Since the early days of formal education, seing and hearing are the main media of transfer knowledge. Teachers had taken big efforts since thirty years a go encouraging studentsto make use of other senses like touch, smel and taste in their learning processespecially in science subjects. The only obstacle that might stop them from doing thatwas the lack of facilities in their schools. In fact, most teachers did not hasitate toprepare transparencies, models, and other teaching aids using their own pocket money.

Although tape recorders, radios, television, over head projector, slides and flims mightbe considered out dated, they are still playing important role in teaching and learnig inschools. The list of multimedia equipment is becoming longer by the introduction ofcomputer in education.

School's computer clubs.

computers were introduced in Malaysian schools more as extra curricular activities thenas subject. They were set up to teach computing skills. Most of these clubs were supported byfunding from Parent-Teacher Associations or fees collected from club members. Besides, the more motivated principles and his/her teachers took initiatives to organizeschool funfair, walkathon or some other activities to follow the trends of setting upcomputer clubs at those time. Most of the time they were only able to raise just enoughmoney to buy one or two Apple II or compatibles (Lingo). With these limitations, the schools involved were at least succeeded in promoting the computer power to schoolcommunities. With lack of resources, facilities and personal, limited number of studentswere thought using basic application software such as wordprocessor, database andelectronic spreadsheet.

Computer Literacy Pilot Project

At the same time Malaysian educators embark on creating a computer literacycurriculum for schools. The Computer Literacy Pilot Project (CLPP) was launched inApril 1986 in twenty pilot schools, where Form Four pupils were taught a subjectcalled Computer Literacy. This CLPP were abruptly stop the following year.

Although many consider that computer clubs and CLPP project were a failure, it hadbeen a good starting point. With bare minimum trainning and facilities, teachers wereable to familiarized participated student, and school communities, with basic computerliteracy and terminologies.

Computers In Education

In the same year, the Ministry of Education (MOE) set up a joint committee with theMalaysian Institute of Microelectronics System (MIMOS) to study and makerecomendations or IT implementation in schools. A report was prepared by MIMOSand presented to the MOE in early 1989. This report noted that computer literacy wasno longer the major issue in education. What was percived as needed was thewidespread use of computers in the delivery of educational programmes across theboard an integral part of curriculum. With such an approach, computer literacy wouldbe naturally acquired.

The core of the recomendations is the recognition that information and knowledge willincreasngly manifest themselves in electronic form. This requires that IT systems bemade widely available in schools.

There were some other MOE-MIMOS projects and programmes resulted from the jointreport. They had a blue print of the ComIL system (Computer Integreted LearningSystem) completed in 1990, Knowledge Resource Centre, Computer-AssistedInstruction/Learning (CAI/L).

In 1995, Ministry of Education made an anouncement that the CIE Project would beextended to all primary and secondary schools in the country. Unfortunately, thepromise remain to be kept. Internet projects.JARING is the pioneer Internet Service Provider in Malaysia. It was launch in 1991 byMIMOS. Taking advantage of JARING, Ministry Of Education launched another pilotproject in 1994, Jaringan Pendidikan.

In this project,

Internet connection were installedin 50 pilot schools throughout the country. This project was suppose to enhancecommunication and information exchange among teachers and students in the country.

In 1996, the Ministry Of Education launched another Internet Project, Pusat SumberElektronik (PSE) in 14 selected pilot schools, Rangkaian Munsyi (the computernetwork contributed by Telekom Malaysia) was expected to enable schools to accessthe Internet and use multimedia applications. Some of the project schools have createdtheir homepages, most of which is not being updated regularly.

Smart Schools Project

Perhaps the most established IT projects in schools is the Smart School Project. Theselected schools are well-equiped with resources such as computers with internetfacilities. School involve in this project are expected to extensively incorporate IT intoteaching and learning. The emphasis was It-across-curriculum.

IT education in schools is taken more seriously recently whereby a better infrastructureincluding new buildings and resonable number of computers are being prepared in more schools.

The Issues

Most of the IT projects mentioned above were pilot projects being experimented inschools. They were suppose meant for testing viability and feasibility before wide-scaleimplementation. The success of these projects are questionable. Some of them are stillgoing on, but none has generated into a nationwide project as intended originally.

Insufficient Facilities.

Computer is the very basic tool needed for IT education without which, any attempt toimplement IT in schools deemed to be a failure. It is a well known fact that schoolscomputer clubs did not have enough computer to catter for big number of students.Without enough machines, the number of students could be involve is limited and handon activities cannot be done.

Teachers training

Unavailablity of well trained teachers and personals in IT was another factor thatcontribute to the slow progress of IT education in schools. A sudden introduction ofcomputer in schools cause dificulty in asigning school's staf to the job. Teacherstraining colleges across the country which train non-degree teachers for primary andsecondary schools started offerring a compoulsary IT course i n 1990s. Howeverfaculties of education in univarsities seem to be lagging behind. Most offer suchcources only as electives. So most teachers graduating from such programmes were stillIT illiterate by the time they start teaching. The situation was worsen when most of theinservice teachers had little or no exposure to computer. Teacher's training programmeshould have started long before computers were introduced in schools.

Educational software.

No matter what approach is taken for the IT education in schools, asspecially IT-across - curriculum approach, suitable software is needed for implementation. Mosteducational courseware available at present are not suitable for most of schoolssyllabus not only interms of language, but also contentwise. Since most of the sofwareare writen by programmers, not teachers, their products only served as informationdisplay, and does not follow the proper the process of teaching .

Educational Policy

Until now, nobody can deny that education in Malaysia is exam oriented. Hence IT wasnot taken seriously by pupils, parents and educators. Computer and IT subjects werenot formarly included into the curriculum and worse still they were not in the formalschool time table. Time and efforts by a few motivated teachers were not taken into consideration of their existing heavy workload.