Article Review

Issues of ICT Usage among Malaysian Secondary School English

Teachers

Arumugam Raman & Abdul Halim Mohamed

School of Education and Modern Languages, Universiti Utara Malaysia

Information and Communication Technology or ICT has revolutionized our lives, and this includes education as well. As a developing county and we put all of our efforts to achieve the target in the year 2020, our nation realized the importance of ICT, and there have been various ICT methods being introduced in the education system. The Ministry of Education has already started few campaigns such as Smart Schools, MySchoolNet, computer labs, Educational web TV, Teaching Mathematics and Science in English , Access Centre, and several others are some of the examples of these initiatives.

 The paper’s aim was to reveal the perception, usage and obstacles of using ICT in teaching English Language among secondary school English teachers. Specifically the objectives of the paper firstly, are to assess secondary school English teachers’ perception towards integrating ICT in teaching English, to find out the usage level of ICT among secondary school English Language teachers in teaching English and to identify the dominancy of obstacles faced by secondary school English Language teachers in integrating ICT in teaching English Language. Through this aim, the paper can also help new teachers be prepared on the real life situation that can help them prepare themselves better in future time. As for the methodology, this is a quantitative study and it was conducted by using a questionnaire which is suitable to collect data from teachers in numerous schools. The researcher will allocate questionnaires to 30 trained teachers from three secondary school. The type of research used in the article was quantitative research as it includes numerical data and information. Survey research was used because it is easier to collect data throughout questionnaires. The questionnaire that was used in the article was taken from Gulbahar & Guven (2008); Hutchison (2009). It contains two parts which is A and B, where A is the question focuses on the teachers’ gender, race and school. As for the B has three parts which was measured using a Likert scale. As for the subject and the sample, the school that was involved are Sekolah Menengah Kebangsaan Che Tom, Sekolah Menengah Kebangsaan Pinang Tunggal and Sekolah Menengah Kebangsaan Dato’ Bijaya Setia. The researcher came to all of the three school to give out questionnaires in order to collect all of the data. As for the result, it is found that teachers and the school management have their own part in promoting ICT English teaching in schools. Most of the teachers is having a positive perception about ICT being integrated in their English lessons. However, teachers’ usage level of ICT showed that teachers only use ICT for finding information on websites, making PowerPoint presentations and reading. They do not appreciate about the benefits of other ICT applications.

In my humble opinion on answering the question whether the research interest me, I have to say that I am quite interested in the article. This is because as a future teacher, we have to stay updated with the latest trends in technology so that we do not get left behind. Teachers also need to use the advantages of the technology and benefit it in our teaching and learning processes. ICT content in English will enables students to progress and develop new skills, responding and presenting using the latest technology provided, and as slice of the creative and critical thinking the undertake in English.  In learning English or other second language, students are able to improve and use their background knowledge of word processing, multimedia, presenting texts, simulation software, graphics and further grow their skills, familiarity and understanding of these technologies. Thus, through research like this it will help us teachers on a real life situation and we will know what to expect from the students themselves in the classroom.

Upon reading this article, I can say that it is well conducted due to many reasons. Firstly, it is because the sample of the article are among the real life teachers in real context of Malaysian school. This made me able to relate more to this paper compared to other articles on the net. Furthermore, this article also base its research from an actual framework and theories. It does not blindly doing the research without considering the readers’ knowledge on the issues that are being discussed in the paper. Not only that, the literature review done in the article is also very thorough, it takes into consideration other people’s take on the issues from within this country and also outside the country. The findings were also executed well as it answers the research questions. Needless to say, I did not manage to find any drawbacks from this article.

Based on the findings and the discussion made in the article, there are indeed some implications of using technology in teaching and learning. Firstly, it makes me realize that both teachers and administrators have an immense role to play in promoting ICT integrated English teaching in schools. This task does not fall solely on the shoulders of the teachers. Nowadays, many people like to point fingers on the teachers for Malaysian students’ achievement. However, it must be noted that there are many contributing factors that affect students’ understanding and knowledge of ICT in Malaysia. How can teachers conduct a technology-based instruction if they do not have the equipment? Plus, the administrative board of the school system are responsible in helping teachers to gain knowledge on how to use the technology in order to make them realize the importance of the technology and the many benefit that both teachers and students can gain from using it. We need to increase teacher’s knowledge in using computers in order to rise the usage level of ICT in classroom instructions. The activities does not necessarily have to be for gaining information and power-point presentation. There are many undiscovered tools that teachers can use. In order for the teachers to teach students on the usage of ICT in lessons, they have to master the knowledge of ICT. This, strengthened the importance for the Malaysian teachers to gain more knowledge on the use of technology. Hence, it is suffice to say that everyone has a role in revolutionizing the use of technology for teaching and learning instruction in class.