Comment on Marsigit’s Paper Presented at One Day Seminar About The National Value; The Value of Mathematics and International Standard

Globalization and the challenges recently are absolute things that to be faced by every people over the world. It is because the window of the world is opened wider by the developing of telecommunication system and global information that easier to be found by every people, so, almost no reason for everyone who cannot access the information and get the global knowledge. The competition in globalization era is really strict because the person who got of best of information is the winner, moreover the global challenges absolutely must be defeated if they want to survive. Mastering of IT and English language is an absolute requirement for every people if they want to success or survive in better life, and beside of this, the supporting soft skills must be mastered, so they can compete with everyone in national level or international level.
Indonesia as developing country must realize the global competitions and global challenges is an important thing to be faced if Indonesia wants to exist. Every preparation must be prepared as well as can do in order to be success to face the challenges. To answer the challenges, first thing that we have to prepare is from the education in Indonesia. Now the questions are whether our education in this country is ready enough? How about the system? How about the curriculum? How about the facilities? How about the teachers and students? Are they ready enough to face the global challenges? Maybe it can be our homework. Not only for the central government, but also the region autonomy must take a part to solve these problems.
According to the paper of Marsigit with the title “Gerakan Reformasi untuk Menggali dan Mengembangkan Nilai-Nilai Matematika untuk Menggapai Nilai-Nilai Luhur Bangsa Menuju Standar Internasional Pendidikan”, there are so many things that must be evaluated in our educational system in Indonesia. Begin from the moral values are being degeneration; educational system that tendency to follow the guide line from the top, so the creativity or improvisation is hard to be done; until the education system in Indonesia still reclusive that can give big chance to imply corruption and collusion. If the government lets it be continuously, moral degradation and fatuity level in Indonesia and make the increasing of unemployed in this country that is caused by the unready of people to face the globalization challenges will be happened.
Therefore, I really agree with the Marsigit’s paper to reformate the education system in Indonesia that tendency to behavioristic, reclusive, and stiff, and also to reformate the paradigm of education in Indonesia. I think, the reformation can be started from the openness of educational system, transparency of administration, student centered system in learning process, and more flexible in bureaucracy; and also direct the orientation of education in Indonesia to global insight, until the education “products” in Indonesia are ready to face the problems, challenges, and competitions of globalization era.
Another way is internationalize educational standard in Indonesia by conduct international class or international school until the education system will be able to direct and change the paradigm of education component to the global direction, so the student will be more ready to face global challenges. Of course, it is followed by good preparations in form of strict selection to put the test whether the student is ready or not to follow the learning process in international class. And also the selection must be transparent in order to minimize the discrimination, corruption, and collusion, so every people have same right, chance, and justice to get the education.



Reference:
Marsigit’s Paper Presented at One Day Seminar About The National Value; The Value of Mathematics and International Standard November 30th, 2008

How To Uncover Pedagogic Psychological Phenomena of Mathematics Education by Applying Quantitative Method.

Mathematics is not only about estimating, counting, number and formula, but also about the logical thinking and creativity to solve the problems in mathematics it self. Maybe, it must be emphasized for the teachers when they are teaching mathematics in class. They must understand that logical thinking and creativity are part of psychological phenomena in mathematics education because it can influence whether the student active or not. When the students have high logical thinking, their creativity can be increased and it can make them to be confident to solve the problem or even go to in front of class to presents their solution about the problem. Actually the process from appearing their logical thinking until they solve the problem or go to in front of class to present the solution is not easy as you flip your hand. It needs big braveness for them to make sure them selves that they can solve the problem or maybe go to front to present the solution. The teachers have an obligation to recognize and to understand this aspect, and also they suppose to give an appreciation for every progression of the students that have an achievement in class and exactly not only beautiful smile, commendation and applause, but also in form of score. So it can be a motivation for the student to get more achievement in their study of mathematics.
The way to estimate the progression of student with consider about cognitive, affective and psychomotoric aspect is by applying Quantitative Method in learning process. Quantitative Method is research technique that is used to gather quantitative data and information dealing with numbers and anything that is measurable (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantitative_methods). It is mean that we can measure the competence level of student by using data as media for the teacher to recognize the progress of the student during the learning process. The data in here can be in form of table of data, graph and statistic. Exactly trough this way, the precession of estimating the student’s competence level is accountable. So, there is no mistake when the teacher giving evaluation or estimation for the students during the learning process still goes on. And ultimately, trough Quantitative Method, we can uncover pedagogic psychological phenomena of mathematics education.




REFERENCE:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantitative_methods