‘Stupid and uneducated’ people preferred' - Tunku Ismail

 

Here is a Tweet and comments I read this morning which started me pondering.

Prof. Feynman @ProfFeynman (9.8.23)

When you're stupid, you think you know everything, without questioning and when you're intelligent, you question everything you think you know.

The wisest people are often those who are open to new ideas and perspectives, even if they challenge their own beliefs. @ravisama5

Ignorance boasts unwarranted confidence; intelligence thrives on relentless questioning. @FindTimK

Maybe I'm just smart enough to know that I am not smart enough to understand how one can be both stupid and intelligent simultaneously! @Naveen_Srini_

The question is, are intelligent educators making stupid statements without thinking or are they puppets of puppeteers with a vested interest?

 

I am reminded of an article I read yesterday on an online news portal. 

‘Stupid and uneducated’ people preferred, Tunku Ismail told…

In an excerpt of an exclusive interview posted on the Southern Tigers Facebook page today, Tunku Ismail, who is the Crown Prince of Johor, revealed this shocking answer when he said, “I have questioned a certain important individual, why can’t we improve the education levels?

“The individual answered that it was for two simple reasons, the first is to obtain votes.

“And the second is to make it easy to control the minds of the stupid and uneducated.”

 

Is this why our Education Minister, Fadhlina Sidek, has not responded to my email and numerous tweets?  Read my email to MOE.  

I believe that the above applies to all the countries in the world. 

 

We all know that the simple formula for reading is:

D (Decoding) x LC (Language Comprehension) = RC (Reading Comprehension).

 

I write about why kids are unable to decode and these so-called educators keep insisting that the reasons I state are acceptable but fluency, vocabulary and comprehension are just as important. Could this be just to confuse the parents and other teachers? What has decoding to do with fluency and comprehension?

 

Educators keep saying kids are unable to blend. How are kids to blend when they have been taught the pronunciation of sounds represented by letters with extraneous sounds. Listen to the Video clip that is broadcasted over more than 100 countries. How does a child blend Fuhuhnuh. When I wrote about this many teachers said that this is just an entertainment programme. 

 

From 2010 to 2015 I wrote saying that phonological awareness deficit cannot be the cause of kids being unable to read. No one I wrote to, agreed with me. They asked me for evidence and research reports. Can’t these so-called educators think for themselves? These educators include big names such as Sally Shaywitz, David Boulton, Andrew Johnson, and Timothy Shanahan. 

Timothy Shanahan in 2015:

 

“The term dyslexia has been, justifiably, controversial, and has consequently been avoided by most reading educators—including me.

There are scads of studies revealing that dyslexia is phonological in nature. That is, students with this disorder have a particularly difficult time perceiving phonemes and coordinating this perception with the letters on the page.

Timothy Shanahan in 2017:

 “This explanation of dyslexia seems especially pertinent ….. and the only thing I would change in it now is the estimate of the phonological/phonemic awareness role in reading problems. There are some more recent data in relatively large studies suggesting a somewhat lower incidence of these problems at least with some populations; that wouldn't change the overall thrust of this much, but it would be, perhaps, more accurate.”

 

Paul Thomas who says, “I am capable of navigating research” has yet to research why millions of kids are able to read despite being taught the sounds represented by letters with extraneous sounds. LINK

I have written enough blog posts of these guys who do not respond to questions asked. Are they stupid or puppets to mislead parents and teachers around the world?