MDEC: Coding to be taught in schools from next year

Here’s a promising piece of news for education in Malaysia — starting next year, coding will be officially added to national school syllabuses.

This move, the Malay Mail Online reports, will be incorporated into the ‘pedagogy of teaching, especially in science and maths classes’ and not just taught as part of a computer science subject.

“We will be launching this thing called the digital maker movement next month, where coding is embedded as an official curriculum in schools, starting from standard three onwards,” Malaysian Digital Economy Corporation (MDEC) CEO Yasmin Mahmoud was quoted as saying. 

“It’s very exciting because we will be one of the first few countries that will be doing this officially,” she was quoted further.

Additionally, the decision to introduce coding into national schools’ teaching and learning was to encourage Malaysian youth to not just be users of technology, but also makers.

Headed by the Education Ministry with help from MDEC, this will become part of next year’s new Primary School Standard Curriculum (KSSR) and Secondary School Standard Curriculum (KSSM), the portal reported.

“And it’s been proven that coding, or computer science, is a very important driver towards higher thinking skills,” Yasmin said.