Creating a knowledge sharing portal to support the teaching of Malaysian indigenous language

• Main Authors: Alwi, Azwinawati, Mehat, Mazlina, Arshad, Noreen Izza, Mohd Ariffin, Mazeyanti, Sugathan, Savita K.
• Format: Conference or Workshop Item
• Language: English
• Published: 2016
• Subjects: QA75 Electronic computers. Computer science
• Online Access: http://repo.uum.edu.my/23373/1/ICT4T2016%2030%2035.pdf; http://repo.uum.edu.my/23373/
• Institution: Universiti Utara Malaysia

Bahasa Semai is one of the indigenous languages that exist in Malaysia and is taught in selected Malaysian primary schools.In sustaining the existence of the biggest indigenous ethnics in Malaysia, it is significant to preserve the existence of their language and best supported with the existing computing technology.The purpose of this paper is to report the process of developing a portal for the usage of Bahasa Semai educators that teach the language to the school children.The portal allows educators to upload their teaching materials, access Bahasa Semai dictionary, share teaching experience with other teachers and communicate with the indigenous language coordinator.Interviews and literature reviews were conducted for the preliminary studies in identifying the functionalities of the portal. The portal was developed by following agile methodology and six educators from two primary schools that offer Bahasa Semai in class were interviewed in the user testing phase.As a result, the educators have positive interests in using the portal and believe that the portal will be able to assist them in teaching the language, especially to educators that Bahasa Semai is not their first language. Moreover, the portal will allow knowledge sharing of Bahasa Semai teachings between educators and coordinators, which will assist in sustaining an indigenous language in Malaysia.