The Thai Education System is Failing its Students

[webfact]

The Thai Education System is Failing its Students

 

BANGKOK: -- The Thai education system has recently been featured in the Economist, the article discussed Thailand’s international education rankings in the recently released Program for International Student Assessment (PISA).

 

Thailand’s scores have plunged to an overall ranking of 54 out of 70 assessed countries. PISA have found that one-third of Thailand’s 15-year-olds were “functionally illiterate.”

 

I recently took my family to a Thai school in the outer provinces. We went there to donate school supplies, money, and provide lunch for all the students at the school. We were expecting a couple of hundred children but only about half of the children were present.

 

Full story: http://www.chiangraitimes.com/the-thai-education-system-is-failing-its-students.html

 

-- © Copyright Chiang Rai Times 2017-03-02

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Minister laments poor Thai scores in PISA tests
By The Nation

 

 

SCORES OF Thai students in the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) have not improved in 16 years, Education Minister Theerakiat Jareonsettasin said, calling it a failure of previous attempts to solve problems.

 

Addressing directors of education from across the country in Bangkok on Tuesday, Theerakiat said that since Thai students joined the PISA test in 2000, their scores have been stagnant and the gap between a high scorer and a low scorer was only 200 points – from a high of 550 points to a low of 350.

 

He said the country needed to improve the state of thousands of schools that were in the “intensive care unit”.

Informing the directors about the ministry’s educational reform policy and direction, Theerakiat said that teacher development would not be linked to academic standing.

 

Full story: http://www.nationmultimedia.com/news/national/30307672

 

-- © Copyright The Nation 2017-03-02

[Nigeone]

They could stop educating all the students tomorrow, spend 2 years setting up a Education system based on leading nations in the West and the students would still be 50% more intelligent than the current joke attempt to teach. It's not going to happen though despite the money that's poured at it. To many hands in troughs and ineffective teachers and teaching methods involved . Very sad as the potential is massive  

[trogers]

Only half the students turned up...

 

The other half was too busy with their extracurricular activities on their motorcycles, experimenting with sex and drugs...

[taichiplanet]

the best way to control the masses is not to educate them; the plan seems to be working well then.

[Lingba]

where do you start??? maybe with getting teachers who teach instead of beating kids................  the education system in Thailand is abysmal...but Thailand prefers to have the population dumbed down...this way there is no one educated enough to question things

[stud858]

One great thing that should happen is that every classroom should be enclosed in a quiet environment with air conditioning. Just needs actioning. That would be my first step. Tick it off the list and move on to teaching method.

 

[dinsdale]

50 students in one class, overworked and underpaid teachers, not enough teachers,  too many out of class activities, corruption, antiquated teaching methods..............

Edited March 2, 2017 by dinsdale

[IMA_FARANG]

The real problem is that Thai students are never taught to ask their teachers the question WHY.

Students are being presented with packaged answers and not ever asked why those answer are correct or HOW those answers relate to the wider world outside the classroom.

True education is not facts or answers , but why and how to use that knowledge.

thinking is dangerous.

 

[Emster23]

The Thai Education System is Failing it’s Students

This is news?

[rodney earl]

I dont think the Thai government and the people in power want to change anything, they are happy with a lot of people being treated like mushrooms.

[trogers]

23 minutes ago, IMA_FARANG said:

The real problem is that Thai students are never taught to ask their teachers the question WHY.

Students are being presented with packaged answers and not ever asked why those answer are correct or HOW those answers relate to the wider world outside the classroom.

True education is not facts or answers , but why and how to use that knowledge.

thinking is dangerous.

 

You cannot teach people who do not turn up.

 

Don't worry about their ability to question. They have lots of practice at home with their parents.

 

With the "No-Fail" educational policy, they do not even need to attend classes nor sit for tests to get their graduation papers. That's why they have lots of time for extracurricular activities.

Edited March 2, 2017 by trogers

[whatawonderfulday]

6 minutes ago, Emster23 said:

The Thai Education System is Failing it’s Students

This is news?

More accurate to state that it has failed the students.  Failed them decades ago  when the powers to be, due to their connections, decided that a poorly educatedand  brainwashed populace, could be of more use to their exploitive business empires than what they would be had they been educated well.

 

 

[colinneil]

41 minutes ago, dinsdale said:

50 students in one class, overworked and underpaid teachers, not enough teachers,  too many out of class activities, corruption, antiquated teaching methods..............

 

Where do you get them facts from?

Not every school has 50 students in 1 class, or not enough teachers.

Some schools have too many teachers, school near me has 6 teachers 51 students, so your figures do not work here.

[bmore99]

PISA have found that one-third of Thailand’s 15-year-olds were “functionally illiterate.”

It's always the teacher's; the parent's; the system's or whatever's fault ...

And nobody ever thought of simplifying the overcomplicated Thai writing system? Separate the words; write hidden vowels; straight forward tone marks; unique consonants and vowels per sound; etc. In other words phonetic Thai.

Even highly educated Thai take a very long time in reading an article in Thai compared to Western people reading in their language.

[mikebell]

55 minutes ago, Emster23 said:

The Thai Education System is Failing it’s Students

This is news?

Shame there is a punctuation error in a headline about educational failure.

[alfalfa19]

its

[alfalfa19]

1 minute ago, mikebell said:

Shame there is a punctuation error in a headline about educational failure.

you beat me to it.  seems they are failing more than the students. 

[dinsdale]

29 minutes ago, colinneil said:

Where do you get them facts from?

Not every school has 50 students in 1 class, or not enough teachers.

Some schools have too many teachers, school near me has 6 teachers 51 students, so your figures do not work here.

Well yes it's a bit of a generalisation but I've been teaching here for 14 yrs and have taught in and seen many over crowded classrooms. Are you a teacher? How many schools have you been in? How many teachers do you know? Please let us all know how experienced you are in this matter.

[jwest10]

8 minutes ago, dinsdale said:

Well yes it's a bit of a generalisation but I've been teaching here for 14 yrs and have taught in and seen many over crowded classrooms. Are you a teacher? How many schools have you been in? How many teachers do you know? Please let us all know how experienced you are in this matter.

 

Wow whereabouts is this and have had anything way past 50 students

[Lingba]

1 hour ago, IMA_FARANG said:

The real problem is that Thai students are never taught to ask their teachers the question WHY.

Students are being presented with packaged answers and not ever asked why those answer are correct or HOW those answers relate to the wider world outside the classroom.

True education is not facts or answers , but why and how to use that knowledge.

thinking is dangerous.

 

very well said..however IMO the gov't does not want educated people capable of questioning anything..thus WHY and HOW is not encouraged

[The Old Bull]

55 minutes ago, bmore99 said:

PISA have found that one-third of Thailand’s 15-year-olds were “functionally illiterate.”

It's always the teacher's; the parent's; the system's or whatever's fault ...

And nobody ever thought of simplifying the overcomplicated Thai writing system? Separate the words; write hidden vowels; straight forward tone marks; unique consonants and vowels per sound; etc. In other words phonetic Thai.

Even highly educated Thai take a very long time in reading an article in Thai compared to Western people reading in their language.

The Frenchmen sorted out the Laos language before they left , made it much easier than Thai.

[jaltsc]

"Thai Education"

 

Now there's an oxymoron if ever there was one.

Edited March 2, 2017 by jaltsc

[ChrisY1]

We can complain all we want about the serious shortcoming of the Thai education system.....but we also need to be mindful that the ruling elitists want it that way.....it's always been this way and there seems no change on the way, while the wealthy will keep sending their kids to international schooling.

The middle class kids go to Uni here and finally graduate from these mass populated institutions, with a "degree"....

The poor get little and are meant to stay in the rice fields!

Although education is supposedly allocated the biggest share of the budget, it obviously isn't spent on education...and if it is on schools, then there's very little evidence.

[chainarong]

The Thai education system has been in trouble for decades, just another statement of thousands that will be ignored and swept under the carpet, while Thailand stay's an emerging economy, which it has been for the last thirty years it wont improve in any area, the standard of education can be reflected in the standard of their school buildings, one possible way to improve the budget for education is to get their priorities right for a change and axe 75% of the military.............................................. 

[jaltsc]

2 hours ago, IMA_FARANG said:

The real problem is that Thai students are never taught to ask their teachers the question WHY.

Students are being presented with packaged answers and not ever asked why those answer are correct or HOW those answers relate to the wider world outside the classroom.

True education is not facts or answers , but why and how to use that knowledge.

thinking is dangerous.

 

I taught on Taiwan at a college and was perplexed why no one ever asked any questions. The reason had more to do with archaic/Asian tradition than anything else. It is accepted that the teacher possesses knowledge, and if a student does not understand something that is said, it is the student's fault. Asking questions will make the teacher lose face. I did my best to encourage the students to ask questions when it was obvious that they did not fully comprehend some of the course material. No matter how much I explained that asking questions in order to fully comprehend subject matter was accepted in education, they were unable to change what they had been conditioned to do as a result of their culture....Never question people of authority. Thailand is the epitome of this mindset. 

Edited March 2, 2017 by jaltsc

[jaltsc]

1 hour ago, mikebell said:

Shame there is a punctuation error in a headline about educational failure.

Your write.

 

Sorry...I couldn't resist.

[JAG]

Where do you get them facts from?

Not every school has 50 students in 1 class, or not enough teachers.

Some schools have too many teachers, school near me has 6 teachers 51 students, so your figures do not work here.

In fairness it depends on where you are. In many rural areas falling school rolls mean fewer pupils, whereas the security of tenure for government teachers means that the number of teachers remains the same. In many urban areas, if the school is not one of the well resourced "demonstration schools" then classes are often large and facilities limited.

[johninbkk71]

1 hour ago, colinneil said:

Where do you get them facts from?

Not every school has 50 students in 1 class, or not enough teachers.

Some schools have too many teachers, school near me has 6 teachers 51 students, so your figures do not work here.

His facts are correct for many schools in cities. In Bangkok 46 is about the average anybody who has had the misfortune to teach in a Thai school can tell you this. There are schools with close to 60 students in a class in Bangkok and some have to sit on the floor as there is no room for any more desks. It maybe different in rural areas and the case you cite-maybe some of those teachers need a transfer to a school were they will be of more use. 

[Moonlover]

32 minutes ago, The Old Bull said:

The Frenchmen sorted out the Laos language before they left , made it much easier than Thai.

I'm no linguistic expert, but surely you're referring to Vietnamese rather than Laotian. The latter looks as incomprehensible to me as does Thai. But I can at least read the former, even though I don't understand it!