up. Get rid of all older teachers, and administrators. Send some of the administrative staff overseas, to learn what real education looks like. Encourage all students to question the voracity of the teachers. Make sure the teachers can pass the tests they administer. Hire foreigners to teach English. Break down the broken system. Now is the best time to start. First, an admission of just how broken the system is, would go a long way towards establishing a willingness to fix it.

Spidermike

Chaiyaphum, Thailand

Sent from my iPad using Thaivisa Connect Thailand mobile app

[Strangebrew]

They should start at Not passing students unless they earned the right to be passed to next grade. teachers are required to give passing grades to all students even if there dumber than a rock. There is no reason to learn They know they will pass, But with the threat of being held back and do same grade over I think they would try harder. Slower Students can get more help to keep up.But the downside is You will have more 18 year old's in the 6th grade.

[wilcopops]

as the wording on this dictum seems to come from people who know diddly about education, I can't see how it will change anything.

[wilcopops]

You know when there is something wrong in the education system when the girl at the counter needs a calculator to figure the change for an 85 baht pack of smokes and you hand her a hundred baht note.

People still smoke?

There goes another education system.

You wimp,i get through two lighters a day

My grandad smoked 40 Capstan a day 'till the day he died........ at 42.

[wilcopops]

Seems there are lot of newly motivated high govt officials now (i.e., look boss, see the great things I'm doing) with the NCPO moving lots of officials to inactive posts. Hope the newly found motivation results in significant improvements vs just press release/committee meetings for a few months.

Dictum after dictum......not a hope of a result.

[attrayant]

...which is astounding as Thai government schools ban the use of calculators in their maths exams!! (unless it's an EP/bilingual school)

What are they supposed to do in trig and algebra? Do they have to carry books full of trig functions and log tables? That's how it was done before the slide rule and calculators were invented.

Quick: what's the sine of 225°?

Edited July 3, 2014 by attrayant

[soalbundy]

You know when there is something wrong in the education system when the girl at the counter needs a calculator to figure the change for an 85 baht pack of smokes and you hand her a hundred baht note.

People still smoke?

There goes another education system.

You wimp,i get through two lighters a day

My grandad smoked 40 Capstan a day 'till the day he died........ at 42.

i'm almost 67,we all have our examples,ex Bundeskanzler Helmut Schmidt is a chain smoker and is still fit and still works at over 90 years old,he has a girlfriend 87 also a chain smoker. I'm not saying its good for you,just don't be so high an mighty with your judgement

[billd766]

Bunch of lies. Just look at that picture of the class room. The number of students in the class room. Staged photo and more lies coming from OBEC.

How many children do YOU have in a Thai school?

My son goes to the Anuban Khampaeng Phet school on the English language program.

There are 25 in his class.

FACT.

[soalbundy]

You know when there is something wrong in the education system when the girl at the counter needs a calculator to figure the change for an 85 baht pack of smokes and you hand her a hundred baht note.

People still smoke?

There goes another education system.

You wimp,i get through two lighters a day

My grandad smoked 40 Capstan a day 'till the day he died........ at 42.

He went out with a wheeze.

[northernjohn]

Holding students accountable for their work would be one place to start helping the education system here. 100% passing of every student no matter how little he or she has done--or capable of doing--makes a mockery of education here.

What's the difference if the teacher can't teach in the first place.

this idea of holding them back just promotes the idea of the system is good it is the child's fault.

"wrong" It is the whole systems fault.

Edit

There are plenty of students doing the work and passing who still don't know any thing.

that is not true in many cases where the parents step in and help the children with real education. My hat is off to them.

Edited July 3, 2014 by northernjohn

[northernjohn]

...which is astounding as Thai government schools ban the use of calculators in their maths exams!! (unless it's an EP/bilingual school)

What are they supposed to do in trig and algebra? Do they have to carry books full of trig functions and log tables? That's how it was done before the slide rule and calculators were invented.

Quick: what's the sine of 225°?

Do they even know what those subjects are.

[wilcopops]

here we go - education and everyone's a frigggin' expert!

[billd766]

You know when there is something wrong in the education system when the girl at the counter needs a calculator to figure the change for an 85 baht pack of smokes and you hand her a hundred baht note.

People still smoke?

There goes another education system.

You wimp,i get through two lighters a day

My grandad smoked 40 Capstan a day 'till the day he died........ at 42.

My mate smoked Capstan full strength at about the same rate until his doctor asked if his young children would be going to his funeral. He quit cold turkey that day about 40 years ago and he is now 73 with grandchildren. My Mum used to smoke until she was 65 and she died of lung cancer at 69.

[TPI]

But still not a whisper about every student passing every year. It was not always like that -- the policy was put in place for private schools, who were losing students when students were accountable for their own progress.

This corruption is insanely expensive, and why Thailand simultaneously has the largest education budget in SEA and the lowest result.

They use public taxes to subsidize private schools, and such schools get paid per student. Very little goes to classrooms and books and upkeep -- it is lining pockets.

No words from the junta on this issue -- never was before and never will be. Ten years of this educational "subsidy" has siphoned off more money than the rice scheme lost, by a large margin....

Mr FF it's not often I agree with you but this topic has been buzzing for the last 15 or so years! The situation where school directors can drain a schools bank account, present the money to the regional office, and receive a transfer to a better school on the back of it has been going on for years.

This cynical corruption has damaged the system and the students it is supposed to educate, the sooner "someone" can get their teeth into this shameful action either "never fail" or the theft of school funds the better everyone will be!

So there!

[TPI]

You know when there is something wrong in the education system when the girl at the counter needs a calculator to figure the change for an 85 baht pack of smokes and you hand her a hundred baht note.

Are you kidding? It's the same in the US. They dont know how to count either, they only give you what the

cash register shows them. I gave a girl in the US a $10 bill, she made a mistake

and rang it up as a $100 bill and she was giving me change for $100. I tried to tell her and

she still wasn't getting it. I dont know much about the Thai school system but the US has problems too,

maybe not as bad as here.

I am happy to see the Junta is moving forward with long over due changes. I do hope this continues.

It's nice to see how much that can get done when politics are not involved.

What planet are you from? Such a girl would be employed for not more than ten minutes. Ug, not able to count money and give change......you are a liar. You tried to tell her...NO ONE believes that story.

And after I just got through complimenting you! The Op's experience was repeated during my last trip to Oz, the amount was smaller but the outcome was the same! If kids can't do it on their ipad they just don't know.

By the way Mr FF......calm down, the money will be paid as usual!

[Shaunduhpostman]

Who are they kidding talking about "whipping up a plan?"

[wilcopops]

There goes another education system.

You wimp,i get through two lighters a day

My grandad smoked 40 Capstan a day 'till the day he died........ at 42.

i'm almost 67,we all have our examples,ex Bundeskanzler Helmut Schmidt is a chain smoker and is still fit and still works at over 90 years old,he has a girlfriend 87 also a chain smoker. I'm not saying its good for you,just don't be so high an mighty with your judgement

What I find so ironic is that you appear not to realise how facile your reply is.

[soalbundy]

How could i? I didn't know what facile meant until i looked it up

[mok199]

i believe some thais are eager to learn and given the proper curiculum they would appreciate the chance to broden their knowledge ,but english is a must .,After spending 12 years myself leaning to read write and speak thai,i can say this about thier language( and most other asian languages),at best thai is repetitive and elementary AT BEST.....at its worst, it is repetitive and crude,and the voice ''pitch'' sounds like a pack of wild boars fighting over an old zebra carcass.thier is nothing beautyful, romantic or elequint about this language...i still dont undersatnd why english isnt spoken more amongst the local educated thais,i never see a group speaking english..thailand is stuck,and the only way to fix it is to let go of the past,,thais love thier confort zone,inside it they are safe ,in control and the best at everything,because when you live blind and in fear you never have to change....or just live by the credo''the more i know ,the less i understand''..thailand needs a ''complete makeover''i say'',love your country, embrasse your culture,use your ethinc language,but,the future is now,dont get left behind''..thias are talented and resourceful people they deserve much better education than the system offers...we have a newborn and my wife speaks very little english,i have warned her about this ''kap'' bullsh*t,''kap''kap''...god it is pathetic'''the only time my boy will ever say ''cap''is when it follows the word''baseball''..as in ''baseball cap''....am i alone here thinking this way...thais have become to lazy to even say the words, ''chai'' yes, or ''mai chai'' no .....now it is ''ahhhhhhh'' one long grunt for yes and ''ahh''one short grunt for no....the word ''yes'' is beautyful,it rings and chimes and sounds like music...''yesssssss''...

Edited July 4, 2014 by mok199

[soalbundy]

i believe some thais are eager to learn and given the proper curiculum they would appreciate the chance to broden their knowledge ,but english is a must .,After spending 12 years myself leaning to read write and speak thai,i can say this about thier language( and most other asian languages),at best thai is repetitive and elementary AT BEST.....at its worst, it is repetitive and crude,and the voice ''pitch'' sounds like a pack of wild boars fighting over an old zebra carcass.thier is nothing beautyful, romantic or elequint about this language...i still dont undersatnd why english isnt spoken more amongst the local educated thais,i never see a group speaking english..thailand is stuck,and the only way to fix it is to let go of the past,,thais love thier confort zone,inside it they are safe ,in control and the best at everything,because when you live blind and in fear you never have to change....or just live by the credo''the more i know ,the less i understand''..thailand needs a ''complete makeover''i say'',love your country, embrasse your culture,use your ethinc language,but,the future is now,dont get left behind''..thias are talented and resourceful people they deserve much better education than the system offers...we have a newborn and my wife speaks very little english,i have warned her about this ''kap'' bullsh*t,''kap''kap''...god it is pathetic'''the only time my boy will ever say ''cap''is when it follows the word''baseball''..as in ''baseball cap''....am i alone here thinking this way...thais have become to lazy to even say the words, ''chai'' yes, or ''mai chai'' no .....now it is ''ahhhhhhh'' one long grunt for yes and ''ahh''one short grunt for no....the word ''yes'' is beautyful,it rings and chimes and sounds like music...''yesssssss''...

Every language is beautiful in its own right when spoken correctly. English spoken by Richard Burton is a joy to listen to whereas the London accent which is spreading around the country is painful to the ears. The German spoken in Munich is pleasant,German spoken in Frankfurt makes me wish i was deaf. The run of the mill Thais speaks very quickly and they have no time to use the correct tone,at least to my ears, which is why they use two or three verbs for the same action instead of one so that there is no mistaking what is meant. Thai spoken correctly is beautiful especially when spoken by a woman.

[jaideeguy]

"OBEC to quickly whip up plans to improve Thailand's education system"

The headline says it all in that it will be just another hastily unthought out process instead of a careful, well thought out plan to really fix a broken system.........................just another 'band aid' to repair decades of corruption, inept teachers and a system that is designed to pump out obedient robots for the factories, service and tourist industries. Teach the kids to think......................outside the box and stress that more than the dress code.

Oh, and dump the dummy teachers and make them push brooms for the school system clean the toilets and let some new blood in to the archaic system of tenure.

Oh, and teach them that the Thai language is USELESS outside of this little 'bubble' in SE Asia. Thai should be a 2nd language and English the 1st, the world has accepted English as the language of science, medicine, law, love, travel, and more. Where else is Thai a useful tool other than watching Thai soap operas and game shows??

my 2 satang............

Edited July 5, 2014 by jaideeguy

[soalbundy]

"OBEC to quickly whip up plans to improve Thailand's education system"

The headline says it all in that it will be just another hastily unthought out process instead of a careful, well thought out plan to really fix a broken system.........................just another 'band aid' to repair decades of corruption, inept teachers and a system that is designed to pump out obedient robots for the factories, service and tourist industries. Teach the kids to think......................outside the box and stress that more than the dress code.

Oh, and dump the dummy teachers and make them push brooms for the school system clean the toilets and let some new blood in to the archaic system of tenure.

Oh, and teach them that the Thai language is USELESS outside of this little 'bubble' in SE Asia. Thai should be a 2nd language and English the 1st, the world has accepted English as the language of science, medicine, law, love, travel, and more. Where else is Thai a useful tool other than watching Thai soap operas and game shows??

my 2 satang............

That is ridiculous, you can't expect a country to give up its language or push it into second place because so few people speak it outside of their country. Language,more than buildings and history,is a heritage which forms the people,it is who they are.What about Myanmar,Cambodia,Laos,Malaya,Korea etc. are they also to relegate their language to second place ?

[mok199]

i believe some thais are eager to learn and given the proper curiculum they would appreciate the chance to broden their knowledge ,but english is a must .,After spending 12 years myself leaning to read write and speak thai,i can say this about thier language( and most other asian languages),at best thai is repetitive and elementary AT BEST.....at its worst, it is repetitive and crude,and the voice ''pitch'' sounds like a pack of wild boars fighting over an old zebra carcass.thier is nothing beautyful, romantic or elequint about this language...i still dont undersatnd why english isnt spoken more amongst the local educated thais,i never see a group speaking english..thailand is stuck,and the only way to fix it is to let go of the past,,thais love thier confort zone,inside it they are safe ,in control and the best at everything,because when you live blind and in fear you never have to change....or just live by the credo''the more i know ,the less i understand''..thailand needs a ''complete makeover''i say'',love your country, embrasse your culture,use your ethinc language,but,the future is now,dont get left behind''..thias are talented and resourceful people they deserve much better education than the system offers...we have a newborn and my wife speaks very little english,i have warned her about this ''kap'' bullsh*t,''kap''kap''...god it is pathetic'''the only time my boy will ever say ''cap''is when it follows the word''baseball''..as in ''baseball cap''....am i alone here thinking this way...thais have become to lazy to even say the words, ''chai'' yes, or ''mai chai'' no .....now it is ''ahhhhhhh'' one long grunt for yes and ''ahh''one short grunt for no....the word ''yes'' is beautyful,it rings and chimes and sounds like music...''yesssssss''...

Every language is beautiful in its own right when spoken correctly. English spoken by Richard Burton is a joy to listen to whereas the London accent which is spreading around the country is painful to the ears. The German spoken in Munich is pleasant,German spoken in Frankfurt makes me wish i was deaf. The run of the mill Thais speaks very quickly and they have no time to use the correct tone,at least to my ears, which is why they use two or three verbs for the same action instead of one so that there is no mistaking what is meant. Thai spoken correctly is beautiful especially when spoken by a woman.

i agree,a totally different langauge used on the street as compared with a formal gathering...

[MarkCyr]

Educational change should take time and planning and be done in cooperation with the teachers and curriculum planners who will be implementing the plan. They need to be on board with it, otherwise it won't work, no matter how often they tell teachers to vaguely "improve their teaching skills." Snap educational reform just never works, ever.

[inutil]

One of the stranger parts of Thai education for me (of many strange parts). were the scheduling of classes. It may have been my main school. but classes were an hour long (way too long for primary and middle school children), but the next class started immediately following the first one. There was no scheduled break. Its curious when you think about the clear disruption this invariably causes with students either rushing to a room, or the teacher rushing from class to class. It sets a certain tone that can hamper attention, focus and discipline. In my case, students had to come to my room rather than the other way around. With P1-4 this was always okay because their homeroom teacher would chaperon them and sit them down. But for P5 and above (and particularly for the M1-3 kids), it would often result in students ambling in ten minutes after the lesson had started because they went to the toilet or a teacher kept them behind, or something, or something else.

I always found that to be a strange thing. A fifty minute class, a clear ten minute break for students and teachers to prepare for the next class and then everyone is in harmony. But one hour into one hour into one hour and the lesson just seems to start on completely the wrong foot with teachers accidentally screwing over each other through a strange type of kindness. I cant count the number of times ive had to also come out of my class and ask the students waiting to please be quiet, stop tapping on the windows or trying to get my attention because Im still teaching my class. You end up with ten minutes of disruption at the start and ten minutes of disruption at the end because no one appears to be on the same page. All they would have to do is schedule a break like almost every other school system on the planet and immediately all of these issues are resolved.

As for the reforms. Meaningless nationalist pomp and ceremony reforms that will please the old people but do all to help children with their education. It genuinely infuriated me to see kids with just the same intelligence, curiosity and potential as their Japanese and Korean counterparts be flushed down the toilet due to nothing more than a broken education system that no one seems keen to touch. Ive posted plenty on it over the past. I wont add to the noise, but its far bigger than just the school itself. When students with potential end up quitting after middle school because their parents (often, rightly) see less value in their continuing education over work, then theres a deep rooted structural, cultural and economic issue that reaches way out beyond what goes on inside a school.

One of my co-teachers (and she was a phenomenal teacher) told me that three of her best students didnt go into further education the previous year DESPITE acing their tests because their families decided they couldnt afford it. As a poor working class kid with parents who nagged at me to get a job from the age of 14 and then encouraged me to quit school at 16 instead of doing my a-levels, i know all to well those pressures. If you have parents who dont see the value in education (but can always see the value in work and a pay cheque), then youre fighting an uphill battle. Throw in cultural norms which strongly defer to age and family on top of a weak, under-performing school system and its no wonder that these kids are left behind.

What to do? What to do? Theres no band aid solution here. One of the things i certainly wouldnt be focusing on though is more time devoted to patriotism and pomp and ceremony lessons to appease the crypto PTA of old grannies and grandads looking after their kids.

Edited July 5, 2014 by inutil

[taony]

i believe some thais are eager to learn and given the proper curiculum they would appreciate the chance to broden their knowledge ,but english is a must .,After spending 12 years myself leaning to read write and speak thai,i can say this about thier language( and most other asian languages),at best thai is repetitive and elementary AT BEST.....at its worst, it is repetitive and crude,and the voice ''pitch'' sounds like a pack of wild boars fighting over an old zebra carcass.thier is nothing beautyful, romantic or elequint about this language...i still dont undersatnd why english isnt spoken more amongst the local educated thais,i never see a group speaking english..thailand is stuck,and the only way to fix it is to let go of the past,,thais love thier confort zone,inside it they are safe ,in control and the best at everything,because when you live blind and in fear you never have to change....or just live by the credo''the more i know ,the less i understand''..thailand needs a ''complete makeover''i say'',love your country, embrasse your culture,use your ethinc language,but,the future is now,dont get left behind''..thias are talented and resourceful people they deserve much better education than the system offers...we have a newborn and my wife speaks very little english,i have warned her about this ''kap'' bullsh*t,''kap''kap''...god it is pathetic'''the only time my boy will ever say ''cap''is when it follows the word''baseball''..as in ''baseball cap''....am i alone here thinking this way...thais have become to lazy to even say the words, ''chai'' yes, or ''mai chai'' no .....now it is ''ahhhhhhh'' one long grunt for yes and ''ahh''one short grunt for no....the word ''yes'' is beautyful,it rings and chimes and sounds like music...''yesssssss''...

You make a lot of good points. I think generally Thai language is not expressive enough for it to keep up with other countries. As I am earning Chinese, I am surprised to see that the grammar is much more complex, I was expecting it to be less so. And when sentences are being translated and explained, you find that there are two or three different ways to express something and you see that each way has a slightly different and meaning. Japanese and Korean are even more complex and you can see where these four countries are on their development time line.

As for 'krap', you also make good points. My 3 year old daughter is being pounded into submission over this ka and waiing stuff. I hate it. It has no meaning when it is a rote response. I don't want her to grow up to be one of these oblivious ***** you see all over the place. Carrying their shopping talking on the mobile, rush to be the first in the elevator and then stand there in front of the panel after she presses the button for her floor. What the hell are the rest of us supposed to do you ***? Have to ask permission for you to get out of the way?? "But I was saying ka!!". I almost ran you over with my car? "But I said KA!! Why are you upset!!!??" Thais are incredibly rude all over the place, we could have sixteen threads listing examples. Saying ka, waiing, without the sentiment it is supposed to carry - it means nothing.

[jaideeguy]

"OBEC to quickly whip up plans to improve Thailand's education system"

The headline says it all in that it will be just another hastily unthought out process instead of a careful, well thought out plan to really fix a broken system.........................just another 'band aid' to repair decades of corruption, inept teachers and a system that is designed to pump out obedient robots for the factories, service and tourist industries. Teach the kids to think......................outside the box and stress that more than the dress code.

Oh, and dump the dummy teachers and make them push brooms for the school system clean the toilets and let some new blood in to the archaic system of tenure.

Oh, and teach them that the Thai language is USELESS outside of this little 'bubble' in SE Asia. Thai should be a 2nd language and English the 1st, the world has accepted English as the language of science, medicine, law, love, travel, and more. Where else is Thai a useful tool other than watching Thai soap operas and game shows??

my 2 satang............

That is ridiculous, you can't expect a country to give up its language or push it into second place because so few people speak it outside of their country. Language,more than buildings and history,is a heritage which forms the people,it is who they are.What about Myanmar,Cambodia,Laos,Malaya,Korea etc. are they also to relegate their language to second place ?

OK, I'll back down on English as a first language altho in the Philippines, English is unofficially the most common language because of all the dialects and Tagalog is the official language, but half the country doesn't speak it. I will amend my statement to be that more Native English speaking teachers are desperately needed and all the science subjects should be taught in English .............to open more doors to the students.

[connda]

The best thing that OBEC can do is to retire all the teachers over 50 thus freeing up promotion for younger and more modern teachers, set in place a new high quality teacher training university and then resign en masse as most of them are as much use to educating Thai children as a bicycle is to a fish (to put it politely).

I met a gal in Chiang Mai working in a restaurant. Her English rocked. I could pick out an American accent. Asked if she had an American boyfriend. Nope. She go to University? Yep. What's her degree? Education. Why you working in a restaurant? "I don't know." Valley Girl -- rock on! I was impressed.

I've taught English to Thai teachers. I've never been very impressed. Serious subject matter just doesn't seem to sink in, but boy were 99% of them excited about learning how to do "The Chicken Dance" and "The Hocky Pocky".

Then I meet this gal serving beer and sandwiches for a living and she sounds like she's from North Hollywood, and has a degree in Education -- and is serving beer and sandwiches.......?

What am I missing here?

It's probably the same as me offering to teach the local teachers in the Amphur for free if the school assigns someone (i.e., secretary) to work directly with me and the Thai Labor Office to get my Work Permit to allow me to volunteer. Open offer that nobody will take me up on. <Polite laugh and broken English from puuyai> hee hee hee Farang funny. Teach student good. Teach kruu rah? hee hee hee. No need work permit. You teach nak rian dai mai? hee hee hee

So I'm not missing anything. Thais collectively and individuals don't want to risk failure in any way, shape, or form. And Thailand will continue to suck at English until they break that mold, starting with their own teachers and curriculum. And I agree with billd766. It's time to do some housecleaning in the Education Department. Progressive administrators would be a good start, followed by progressive teachers with demonstrable English language teaching skills.

[wilcopops]

How could i? I didn't know what facile meant until i looked it up

QED!