Critical thinking (Part 2)

“Surely, Scott must be aware of Finkel’s views and yet he has made no attempt to counter or rebut them.” (Greg Ashman)

The above comes as no surprise to me.

Other than the three professors no one attempted to counter or rebut my posts on my blog, Face Book or on LinkedIn.

Response to Critical thinking - Greg Ashman (Part 1)

The following is in response to an article in a Blog post byGreg Ashman

In the article above Greg said:

“You need to know a lot of stuff in order to think critically about it. It is daft to set these up in opposition. As cognitive scientist Dan Willingham suggests, a child can think critically about something she knows about and a trained scientist can fail to think critically about something she does not know about."

The National Organisation for Dyslexia AND Dyslexia Association

In my article on 3.11.2018 in response to The National Organisation for Dyslexia Malaysia’s (NOD) article in the Star Online dated 4.10.2018 I had said;

"New learning builds on previous learning. The kids who are prone to shutting down cannot transfer what they have newly learned unless they truly understand what they are learning and connect them with what they have learned."

The president of NOD, Dr. Mullai A Ramniah, did not respond.

Ministry of Communications and Multimedia - MCMM (in Malay KKMM) Malaysia

I wrote several emails to out Ministry of Education and have yet to receive any response.

I then wrote to our Minister Tuan Gobind Singh Deo and his team at Ministry of Communications and Multimedia (KKMM) on 22.10.2018. 

Not receiving any reply I wrote again on 22.11.2018 (one month after my first email).

Finally on 10.12.2018 I received a reply from Ministry of Multimedia and Communication apologizing for the late response and saying that they have forwarded the email to the party concerned which I believe is Astro.

Scout mindset or soldier mindset

Not long ago I heard a TED talk by Julia Galef on why scout mindset is crucial to good judgment.

I believe that both mentalities are important. I used the scout mentality to gather firsthand information from my students on why they were unable to read in English but were able to read in Malay and Hanyu Pinyin.

Ministry of Education of Singapore and Malaysia

                                Molding the future of our nation? What future?         

I wrote to our Malaysian Minister of Education and his deputy several times. 

AND then I wrote to both of them again together with their team members. I have yet to receive a response from them.

I wrote to MOE Singapore and immediately received a response from them.

Therein lies the difference between our MOE and that of Singapore.

My students – the common factor

My only student whom I taught for 5 years from primary one to primary six ( only 5 years because he was promoted from halfway in primary four to primary 5) is my first student.

All my others students were taught only for a short period.

Discussion with Stepehn Krashen (Whole Language Proponent) Part 4

This is a continuation of my discussion with Stephen Krashen, Professor Emiritus at the University of Southern California.

He stopped his discussion and his group administrator said that all comments will be discontinued.

This is what happens when these professors are cornered and have nothing further to say.

Stephen Krashen is definitely an educated guy but may not be learned. He is barking up the wrong tree without knowing the actual sounds of the alphabets in the English language. 

Stephen Krashen - Whole Language Proponent (Part 3)

Here is the continuation of the discussion with Stephen Krashen, Professor Emiritus of the University of Southern California.

Stephen Krashen  “About teaching basic phonics correctly I assume you mean accurately. I suspect that approximately right rules that work most of the time are OK. With reading, children acquire the more subtle rules. So many children have learned to read this way. Is there any research showing the proper way and demonstrating that it is better? Here is, of course, another Krashen paper you might be interested in: Defending Whole Language: The Limits of Phonics Instruction and the Efficacy of Whole Language Instruction
https://tinyurl.com/y8opzwpn

My emails to our ministers on Astro programme

The more appropriate title may be 'Rancangan Tergendala'. I am taking a short break from my continuation of articles on Stephen Krashen. This is a result of a challenge by some opposition members asking me why I had not written to ministers complaining about matters.

I have written several emails to Dr. Maszlee Malik and to Ms Teo Nie Ching and they do not even have the courtesy to respond. 

Similarly I also wrote to Mr.Gobind Sindh Deo to no avail.

Here are my emails to these ministers who probably do not understand what I am writing about. Now. let us eee if the opposition party members will act on this complaint.

Stephen Krashen Whole language proponent (Part 2)

Here is a recent FaceBook discussion between Stephen Krashen and me.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m8gFfr2b5hU

Luqman Michel: "Stephen Krashen, Let us start with the same question I have asked Claire Walter above. Are phonemes in the ABC song above taught correctly?"

Dr.Stephen Krashen – Whole language proponent (Part 1)

                                      This guy wants to change an axiom into a hypothesis.

Recently I happened upon something written by Stephen Krashen which I disagree with. I made some comments in a blog post where both of us are members. In fact, that blog post is exalting him as another ‘God of education’. I have already written about the other ‘Gods of Education’ in my posts on my blog.

The Star online - Response to 'Transforming Dyslexia one word at a time'

On 4.10.2018 I read an article on Star online written by Dr Mullai A. Ramaiah who is the president of THE National Organisation for Dyslexia Malaysia (NOD)

NOD claims that it is teaching through the phonetic approach.  Upon reading the article I know that neither Dr. Mullai nor NOD knows what they are talking about.

Here is the whole article as published:

Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER)

On 13.9.18 I wrote to ACER on FaceBook the following. I wrote to them as their name indicates that they are Educational Researchers.

Reduce illiteracy 

Would any researcher here like to discuss why kids who fail to read in English are able to read in many other languages? I have taught more than 50 kids, many of whom were wrongly certified as dyslexic. I have found that all my students are in fact instructional casualties. Let us please discuss.

 The following is the response from ACER.

Dyslexia simulation by people with vested interest

Recently I read an article on Dyslexia Simulation covered in KMT 3 News.

Watch the simulation for yourself at LINK