1.

0 Introduction
In order to meet our high aspirations amidst an increasingly competitive global environment,
we cannot stand still. Our country requires a transformation of its entire education system.
YAB Dato Seri Mohd Najib bin Tun Abdul Razak (2012)
The aims of our education are manifested in the Malaysian National Education Philosophy
(NEP):
Education in Malaysia is an on-going effort towards further developing the potential of
individuals in a holistic and integrated manner so as to produce individuals who are
intellectually, spiritually, emotionally and physically balanced and harmonious, based on a firm
belief in and devotion to God. Such an effort is designed to produce Malaysian citizens who are
knowledgeable and competent, who possess high moral standards, and who are responsible
and capable of achieving a high level of personal well-being, as well as being able to contribute
to the betterment of the family, the society and the nation at large.
Curriculum is an organised system that provide the needs for knowledge, skills and
attitudes which are underpinned by values. There are a national curriculum that has been used
by all schools and a uniform system of education in both primary and secondary schools has
been recognized. Assessment and examinations at the end of the every periods of schooling
are also adapted into schools. Malay is the official language of instruction in schools and also
the national language. That is why it is very important for the educational system to have a
curriculum that can promotes unity through the use of a single medium of instruction (the
national language) and the provision of the same core subjects for all pupils in all schools within
the National Education System. Teachers can play an effective role in defining and
implementing the curriculum. Teachers will be the one that implementing the curriculum in their
classrooms and also taking on new roles as advisors, facilitators and curriculum developers.

2.0 Roles of teachers in the curriculum process

As the world revolve over the years, educational systems around the world have been
experiencing changes and reforms. It has been recognize that teachers are not only one of the
variables that need to be changed in order to improve the educational system but are also the
most important agents in this reform.

Teachers involves in the creation of classroom realities and they teach according to their
own beliefs, attitudes and perceptions of the relevant teaching situation. Curriculum
implementation is not the process that translates directly into classroom reality. Teachers are the
one that decide the fate of any educational enterprise.
With the teachers knowledge, experience and competencies teachers are central to any
curriculum improvement effort, they are responsible for introducing the curriculum in the
classroom and outside the classroom as well. Teachers attitudes and perceptions should be
taken into account when the policy makers wanted to make changes in the curriculum.
Teachers know their students better than others involved in the curriculum process.
While the state often prescribe the skills covered by the curriculum, a teacher can provide
insight into the types of materials, activities and specific skills that need to be included. Teachers
from multiple grade levels may collaborate to identify skills students need at each level and
ensure that the curriculum prepares students to advance to the next grade-level. A teacher can
gauge whether an activity will fit into a specified time frame and engage students. All teachers
should be allowed to provide input during the creation stage of curriculum. As teachers provide
input they will gain ownership in the product and feel more confident that the curriculum was
created with their concerns, and the needs of their students in mind. With careful planning and
much effort in the making of curriculum, the teachers need to implement the curriculum in their
own classroom. However, when a teacher cannot properly implement a strong curriculum or
fails, she may risks not covering standards or failing to implement effective practices in the
classroom. Hence, that does not mean a teacher cant make minor changes. In fact a strong
curriculum is designed to allow a teacher to be flexible to add a few personalized components,
from a selection of activities.
By being a reflective practitioner, teachers and others involved in the process of creating
curriculum can find any weaknesses in the curriculum, and try to make it better. Teachers may
reflect on curriculum in multiple ways such as keeping a journal as they implement the
curriculum giving student reviews and surveys, analyzing results and assessments, data about
students individual performance. Not only can reflection serve to improve a specific curriculum,
it may guide the creation of a new curriculum.
Brain, Reid and Boyes (2006) agree that the success of any education policy depends
on how the practitioners, namely the teachers, accept the mandated policy and adopt the
desired practices. Teachers openness and willingness to accept changes or their resistance to

(or modification of) government policy could affect the implementation process and eventually
determine the success or the failure of a new policy.
Teachers beliefs about the relevance of a reform to the students and the teaching
environment are also crucial to the reform process. Teachers tend to be reluctant, unwilling and
resistant to change when they believe what is required of them in the curriculum reform is
irrelevant to the students and unrealistic to the classrooms. Palmer (1993) emphasises that
innovations are highly likely to be adapted by teachers if they think it is appropriate and relevant
to their teaching contexts. Indeed, most reform efforts have been to no avail, as they are viewed
and perceived as impractical, unfeasible and incompatible with existing classroom realities,
conditions and constraints (Kennedy, 1996; Wang, 2008).
For example, in increasing English proficiency according to the blueprint some changes
has been updated. Of the 1,191 hotspot schools those with low passing rates for the Sijil
Pelajaran Malaysia (SPM) English Language paper 140 scored the national average or more
for English in SPM last year. Another one is to create fun and exciting language learning
experiences for students, the Education Ministry in collaboration with the United States (US)
Embassy and Enfiniti Academy, organised two camps. It benefited 224 students from 45 schools
in Terengganu, Pahang and Kuala Lumpur. For the Form Three Assessment or PT3, the English
Language assessment expanded to include listening and speaking skills. It was developed with
reference to the Common European Framework of References for Languages, with guidance
from the Cambridge International Examination to benchmark students English proficiency levels
with international standards. To build the teachers language proficiencies, 360 native speakers
from the US, Britain, Australia and New Zealand were sent as mentors to 1,800 primary schools
in remote areas. The Professional Upskilling of English Language Teachers programme
benefited 10,502 teachers. It saw 2,244 teachers improving by one proficiency level, while
another 166 improved by two proficiency levels.
The curriculum changes mentioned earlier however may have their drawback. It is
important how teachers of the programme in Malaysian upper primary schools perceived and
implemented the programme provides evidence that, despite teachers reported awareness of
the aims and objectives of the programme and their support and belief in its benefits, their
classroom instruction was found to be teacher-centred rather than student-centred as
advocated.

As far as I have observed from the schools that I have been to, the child-centred
approaches and activities required by the programmes were for the most part unheeded, as
teachers simply continuing with their usual teacher-centred patterns. There have been restricted
opportunities for pupils to initiate talk and a failure on the part of teachers to build upon pupil
contributions. Teachers failed to differentiate between more or less proficient students. The
more proficient children complained about being bored by inappropriate activities. Wang (2008)
emphasises that unclear understanding of the syllabus and a lack of guidance about the
teaching methods that language teachers should use may result in teachers sticking to the
teaching methods with which they felt most comfortable, even though they were not necessarily
effective or appropriate and might not be congruent with what is prescribed in the policy or the
syllabus.
3.0 Conclusion
In nutshell, a good curriculum requires careful planning and development, and it is
worthless and not affective if teachers are not alert and receptive to what is needed of them and
if they cannot see how the innovation can be successfully applied in their own classrooms
(Marsh & Willis, 1998). Teachers also need to be provided with enough information on what is
expected of them and to enable them to fully understand the innovation. There should be a clear
description as to what teachers should do, why it should be done and how to do it. This is
because issues of clarity have been found in almost every study of significant change,
particularly when the reform is too complicated. Despite the fact that there is agreement that
some kind of change is needed, teachers usually are not clear of what they should do.

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