Eye Opening Experience About SMPKV Shah Alam

We have visited a special needs vocational school at Shah Alam which is named as Sekolah Menengah Pendidikan Khas Vokasional Shah Alam. That was my first experience going to a special needs school. It was a good experience and exposure to me. Ms Pravina, one of the teacher from that school welcome all of us.

  The school cater different disability children such as Deaf, Slow learners, Blind, Physically Disable, and so on. When i went into the school, the first thing that i observe is all the students interact using sign language. They use KTBM ( Kod Tangan Bahasa Malaysia) to interact which is a Malaysian sign language. This sign language is taught in special needs schools in Malaysia.  

  First of all, we went into the meeting room of the school to hear welcome speech from the principal of  Sekolah Menengah Pendidikan Khas Vokasional Shah Alam. After that, we had a Q&A session with Ms Pravina and Ms Saras, they are the teachers from that school. But Ms Saras has more teaching experience, if i am not mistaken it is more than 5 years. During the Q&A session, everyone from Nottingham was shocked to hear the word that utter by the teacher. She refers the children there using double D words. I think that maybe the teacher have difficulties in translating Malay terms into English. 

  After the Q&A session, Ms Pravina takes us a tour around the school. I was amazed by the some of the courses that they had there. I dint expect that a special needs vocational school can have lots of skill traning courses such as hair saloon where they learn how to cut hair and many more. This course is mainly for girls. Moreover, they also have courses such as house keeping, batik painting, motor workshop, portrait painting and drawing, cooking, graphic design  and many more. I was amazed by their talent everything.They are using hi-tech in graphic designing course. They are using use Mac computer for the course which is sponsored by government.

   The years that these children study at special needs school is same as us which are primary 1 until primary 6 and then continue to secondary until secondary 5. These children can extend their studies for two years no matter whether is it primary or secondary level. This extension is for those who need it because of a certain reason. I am not sure of the reasons.

  I heard from the teacher that these student will have an internship program. After they finish their studies, they can get a job. They do not need to go and apply for a job. They can get job in hotels, and many other places as well.

  I am so happy that School of Education had arrange a trip to special needs school which i have never experience it before. This trip was very meaningful for me. I learned a lots of things about special needs school such as their education system, how the teachers there teach them, how is their environment, how the children there interact with each other, what kind of courses they have and many more. I hope that we can visit more different types of school in the future which will give all the students in School of education a good experience.