Lifelong Learning

[chenchow]

A couple of months ago, MCA has initiated Lifelong Learning Campaign and they have started bringing some public lectures, featuring some of the top CEOs in Malaysia, like CEO of Job Street, CEO of Air Asia to speak to the public, as well as provide courses for the elderly.

I strongly believe that lifelong learning would be a very essential initiative, although this would need long term awareness.

Any thoughts anyone has on this topic? This would be something useful to be suggested to the government too~!

[mauntech]

what does it really mean by lifelong learning actually?

as in malaysia, ppl will only understand if it means that u still attending U even u r at age 80.

so now i think we should really discuss the real meaning of lifelong learning and the objectives. I know now there are like Knowlede community etc, but really, what does it mean. As for me, i really would like to have the opportunity and facility to keep on learning.

[chenchow]

Thanks mauntech.

I would say that perhaps a definition of lifelong learning would be that people keep on reading and learning, basically accumulating new skills, new knowledge, irrespective of their age..

Perhaps, a good way to initiate would be to discuss how one, especially those who has already started work, could initiate a lifelong learning and what incentive is there for him/her to continue to learn

[pandaboy]

Learning is a never ending adventure, isnt it? We will still be learning even when we are in workforce. I think giving talks and public lectures is a good move though.

[chenchow]

I would say that the main problem that is happening in Malaysia is that most Malaysians, especially those who have started to work, do not read anything, perhaps with the exception of newspaper. Is this a valid observation? What do you guys think about this?

[pandaboy]

I would say that the main problem that is happening in Malaysia is that most Malaysians, especially those who have started to work, do not read anything, perhaps with the exception of newspaper. Is this a valid observation? What do you guys think about this?

Not exactly true in my opinion. From what I observed, working people (some, or mostly I dont know) still refer to books sometimes, but not as in reading from page 1 to last page. But there are other ways of learning besides reading right? Like training....stuffs like that. My dad is in that field..training and development... :wink:

[mauntech]

from my observation as an active surfer and participants in few sites esp related to education, most malaysia joins and interested if there are a student. I seldomly met or came accross with forum participant who are not student.

What i mean here is that, malaysian just think about education when there is need for them to educated themselves. once there are already comfortable with their life, they will not even bother about education.

me myself, are really interested not only to add my own knowledge etc, but also education can be seen as a profitable sector. Just imagine, malaysia's population is made up by students age range from 7-28 years old. If we look at it as a business, we can make huge profit.

To create awareness is real hard. If there is no participation from students and others regarding this matter. this lifelong learning might not succeed.

BTW, malaysia's education system is an examination based. is not like US, more on to gain knowledge and problem solving. So we are too used with that system, therefore harder to absorb new ones.

Luckily in UiTM, they also focus on industrial training system and not only focus in academic only.

[PeiWen]

Mmm, if not mistaken, Singapore has an Award, which is dedicated to those elderly, who have shown perseverance in learning languages, skills, etc, meaning continue learning and never stop learning due to aging factor.
For example, there are institutes, centers avaiable around Singapore to cater to those elderly, to teach them computers, languages and some other useful skills. These centers/institutes are really in place to encourage the elderly to continue learning, and also inspire the young ones to appreciate "lifelong learning". Don't be surprise that, in fact many elderly are enrolling in computer courses, cooking, languages lessons, in order to keep up with the latest technology, and never be left behind by the society. Though they might be slow in picking up new skills, learning computers, however, their determinants and commitments are the good attitudes to be instilled in us.

[youngyew]

For example, there are institutes, centers avaiable around Singapore to cater to those elderly, to teach them computers, languages and some other useful skills.
This reminds me of my parents who had talked about learning computers since 3 years ago. They still haven't touched once. :lol:

On my side of understanding, I found that lifelong learning is sometimes easier said than done. It is more convenient for those who are previously highly educated, but what about those who had lesser chance like my mum who only had primary school education? Without knowing much about english, she never were in the right track to learn computer, let alone surfing or anything else online.

[chenchow]

I agree. There are generally 2 issues here. Computer literacy, as well as reading knowledge, and I agree that it is easier said than done. For the educated folks, it is easier to make the transition, but I would say that we should empower the people with the tools.

I know what SMJK Dinding has done is to have the students to man the computer labs in the evening and open it to the rural folks to use it. The school is pretty much the most high-tech among all the schools in Malaysia, where the students even swipe their id to take attendance, and library borrowing is done online. While these are normal at higher level, it is one of the first few high schools that employ all these. And all the computers in the schools are sourced by the Principal with some students, where they buy spare parts of the computers and the principal and the students would work together to assemble those computers and maintain it. The Principal was even featured in Readers' Digest for this.

[dlearn]

Lifelong learning encompasses a lot of areas. There is a Chinese saying "xue wu zi jing" (excuse my poor hanyu-pingying....never learnt it at school), meaning one's quest for learning & knowledge shall have no boundary or no end.

The European Union views lifelong learning as a means of helping to reduce unemployment as all workers are supposed to pick up new skills and new knowledge to make them employable. The MCA's veresion is more gear towards a subset of lifelong learning.....longlife learning with the teaching and learning of arts, crafts, qi-gong etc.

All of us needs to adopt lifelong learning simply to keep the mental faculty engaged, use it or lose it! I am perhaps older than most of you guys/gals (and if my presence, introduced by Pandaboy, makes you all uncomfortable, do let me know and I'll back off) and found that I am learning everyday from simple things like how to tune up my Palm PDA to new things on online, new ideas, and new ways to teach my kids. After my PhD, I worked as a research scientist (sound good only in name, and the pay was like kacang putih) for 4 years in a plant tissue culture lab in Singapore. Life was too uneventful at work and I had very little chance to learn, at the end of the 4th year, it suddenly became clear that my mental faculty had not be challenged much and I was losing it (well I was beginning to worried about stupid things like how to get to the lunch table before the workers!). Then I came back to Malaysia and taught at a private college, my first batch of students were those with at least 8 or 9 As......it was challenging and I found my urge to learn everyday.

A person needs to learn and this is especially true of new graduates, what you have acheived at uni is good grounding and solid basics, but come to the working world, you will need to learn a whole new ball game. At present, I am learning a lot about management skills and theory by reading (I was ill-literate for the past few years) , these skills and knowledge are crucial for my work and it is true, life in the corporate world is a battlefield, you are constantly fighting (either on homeground.....internal politics, or with the competitors). Learning from your competitors is the key to sucess and survival.

Good luck to all and Merry Christmas.....as an oversea students for almost 12 years in the UK, I know that Christmas can be a very lonely time for overseas students, but do some get-together among your 'kakis' and forget about the studies for at least a few days!

[chenchow]

dlearn, thanks a lot for joining ReCom~! It is definitely our pleasure that you are joining ReCom and I am sure you can help guiding us, especially since you have a lot of experience be it in terms of technical expertise, research expertise or teaching expertise. Age is definitely not a barrier. Hopefully that you can help guide us~!

Thanks for your sharing and hopefully your post could transpire and help us in our pursuit of knowledge, and hopefully inspire more Malaysians to make learning as a pursuit of life~!

[pandaboy]

Dr Chow, thanks for sharing! Oh ya, welcome to RECOM! Your first post is already so influencial and full of thoughts to ponder upon.

You're so right about working world....I'm already struggling to survive in study world, and yet there are more to come in working world. I tried working before, it's a lot more than what we expect... That's what I dont like study life, I think it should concentrate more on preparing us to working life, instead of cramming on books :(

Dont back off, your sharing here will be very invaluable to us~ But you dont have to commit yourself here, just pop by whenever you're free ok? Enjoy ya..and thanks again~

[chenchow]

The Star has a number of good articles on Lifelong Learning, which I strongly think that it should be the practice of life of fellow Malaysians. We need to practice the culture of to learn, un-learn, and relearn.

Dato' Seri Ong Ka Ting specified that the two main benefits of Lifelong Learning is to improve the economic competitiveness of Malaysia, as well as build up an inclusive society.

http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2005/3/6/education/10318783&sec=education

http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2005/3/6/education/20050305135246&sec=education

http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2005/3/6/education/10320602&sec=education

and a list of programs organized by The Star in conjunction with Lifelong Learning

http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2005/3/6/education/10332860&sec=education


Below is a quotation of speech by Dato' Seri Ong Ka Ting regarding Lifelong Learning.

I see the lifelong learning as a tower built upon three foundations. First and foremost is getting people to change their old mindset, which includes a negative attitude on learning. People must also be bold enough to admit their weaknesses and be willing to learn under any circumstances.

The second foundation is reading. It opens us to a world of knowledge and this must be made a habit, be it for formal or informal education.

We encourage every Malaysian to read at least one good book a month, besides those on entertainment, magazines or newspapers. Reading is a habit among those in advanced countries like Japan where the people read in public, including during train rides.

The third foundation is making learning facilities accessible to the people. Institutions of learning are encouraged to offer more courses catering to different groups of people.

Those who have completed their formal education, including tertiary level, are also encouraged to take the initiative to continue learning via all available means, such as attending courses, talks and other activities.



For more information on Lifelong Learning, go to http://www.lll.net.my

Hope that fellow ReComers can discuss more regarding this issue, as it will be very central to the development of our nation.

[chenchow]

In conjunction with lifelong learning, the Higher Education Ministry has decided to allocate 10% of places at IPTA for those who have started working and decide to further their education at IPTA.

What do you guys think about this policy? What do you guys think would be the best way for Malaysia to encourage fellow Malaysians to further education.

As of now, we have two distant learning universities, Open University Malaysia and University Tun Abdul Razak (UNITAR), and that has gradually built up the momentum on people.

Besides formal lifelong learning, I feel that one essential aspect of lifelong learning for Malaysia in the short and long run would be to gradually bring up our value-added chain. We are gradually losing our competitive advantage in terms of cost advantage, and hence we should work hard towards building up the value-added chain, and these would require a much more educated workforce of Malaysia.

How about general citizen of Malaysia, who have left school/college/university since a long time ago? How can we encourage these people to learn new skills/knowledge? Or perhaps keeping up with the happenings in the world, as well as learn new skills? One aspect, I realize is that there are a large number of Malaysians who tend to rest on laurels and treat their jobs as merely doing a job, rather than fulfilling a certain function.

For instance, the job as teacher, which is a very noble job, should be seen as a way to educate the future generation of the country and the world, with sharing of experience, gentle touch and caring, besides imbibing them with knowledge. Teachers should constantly upgrading themselves, and I am not talking about going to training sessions, but rather learn about the new advancement that are happening in the field. For instance, a teacher teaching history, should constantly reading up on new findings, or even just keeping on expanding on what they have already known on the field. There is no end in learning, and it is definitely physically impossible to finish reading every book that is available in any library, what more in throughout the world.

Any thoughts on this issue?

[jackfook]

Lifelong Learning? I cannot deny that it is a good campaign.The world has entered new century which is globalisation era.We need to update ourselves in order to compete with the world.Learning is endless but we have to know which should be learnt or shouldn't.I remember that our former PM,Tun Mahathir advised Malaysians should learn from Japan which is one of the modern countries in Asia.However,the people went to learn Japanese.They should learn their enthusiasm in working,serving for country,reading and loving environment.Am I right?

It is good for Malaysians to start defining the real meaning of learning.This programme improves our ability to the changing of the world.We have known for doing things for" five minutes hot ".Don't you agree?Furthermore,this programme can continue or not depends on our commitment.