MIRI, March 29 (Bernama) -- Practical stints in small schools in rural areas should be included in the training at teachers training institutes, Deputy Education Minister Dr Mohd Puad Zarkashi said Monday.
He said such stints would better prepare the trainees to have the right attitude should they be required to serve in rural schools upon completion of their training.
"They can see the actual condition of the small schools in the remote areas (while training) so that they will be prepared," he told reporters after opening a workshop on Pedagogical Strategies for Improving the Performance of Small Schools here.
A total of 56 participants from Malaysia, Cambodia, Philippines, Indonesia, Thailand and Brunei took part in the three-day workshop organised by the Education Ministry in collaboration with the Southeast Asia Ministers of Education Organisation (SEAMEO) and the World Bank.
Dr Mohd Puad said a programme requiring trainees to undergo practical training in rural schools had already been started in Colombia and he felt that the teacher training institutes should explore the possibility of emulating such initiative.
He said that sending teachers to serve in rural areas was one of the challenges in managing small schools in the country.
According to him, there were 2,518 small schools with each having student enrolment of less than 150 andd 2,402 of them were located in rural areas.
In Sarawak there were 728 small schools, the biggest number in Malaysia.
With students of varied age groups in each class, he said, teachers serving in rural small schools were having difficulty to carry out their teaching tasks.
-- BERNAMA
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