National Reform Steering Assembly hears report on education reform

BANGKOK, 17 May 2016 (NNT) - The National Reform Steering Assembly (NRSA) has deliberated its committee’s report on education reform, which offered solutions to the issue of declining O-NET scores.

The assembly considered the issues of teacher development, particularly the issue of declining O-NET scores, as well as reforming education legislation and the draft National Education Act.

Chairman of the NRSA committee on education reform Wiwat Salyakamthorn said the continuous decline of O-NET scores has been the result the current inability to train and develop teachers that can effectively instill students with learning and thinking skills.

The committee therefore proposed curriculums that emphasized skill development while also reforming education legislation and the draft National Education Act in an effort to make the education system more effective.


-- NNT 2016-05-17

A few weeks back I was in a bookshop and happened to see a book on English which I'm fairly certain was an O-NET one. On just one page there was a spelling mistake and 2 or 3 questions that couldn't be answered.

"particularly the issue of declining O-NET scores"

hmmm Have teachers that know how to teach and happen to know the subject matter? Fail students who fail? Drop all the extra useless activities at school and focus on learning? Promote thinking?

Is it really that difficult to figure out?

First agenda on the reform list is re-consider the centralisation system of education. High on the achievement and critical thinking in OCED's global education ranking is South Korea and Singapore which have de-centralized education system.

"particularly the issue of declining O-NET scores"

hmmm Have teachers that know how to teach and happen to know the subject matter? Fail students who fail? Drop all the extra useless activities at school and focus on learning? Promote thinking?

Is it really that difficult to figure out?

"Is it really that difficult to figure out?"

Not if you aren't Thai, but Thais aren't big on figuring stuff out, it's just not in the DNA.

Perhaps if the junket-addicted government and NGO's from Thailand were to sally forth to Finland and figure out what Finland does right and what Thailand does wrong, then the situation might be a little more hopeful,

However, the arrogance of pretending that Thais have nothing to learn from foreigners has to go first, and that just won't happen. As an ex-teacher in Thailand, I have seen first-hand what the problems are and I admit, they are way to many, way too big and way too hard for me to come up with any answer but knock it all down and have some non-Thais rebuild it. Sadly, the same applies to the justice system and the armed forces in Thailand - it's a national malaise.

The biggest problem in Thailand is it's piss-poor 14th-world education system.

I honestly have no clue how to reform Thai education without demolishing Thai culture and the increasingly ridiculous idea of 'Thainess'.

So since I have no clue, I suggest they be left to stew in their own abhorrent juice and learn how to be a stone-age society, a pariah state with no friends and nothing going for them but the weather (assuming you don't live in BKK, where the weather is horrid). Sooner or later, the wealthy classes that are at the very root of all Thailand's problems, including that of education, will hopefully get fed up with declining wealth and leave. Go and be rapacious somewhere else is my advice, Thais everywhere will love you for it.

Winnie

Edited May 17, 201610 yr by Winniedapu

How fortunate for governments that the people they administer don't think.

By the skillful and sustained use of propaganda, one can make a people see even heaven as hell or an extremely wretched life as paradise.

Universal education is the most corroding and disintegrating poison that liberalism has ever invented for its own destruction.

Doing some research into the O-NET test (a multiple choice test with 4 or 5 possible answers) I found this information from 2011;

(Bear in mind that a monkey with no formal education at all will on average score 25 % on a 4 answer MC test and 20% on a 5 answer one)

On English, 59% of students (over 200,00 of them) achieved scores in the most common range of 10 to 20 % i.e. they were unable to do better than the monkeys! (at English anyway)

On Maths, 47% (more than 160,000) achieved scores in the most common range of ) 0 -10%. i.e the average monkey would do twice as well as the test. It is almost as if they were deliberately selecting the wrong answer.

https://asiancorrespondent.com/2012/02/thai-education-part-1-ridiculous-o-net-questions/

On the Health education test this question was asked of M6 (18 y.o.) students

If you have a sexual urge, what must you do?

Interesting question, and particularly the use of the word MUST instead of might? should? could? How many 18-19 year olds never have a "sexual urge?"

Now see if you can select the correct answer from the 4 choices

A Call friends and go play football (remember that half the kids taking the test are girls)

B Talk to your family

C Go out with a friend of the opposite sex

D Invite a close friend to see a movie

at least "have a private conversation with your teacher" wasn't on there!

Now health education is one of the subjects that Thai kids do better on. the most common score that year was in the 60-70% range, so they at least know what is going through the minds of the teachers. I kind of wonder what the responses might have been if it were not an MCQ but there was a blank space for a written answer.

So teaching is a big part of the problem but testing is also a major issue. In key subjects Thais do poorly on international standardised tests too, but A LOT BETTER THAN THEY DO ON O-NET!

Once again Winnie spot on!

The problem is rooted in the culture where upper class people are thought to know everything and therefore they can tell lower class people what to do and how to think.

The elite have no interest in the masses becoming independent free thinkers.

They might wake up and throw the elite out of their positions of privilege.

That is why teachers are held up to be perfect paragons of knowledge.

If you know any teachers here you will soon realise the standard of their knowledge is quite poor, and yet they demand absolute authority over their students.

No arguments or awkward questions tolerated.

And so on it goes, the blind leading the blind while the rich and powerful (mostly educated in Europe and the US) run the country as their own private business.

Doing some research into the O-NET test (a multiple choice test with 4 or 5 possible answers) I found this information from 2011;

(Bear in mind that a monkey with no formal education at all will on average score 25 % on a 4 answer MC test and 20% on a 5 answer one)

On English, 59% of students (over 200,00 of them) achieved scores in the most common range of 10 to 20 % i.e. they were unable to do better than the monkeys! (at English anyway)

On Maths, 47% (more than 160,000) achieved scores in the most common range of ) 0 -10%. i.e the average monkey would do twice as well as the test. It is almost as if they were deliberately selecting the wrong answer.

https://asiancorrespondent.com/2012/02/thai-education-part-1-ridiculous-o-net-questions/

On the Health education test this question was asked of M6 (18 y.o.) students

If you have a sexual urge, what must you do?

Interesting question, and particularly the use of the word MUST instead of might? should? could? How many 18-19 year olds never have a "sexual urge?"

Now see if you can select the correct answer from the 4 choices

A Call friends and go play football (remember that half the kids taking the test are girls)

B Talk to your family

C Go out with a friend of the opposite sex

D Invite a close friend to see a movie

at least "have a private conversation with your teacher" wasn't on there!

Now health education is one of the subjects that Thai kids do better on. the most common score that year was in the 60-70% range, so they at least know what is going through the minds of the teachers. I kind of wonder what the responses might have been if it were not an MCQ but there was a blank space for a written answer.

So teaching is a big part of the problem but testing is also a major issue. In key subjects Thais do poorly on international standardised tests too, but A LOT BETTER THAN THEY DO ON O-NET!

That seems to back up what I said. An interesting article with the usual Thai response to criticism; we've checked it and it's OK and correct.