I would like to express my appreciation to Abdul Hakim, my graduate research assistant (GRA) who is also my PhD student, for making these two days a success in our study. He arranged everything with KPM, JPN, JAKOA, and the school headmasters before we visited these two schools; SK Asli Peta and SK Asli Punan.
Hakim is the son of the former UTM lecturer of Akademi Tamadun Islam, almarhum Prof Abd Jalil, who used to be a college principal at Kolej 10 and KTF before moving to Universiti Malaysia Pahang Al-Sultan Abdullah (UMPSA).
I would also like to thank all the headmasters, teachers, and students who offered us their unconditional support. What I love the most about Orang Asli children is their attitude and politeness.
During these two days, we started our journey from the hotel as early as 6.30 am, stopping for breakfast along the way. From the main road in Jalan Kluang-Mersing, it took us two and a half hours to reach SK Peta and two hours to reach SK Punan. Most of the teachers stay at the quarters, but there are also teachers who commute daily, which surprised me.
This afternoon at SK Punan, there is a former undergraduate student from the School of Education UTM who was recently posted to the school through a ‘one-off’ intake by KPM. He was surprised by his posting, as his majoring was mechanical engineering, and he was originally supposed to teach at a Vocational College. However, he still looks happy and committed to his career.
All in all, Hakim has covered all 10 SK Asli schools in Johor, and he visited two of them with me. He conducted interviews with 13 mathematics teachers at SK Asli, and I asked him about the information he obtained. I felt relieved when Hakim told me that the information provided by the interviewees was sufficient and saturated enough.
Please let me know if anyone knows of a transcription service with an affordable rate. We also collected data from the students through mathematics tests. Don’t underestimate them, as a few of them answered all the questions correctly.
