Anuar Ahmad, a senior lecturer at Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, said the weakness caused many primary school pupils to find science and mathematics difficult and therefore eroded their interest in taking these subjects in secondary school.
Anuar said the teaching method was uninteresting and focused more on the goal of getting high marks, correct and accurate answers, resulting in primary school pupils being afraid of making mistakes.
“This is not science. It’s a form of rote learning. But science is a process of trial and error, observation and testing,” he said. “The key objective of science and mathematics is to instill experimenting until they get the answer.”
He said primary schoolchildren are stressed by the demand for correct answers and find it difficult and stressful to learn science and mathematics.
Using Thomas Edison as an example, the academician said that the American inventor had failed many times, but tried repeatedly until he finally succeeded in inventing a light bulb that is still in use today.
Anuar said the stigma of science and mathematics being difficult subjects to learn had made secondary school pupils in Forms 1 to 3 less interested in the subjects, which they still have to take because they are compulsory subjects.
However, in Forms 4 and 5, when the pupils have the opportunity to choose, they take other subjects besides science as the subject is no longer compulsory for the SPM examination.
Anuar said the science and mathematics syllabus used by the education ministry is too heavy which contributes to the subjects being not popular in primary schools.
“Primary school students should not have such a heavy syllabus. It should emphasise on children conducting exploratory activities, scientific investigations and observations outside the classroom, for example to see how flowers grow, how photosynthesis works and how water is formed from the combination of two gases,” he said.
The demands of the syllabus forces science and mathematics teachers to rush to complete the entire curriculum within the academic year to meet their key performance index (KPI).
“Sometimes there are students who don’t quite understand what the teacher has taught, but the teacher does not have time to explain or make sure they have really understood. The teacher then has to move on to the next subject because he has to catch up with the syllabus.
“In the end, many students are left behind when it comes to understanding the meaning and purpose of a scientific phenomenon they are studying,” he said.
National Union of Teaching Profession president Aminuddin Awang said many schoolchildren choose the arts stream because of the perception of science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) as difficult subjects.
Aminuddin agreed with Anuar that the syllabus plays a big role in determining the direction of STEM learning. He said he had received many complaints from teachers who have to speed up the learning process due to lack of time.
On Aug 4, Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim urged the education ministry and the ministry of science, technology, and innovation to find new approaches to attract schoolchildren’s interest in science and mathematics.
A study conducted by the National STEM Association has found that only 19% of schoolchildren have chosen science subjects since 2020.