Graph Analysis

Based on the World Educational Ranking (PISA) in 2012, Malaysia is stated as

the second worst country in Southeast Asia at the rank of 52 out of 65 countries around
the world. Through the graph that has been interpreted, Malaysias mean for Reading is
398 marks, Science is 420 marks, and meanwhile for Mathematics has the mean score
of 421 marks.
As seen in the PISAs ranking table, Shanghai-China is the country that scoops
the top performance in Mathematics with the level five or six. Compared to Malaysia
which implements oriented examination, Shanghai-China is focusing to execute the
real-life skills to their students. Chinas education system has struggled to move away
from the exam-based system that drives curriculum and results in memorizing facts to
pass the test. Multiple choice questions are no longer appearing on the citys exams.
Other than that, the students in Shanghai-China are the first to achieve one hundred
percent primary and junior high school enrollment. It was one of the first to achieve
almost universal secondary school attendance. Despite the reforms, exams still exist.
An estimated 80 percent of students attend night and weekend cram schools to
ensure that they pass. This comes in addition to nightly homework and extracurricular
activities making the life of a Chinese student overwhelming. It shows that our country
has ineffective education system that suit the level of students.
In term of Reading performance, Italy obtained 490 mean score compared to
Malaysia, 398. The Malaysias mean score in Reading performance is one of the lowest
among PISA-participating countries and economies. The graph also depicts that
Malaysia performance in Reading is declining by -7.8 changes in score points. One of
Italys attempts to improve their Reading performance is using student assessment to
improve the quality of education. In 2012, 92% of students in Italy attended schools
whose principal reported that they use student assessment to identify aspects of
instruction or of the curriculum that could be improved. While in Malaysia, the
inconsistencies in education and a refusal to put greater emphasis on English was to

blame for the countrys prolonged drop in standards. Apart from that, higher order
thinking skills is one of the main elements in the Pisa survey but our exam questions
focus too much on testing students memory. Our students are good in memorizing but
higher order thinking skills is generally lacking.
Besides, Malaysian performance in Science area is clearly declining by -1.4
compared to the previous assessment. This probably caused by the hot issue regarding
teaching Science in English which had been debated since it had been introduced in
2003. Since then, Malaysian students were struggling to learn Science in the English
language. However, as compared to our neighbourhood country which is Indonesia,
Malaysia still having a bright future in Science Area. The graph obviously shown that
Indonesia was ranked the second lowest with the deterioration of -1.9 score points. This
is because Indonesian country did not consider Science as an important subject. To
make it worse, they planned to remove the Science subject from the list in their New
2013 Curriculum. In short, we could say that change in Science curriculum did not help
these two countries to enhance their Science performances but making it worsen.

References
Educational issues in Indonesia, the newest curriculum. Retrieved on July 26, 2015,
from
http://thaliamarten.blogspot.com/2013/05/educational-issues-in-indonesianewest.html
Ibrahim, D. (2015, March 13). Muhyiddin shocked by local students poor scores in
global tests. The Malaysian Insider. Retrieved from
http://www.themalaysianinsider.com/malaysia/article/muhyiddin-shocked-bylocal-students-poor-scores-in-global-tests
Muniandy, K. (2014). Up in Maths, down in Science and reading. Retrieved on July 25,
2015, from
http://www.freemalaysiatoday.com/category/opinion/2014/01/01/up-in-mathsdown-in-science-and-reading/
News: PISA 2012 highlights deteriorating education performance in Malaysia. Retrieved
on July 27, 2015, from
http://www.scientificmalaysian.com/2014/04/18/pisa-2012-deterioratingeducation-performance-malaysia/
PISA 2012 Results: Italy. Retrieved on July 26, 2015, from
http://www.oecd.org/pisa/keyfindings/PISA-2012-results-italy.pdf