The Reader

To Sir with Love 11

First,let me wish all teachers Happy Teachers Day[Hari Guru],cikgu!

Now, let me recollect a few of my teachers who had made significant contributions to my education:

1. My mother and my father.
2. My standard one teacher,the late Cikgu Ismail who taught me a,b,c and alif ,ba,ta..
3. My standard six teacher Cikgu Zakaria who worked after school hours to make me pass the exam to be selected to a boarding school.
4. My form remove teacher the late Mr Weller who taught me basic English grammar.
5. The HM of SDAR the late Cikgu Amat Mion who taught me to aim high in life.
6. My math teacher Mr Pandian who challenged me to score distinction in my additional maths.
7. My BM teacher Cikgu Fatimah Embong who told me it is better to be an engineer than a teacher.
8. The late Prof Rawlings of Sheffield University who  told us not to believe everything what was going to be taught at the university.
9. Prof Burgess who taught me to do intellectual somersault.
10.Tan Sri Dato Ir Omar Ibrahim who taught me about professional integrity.
11.Dato Seri Prof Dr Ir Wahid Omar who taught me about  being true to knowledge and the fear of Allah.
12.Dr Yeoh who taught me  about contract laws.
13.My partner who  taught me  not to completely  trust others when it comes to money.
14.Ustaz kamaruddin who patiently taught me tajweed when I was 49 years old.
15.Prof Syed Naguib al-Attas who taught me the philosophy of religion and Islamic world-views.
16. Last but not all, again I will list here my mother for the character building and my late father for his teaching about 'aqidah.And to my wife and kids to enable me to be a good husband and a good father. 

I also would like to thank everyone that have taught me one way or another and I humbly thank Allah swt for His Guidance.

Selamat Hari Guru.

Education CONsultants

Someone out there must be selling the house telephone numbers of students who took their SPM in 2006. Even before the exam results were out I did receive a call with offers of a unversity college for my son.After the result was out, more calls came through telling us that our son was offered a place at their university college with potential to study overseas and loans provided.I asked one of them how could my son was offered a place if he has never applied?

I am not writing here to offer advice on how to select the best unversity for you or your children, but to share some experience in dealling with this so called 'education consultants'.IMHO, these CONsultants are just telemarketeers for certain university colleges. The more aggressive they are, the more I suspect of their reputation.One lady called me and asked me to visit the college she worked for and in return I  asked for the college corporate brochure to be sent to my office. A month has passed by and I received nothing.Anyway, it was not my intention to visit the university college.

Last night, I got another call from the same college but from someone I know.And that broke the camel back.Another nice story being played back and lastly I asked: My son wanted to be a engineer.You told me that this course is approved by JPA and LAN.Do you know  that before my son can work as an engineer in Malaysia, he must be registered with the Board of Engineers(BEM)? The course must be approved by BEM. A few years back, the qualification of one big local university was rejected by BEM.
That someone I know never heard of BEM!

Personal guidance

During the coffee break with my teacher last night, I saw a participant came to his table and asked question.This is one way to clear any doubt when we really wanted to learn. From my experience, personal contact and coaching is very effective. As a student, I made a real effort to get close to people of knowledge and get connected to them. There are a lot more we can learn other than from the formal lectures.

Mr Ronald Weller

Mr Ronald Weller was my English teacher and also my class teacher way back in 1965. That year was a sad as well as happy year for me. I was sad because I had to leave my family and starting living in a full boarding school SDAR,Tg. Malim,Perak. I was also happy to be selected to that school where I could study under electical lighting and slept on a Dunlop mattress/pillow.

Mr Ronald Weller passed away two days ago.I only knew it last night when my friend sent me a text message.The last time I met him was in 1968. Our alumni had always invited retired teachers but I never met him since. One regret that I have is not able to meet him when I graduated from Sheffield University in 1976. The blame is on me for not trying or taking enough effort to look for him then.

It was a long,long time ago when about 40 Malay pupils from Malay medium school (mostly from kampong) were entrusted to the late Mr Weller to teach us English. Our knowledge of English was almost non-existence. I still could recall when he was asked me,"Do you understand?" because I did not know the meaning of the word 'understand'. On a few occasions, I had to stand by the blackboard for my spelling mistakes.He had done a good job when all of us had passed our LCE exam(now is called PMR) as good and better than pupils from English medium school.He really grounded us in grammer and forced us to remember a lot of English words. Later,I learnt another word "vocabulary".That,reminded me of many Enid Blyton's books and The Famous Five.

Before I bid farewell,I would like you to know that I now can spell the word "hippopotamus" correctly  but I still speak English with Kelantanese slang.However, I would like you to know that I got C3 for my O Level English and my thanks for your tireless efforts to make me learn English language.

Good bye and thank you,Sir.

Be careful

Let me share some words of wisdom from Anonymous:

Be careful of your thoughts,for your thoughts become your words.

Be careful of your words,for your words become your deeds.

Be careful of your deeds,for your deeds become your habits.

Be careful of your habits,for your habits become your character.

Be careful of your character,for your character becomes your destiny.

Reading the above,I have two questions:

1.What are the resources that form our thoughts?
2.Can we begin the journey without knowing our destination?

Project Management course in action

  Project Management course in action 
  Originally uploaded by Adibi.

The photo shown is a snapshot of my partner giving a lecture on project management.I started the business about four years ago, and to- date, about 500 professionals have attended our course.This discipline of knowledge has began more than 50 years ago but only achieved great growth in the 90's.

From my observations,many people become project managers by virtue of their senior positions in the organisation but they have little knowledge in managing projects.They become accidental project managers and no wonder, many projects have met with a lot of "accidents" along the way.Lately,I observed that MSC companies' advertisement for project managers required a PMP.PMP stands for Project Management Professional.One has to sit for the exam to qualify for the certification.AFAIK,in Malaysia,there is no body or authority that can issuse similar certificates.Some time ago I heard CIDB is working on certification for construction managers.

If you happen to be a project manager or involved in a project or a member of a project team,make sure you know something about project management.It is a dsicipline of knowledge,when applied properly,could increase your probability of achieving project success.

By the way,we have PMI Malaysian Chapter and I am currently a member of its Governing Council.You are kindly invited to visit our website.

Taking notes..

  Mindmap of PIP 
  Originally uploaded by Adibi.

Last Saturday,I gave a short introduction to a subject on People in Project  Management at IKRAM. At the end of the talk,we have a class work on roles and responsibility of project manager.When I went around,one particpant was referring to his notes made using Tony Buzan's Mind Mapping.

From a study,85% of those who DONOT take notes while listening to a lecture or talk, will forget in a matter of days.I observe that a lot of people who attended kuliyyah agama are not taking notes. At our surau,only less than ten percent of the attendees bring books and pens. They are are just listeners and not learners.

So,do take notes if we really want to learn something.

I am pleased to remind you(muslims/muslimahs) and me that the 1st Rejab falls on 26th July,2006.Please take note of it. As an exercise to inculcate the culture of taking notes,please go and get a notebook/diary/PDA and a pen. Then write down the date and create a TODO list of what you are going to do to get closer to Allah swt /earn the pleasure of Allah swt during this blessed month of Rejab.

The Leader in You

The last two days I participated in a course entitled Developing The Leader in You conducted by Mr Bujang Hussin of Dale Carnegie,Malaysia.It was a very imformative and self discovery course.

One interesting thing was I discovered my own leadership style - with associated strengths and weaknesses. It was more like 'muhasabah'.I found out what I have not done and what I could have done. As I understood, a leader must be something,must know something and must do something.The 'something' is quite a long list...

Looking back over the few decades in my working and personal lives,I could have done much better if I have the necessary knowledge,skills and attitude as a good leader.

Teacher's Day

First,let me thank all my teachers,especially the first ones who are my father and my mother.May I wish all of you Happy Teacher's Day.May Allah reward you all for all the lessons and guidance you have given to me.

My standard one teacher was Cikgu Ismail.He passed away a few moths ago.I remembered he came looking for me when I did not go to school for a week. Actually I was sick.At that time one teacher taught all the subjects. During one jawi lesson,I was caned by him because I was not able to spell corn. I visited him a few times when he was sick and he told me how hard it was to get educated in the 40's.Just imagine there was only one secondary school for one district.

My first Quran teacher was my own auntie-my father's sister.I really like her. Every time my father asked whether I attended the Quran class,she would always said yes even though I did not attend some of the time.May Allah swt bless her soul.

I started to learn English only in Std 4(in 1962) when a new teacher arrived in my kampung.His name is Cikgu Daud and his qualification is LCE(equivalent to PMR).He was the only teacher who could teach us English and the most qualified. My first book is  "Far and Near". Most of the books came from England and there were not many around.Then only I know how to count to 100 in English!

Fast forward to the present,my first teacher in project management is Tan Sri Omar Ibrahim,the ex-Director General of JKR.Prof Dr Syed Naguib Al-Attas introduced me to Metaphysic of Islam,Dr Musa Harun to Tasawuf,Dr Hashim Minhat on Islamic Jurisprudence and last but not least to my Quran teacher who was patient enough to teach me to re-read Quran with proper tajweed!

To all of them mentioned above and not mentioned,I thank you Sir with all my heart.

Let me qoute an African proverb: It takes the whole village to educate a child.

SELAMAT HARI GURU.

Note: By the way,I am still a student who has yet to graduate.Sometimes I also teach.

Where are you,teachers?

Today,I read the report that the Minister of Education Dato Hishamudin admitted that the schools donot have enough teachers.I was not shocked at all because all along my own son had to suffer going to school without a teacher in his class.By the way, my son's school is located only 15 minutes from KLCC.

Every time when his teacher went on maternity leave or  had to attend courses,my son and his classmates were left to do work on their own.At some times,he told me he is wasting his time at school.He would rather stay home and do his homework. No wonder, he asked me permission to attend tuition classes.

By August 31st next year, we have been independent nation for 50 years.I would be very ashamed of my country if we donot have enough teachers by then.Not only the numbers, but also the  quality of teachers for our schools.

My sister is a teacher.She graduated in Bio Chemistry from UM.She was trained to teach Science and Mathematics.Owing to shortage of English teachers in her school,she has to teach English as well.I pity the children....

While the ministry of Education is making efforts to get enough quality teachers,your children and mine have to suffer.I think from now on,we should stop to be the  BIGGEST or THE LOOOONGEST in anything.Just give us enough good quality teachers for our kids,and we would be grateful.