PETALING JAYA, MALAYSIA - Both Tamil and Chinese educationists have welcomed the Cabinet's decision to revert the teaching of Science and Mathematics to one's mother tongue in vernacular schools.

Dong Zong (United Chinese School Committees Association of Malaysia) president Dr Yap Sin Tian said the use of English had brought about negative effects on students.

'Therefore, we hope the Government will immediately switch the medium of instruction back to Chinese so that students can pick up in their studies again,' he said.

Dr Yap said Dong Zong welcomed the decision to increase the number of hours for the teaching of English but it also hoped that more time would be allocated for Chinese classes.

Jiao Zong (the United Chinese School Teachers Association of Malaysia) chairman Ong Chiow Chuen said Chinese schools were ready to use Chinese for both subjects as early as next year as it had been going bilingual in its teaching thus far.

'We have textbooks in both English and Chinese for both subjects and we do not have to wait until 2012 to completely reverse the medium of instruction,' he said.

MIC education bureau chairman Datuk Dr T. Marimuthu said the decision was good as it reflected the sentiments at roundtable discussions.

'The majority of Tamil school headmasters supported the teaching of Mathematics and Science in English in 2002 because many scientific terms and reports are in English.

'However, the last six years showed that students had difficulty learning concepts in English. We found out the hard way,' he said.

When the old policy took effect in 2003, Tamil schools adopted English as the medium of instruction for Mathematics and Science unlike Chinese vernacular schools which continued operating bilingually.

National Tamil Headmasters' Association general-secretary Muthiah Sithambaram said the decision would not bring things to a standstill.

'We still keep stock of Mathematics and Science textbooks in Tamil and switching should not be a problem,' he said.