Brunei

SM SMJA CASE STUDY ON PROMOTING HUMAN VALUES-BASED WATER AND SANITATION AND HYGIENE EDUCATION IN SOUTHEAST ASIAN SCHOOLS

THE SCHOOL

Sekolah Menengah Sultan Muhammad Jamalul Alam (SM SMJA) is located near the capital of Brunei Darussalam, Bandar Seri Begawan. It is one of the oldest government schools in the country and was built in 1950. It began its operation in 1951. It is now one of the leading schools in Brunei Darussalam.

The school is made up of several blocks, which include instructional classrooms, including science, home economics, woodwork and computer laboratories. In addition, the school also has numerous non-instructional rooms such as the library, canteen, reading room, resource room and administrative office.

There are 113 teachers who are dedicated in providing the optimal education needs to the 1,127 schoolchildren from Secondary 1 to 5. These schoolchildren also come from different socio-economic backgrounds.

Since April 2008, the school has been headed by its Acting principal, Cikgu Hjh Sipiah Hj Sawal.   

From this school, there were four selected project teachers who underwent the workshop. They are from four different subject fields – Mathematics, English, Geography and Science.

PROJECT IMPLEMENTATION

In late 2007, a workshop on integration of HVWSHE in the curriculum was conducted for teachers across the country ranging from the primary level up to the secondary level. For secondary schools, each of the four schools represented the four districts in the country.

The facilitators consisted of three officials from different departments within the ministry of Education.

The different teachers covered certain topics which were relevant to the task at hand i.e. water conservation.

For Mathematics, the topic was Mass, which is a subtopic of Measure and Money. This lesson was conducted in a two period lesson, which lasted one hour. The students from Secondary 1B were selected as one of the project classes. The teacher used the ICT lab through the use of PowerPoint as well as handouts. This provided a more visual approach to relaying the topic at hand.

A comprehension lesson was carried out in Secondary 1F for English. The students were provided handouts, which included numerous exercises – vocabulary (words related to water conservation), information transfer and also brainstorming. The story was one that was created during the workshop. Besides the writing exercises, general questions were also asked to elicit explicit and implicit information.

In Geography, a lesson on the Water Treatment Plan in Tutong (in Form 1B) where a discussion was conducted about how our water gets processed stage by stage. In the lesson, the teacher also highlighted how lucky Bruneians are. Here, water is abundant and clean compared to other countries such as Africa. The teacher also asked them to stipulate about given situations related to water scarcity.

Another teacher from the Science Department conducted the lesson on ‘Volume of Liquid’ e.g. water. The lesson was conducted in the class. Teaching aids provided were measuring cylinders, drink cans and boxes as well as liquids in bottled. Students were asked to read different volumes of water in measuring cylinders. Later, students were asked to form into groups to discuss how water is used everyday and which of these include wastage of water. Teacher-students discussion was then carried out afterwards.  

RESULTS

The outcome of the program did lead to an observable change in the students to some extent. The students’ attitude towards water increased slightly after having those lessons. This is expected because attitude takes longer time to develop. With continuous guidance from teachers and parents, they might show a significant change in their attitude.

Through the observations made on some of the selected students from the project classes, the following are observed:

  • Washing their hands after using the toilet and/or before and after eating.
  • Reported cases of water wastage in the school compound.
  • Showed proper use of the sanitation facilities.
  • Turning off tap whenever they see any water dripping.

LIMITATIONS

The limitations lie in the fact that three out of the four project teachers are not teaching Secondary One. The project was stressed more on the Secondary One students’ as they are the starting points for the ongoing observations.  

The teachers who are not teaching Secondary One had to take some of the respective subject teacher’s lessons resulting in a disruption of their class time.   

Even if the teacher did teach Secondary One, she did not teach the desired subject that is to be observed.

RECOMMENDATIONS

  • Other subjects should be included for this project such as Bahasa Melayu (through comprehension), Islamic Religious Knowledge (uses of ablution and hygiene topics), Art (through posters to create awareness) and Home economics (hygiene topics).
  • More teachers should be trained from other schools.
  • The officials who went for the big seminars should appoint relevant authorities (e.g. Water department) to work with them in creating awareness about water conservation and hygiene.
  • Ample resource materials should be provided (and present materials should also be revised continuously) so it would be easier for teachers to convey their lessons.
  • Competitions can be held to create awareness on water conservation and hygiene – posters, brochures, essay writing to name a few.