KOTA SAMARAHAN: Nurturing children to be creative and innovative must start from home, says Education, Science and Technological Research Minister Datuk Seri Michael Manyin Jawong.
He said creating a culture where children were given freedom to take risks would encourage the growth of the country’s innovation level.
“To be innovative, like in most developed countries, family is instrumental in nurturing children to become risk takers…but our culture here has been much regimented,” he said at a press conference after officiating the research, innovation and creativity convocation at Dewan Sri Samarahan, Institut Pendidikan Guru Kampus Tun Abdul Razak today.
He emphasised the importance of the culture in willing to innovate and contribute to the the growth of creative education from pre-school years.
“Student should be trained to think on problems that are difficult to be solved so that they can learn to figure out new ways to solve problems.
“In some countries, if a gifted student was able to answer and solve all the questions and problems, the educators perceive that their time teaching did not reach its full potential because the student did not find a sense of willingness to question about the problem they are faced with.”
To create innovative thinking among students, Manyin pointed out that teachers and educators should give freedom for students to grow.
“We must encourage them to be brave, give them freedom so that they will become a person willing to take risks and not be afraid of failure.
“I know this will not be easy because the risks might be very dangerous. Because of this, children and students have to be guided.
“By giving them freedom, this will be the starting point for children to grow.”
“Only through failures can the children learn. But this must be, provided that failures equate to an opportunity to learn.
“In our culture, we always say that failure is not an option and we must avoid at all costs.
“We need to make children and students understand that innovation is room for improvement, which involves the whole organisation and related to human daily activities,” he added.
“Innovation is different from invention. Invention means the process of discovering something which is new and never been discovered before.
“Innovation is a process of discovering a new way of doing things with new added values that will benefit society as a whole.”
