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Students are more and more taking centre-stage in the Thai classroom with the teacher in the role of a consultant. |
Word is slowly filtering out about the profound changes now taking place in the Thai national education system.
In just eight or nine months, the nation’s primary and secondary schools are scheduled to begin implementing a novel, learner-centred and highly flexible curriculum which can be readily tailored to the needs of their communities.
This year, about 2,000 schools countrywide are piloting their versions of this curriculum. The list includes 36 Bangkok-area schools and recently the Learning Post paid a visit to one of the best.
Bodindecha, located in Bang Kapi, has long been recognised as one of Thailand’s premier secondary schools. It has maintained its status despite major changes in its enrolment policy. Under new Ministry of Education regulations, Bodindecha now draws most of its students from its immediate area rather than accepting them on the basis of an entrance examination.
This means the student body now more closely resembles that of other large Thai secondary schools. As such, Bodindecha’s experience with its new curriculum becomes all the more interesting and relevant.
Not cosmetic
It is obvious from the start that the changes in Bodindecha’s academic programme are not cosmetic. The whole school community – administrators, school board, teaching staff, students and even parents – have been mobilised in support of the new approach to teaching and learning.
 School principal Sitthirak Chansawang |
According to school principal Sitthirak Chansawang, preparations began more than two years ago under his predecessor. "We knew beforehand that there must be a change," he says. "We began bit by bit, gradually. We invited experts to explain the concept to parents and teachers. We also sent our teachers to seminars to work with experts and they came back and began writing the curriculum."
The principles behind the national curriculum, he says, are "excellent". The Ministry of Education provides guidelines and standards, a "central core" and the school then creates its own curriculum to meet them.
"This is good," says Archarn Sitthirak. "A school in this region, in this community knows what additional details should be put in the school curriculum for its students."
 Archarn Sukon Sinthapanonth |
The overall coordination for the new curriculum at Bodindecha is the responsibility of Archarn Sukon Sinthapanonth. Like her principal, she is a strong advocate for the new programme.
"It’s different and quite good. Before it used to be top-down. But now we have more freedom and the community has its say."
The drafting process is a painstaking one. "This is the third version of our curriculum," she says and the process is ongoing. "Groups of teachers are responsible for their content areas. We meet during the ninth period of each day to refine, readjust and improve the curriculum."
Each draft of the curriculum goes to the school board, composed of representatives from the community, parents, alumni and teachers, and to outside experts for approval.
"This is very good," says Archarn Sukon. "Under this process, the curriculum belongs to all parties involved."
This year, as in the other secondary schools in the pilot programme, the new curriculum at Bodindecha is confined to the first and fourth years – matayom 1 and 4. Work is almost complete on the curriculum for M2, 3, 5 and 6, and the new programme will be completely in place in two years’ time. Even now, most teachers who are using the old curriculum are delivering it in a learner-centred manner.
Relevance and initiative
 Archarn Petcharat Srivilai |
While the old curriculum has its good points, says Archarn Petcharat Srivilai who is overseeing the new science curriculum, it was fixed 10 years ago. "That means the knowledge our students get is 10 years old – they are 10 years behind."
Under the new system, she says, there is much more flexibility. "We can add the content we see essential to our students at the moment. We can select the content that suits their interests, age, ways of thinking and everyday life. And we can do all of this without worrying that we are different from other schools as long as we are sure the content is beneficial to our students and complies with the basic educational standards."
According to Archarn Petcharat, lectures have never played a major role in science teaching at Bodindecha. "Learner-centre teaching – learning through discovery – is natural to the sciences," she says.
Under the new system, lectures are even less frequent and students have been given much more responsibility for their own learning. The results so far, says science teacher Archarn Rittipol Suriyakul na Ayuttaya, have been more than gratifying.
"I’m very impressed with the students," he says. "In the old system, we used to tell them you need to do this, you need to do your experiment this way.
"Today, I had an M1 class. We are currently studying osmosis. In the old system I would say, take a sugar sucrose solution, put in it in a bag and let it sit in a beaker of distilled water and so on. We did this for 20-30 years.
"This time, I told the students to find a experimental method for studying this phenomenon and propose it to the class. The students had all kinds of ideas, but one thing happened that I didn’t expect.
"Some students said they wanted to conduct two experiments, one with a sucrose solution of 40 percent and another at 80 percent. They read in a book that if the concentration is higher, the rate of osmosis will speed up. And these are only M1 students!," he says.
Such student initiative does not occur spontaneously, however. Archarn Rittipol and his colleagues have spent a great deal of the time making sure that the resources are available for learner-centred discovery to take place. They see to it that the science library is well stocked and Archarn Rittipol himself has developed a web portal with a remarkably comprehensive set of links to science resources on the Internet.
 Archarn Kanokporn Krabuansri |
One key element of the new approach is the focus on what Archarn Petcharat calls "key concepts". In social studies, says curriculum coordinator Archarn Kanokporn Krabuansri, this often means stripping out much of the detail in the old curriculum that was not really relevant to students lives.
The map reading section in M1 for example was extremely detailed under the old curriculum. In the new system, says, Archarn Kanokporn, "students are expected to be able to make use of the maps they are most likely to use in real life."
As in science, learning in social studies is activity-based with students taking an active role. In M1, for example, students begin by mapping their own homes and areas within the school grounds.
"They go out to look at areas within the school and the local environment," she says. Students consider "what areas are in need of improvement. What areas of our school are good condition?
"Later in M4, the stress will be on the community where students go outside of schools," Archarn Kanokporn explains.
Fundamental concepts, like latitude and longitude, are not overlooked in the new approach, she says, but they are taught in ways more relevant to the students’ ages and interests.
"In the past this was always a confusing subject. Now we do things like relating it to World Cup football. We have the students choose a participating country and they use a map to find the latitude and longitude of that country. Later, we just give the latitude and longitude and have the students find what country is located there," Archarn Kanokporn says.
First-hand experience
 Paroon Kornsombut |
Learner-centred instruction is a new experience for M1 students Paroon Kornsombut and Naphol Suebsatchavat. They much prefer it to the teacher dominated instruction used at their old schools.
Both enjoy science. "We are studying about ‘our green world’ – plant and animal types and plant and animal cells," says Paroon. "This week we are studying about food production in plants."
Instruction is activity-based. "The teacher gives us a task and we help each other complete it," explains Naphol. Both seem very comfortable with the responsibility they have been given and are able to explain in detail the experiments they have been doing in class.
 Jirapong Bumroongchatudom |
At the M4 level, the change has been less dramatic since teachers in the first three years have been gradually moving to a more learner-centred approach. However, M4 student Jirapong Bumroongchatudom has still noticed a difference from the previous year. "Lectures are now less frequent," he says.
"Now the teachers give us projects that we carry out ourselves, finding information in the library or on the Internet. Or we go out in the community as in the case of our project on local wisdom.
"At this time, we are doing a project on Chao Phraya Bodindecha, the commander-in-chief of King Rama III’s armed forces and the original owner of the land. We found information that this was a rice growing area before it became a school. We also had to find out what it was before that. It was a rest area for the horse and elephant cavalries of Chao Bodindecha," Jirapong explains.
 Naphol Suebsatchavat |
"This methodology is better because we experience things first-hand, says fellow M4 student Siriarpa Puangpuangrod. Teachers tend to give us task sheets with the core concept to be cover and the actual finding of knowledge is our responsibility.
"In science we have projects of many types. I am doing a hydroponics project – growing plants in chemical solutions without soil. We study the process of growth of the plants under various conditions."
At times, the new learning method can be stressful, says Jirapong, especially "when we are not sure of where to get information. But with effort we are able to get what we want. The teacher is also available for consultation," he says.
Are the students concerned about the university entrance examination? That is bound to test factual knowledge rather than the information students are likely to get through projects on local wisdom. Surprisingly, neither Jirapong nor Siriarpa seem overly concerned.
 Siriarpa Puangpuangrod |
"For sure our school is fully able to give us the knowledge to pass the entrance examination," Siriarpa says.
"This term, as science stream students we are only studying chemistry and biology. But next term we will be studying physics and there will be additional subjects, for example, earth science, space science, according to our interests.
"For example, I am interested in astronomy," she continues, "and I am able to take that subject. Additional courses are available which provide adequate content for us to pass the entrance examination."
Both students are hedging their bets somewhat, however, with two to three hours of private classes on the weekends. "Most students do take additional tuition on weekends," says Siriarpa, "but it is not the core of our study."
"How many of you are going on to university?" |
Not without problems
The latest draft of Bodindecha’s curriculum runs over 200 pages. On page 202 there is a brief report on some of the problems that remain and the intended solutions.
As you might expect, many of the problems stem from confusion over exactly how to implement the rather sketchy guidelines from the centre. This, the report says, is being rectified by increased contacts with the Ministry of Education and experts designated by the Ministry.
Another problem cited by the report is the lack of understanding of the new curriculum on the part of many parents and students. The school has consequently organised three meetings with parents, also students are getting regular consultation in guidance sessions and supplementary classes.
One of the most serious obstacles to the success of the new curriculum is not mentioned in report, probably because it is a fact of life in most Thai schools and it is without an obvious solution. Class sizes are far too high. They average well over 50 at Bodindecha and classes in the 60s are not unheard of in other schools.
 Archarn Rittipol Suriyakul na Ayuttaya |
"Actually, the child-centred method works best with 20 to 30 in a class," says Archarn Rittipol. "Thai students are the equals of anyone in intelligence, but class size is a huge obstacle."
Each week Archarn Petcharat sees about 230 different students in her classes. This causes problems with a task-based approach, she says. "In their first attempts they will invariably have both correct information and incorrect information.
"So in the next period after we have checked their work, we will discuss their answers with them. And when we are not clear on what they have said, we may have them try to explain to the class and attempt to have them improve their answers."
This is time-consuming under the best of conditions. Unfortunately, says Archarn Rittipol there has been pressure from central authorities to increase rather than reduce class sizes, pressure the school principal has so far successfully resisted.
Challenges
Problems notwithstanding, there is little question that a process has begun which could have a major effect on how Thai students learn. Clearly, next year should be one of the most challenging in many years as the new curriculum is implemented countrywide.
Schools like Bodindecha are intended to play a key role in helping schools in their immediate area draft their own versions of the national curriculum. But there is tremendous scope for community involvement as well, particularly on the part of local universities and the private sector.
Without community understanding and support in fact, it may not be long before negative media reports again begin to surface complaining about Thailand’s new "kwai-centered" learning system. That would be a shame for all concerned.
Note: A special thanks to Archarn Chunhakarn Kulprawit who helped arrange our day at Bodindecha and who accompanied us throughout.
terryfrd@ksc15.th.com |