A study on the impact of performing arts education amongst children: Drama as an egalitarian in Malaysia / Too Sze Yuing

Too , Sze Yuing (2019) A study on the impact of performing arts education amongst children: Drama as an egalitarian in Malaysia / Too Sze Yuing. Masters thesis, Universiti Malaya.

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Abstract

The concept of utilising Creative Drama as a form of education is still relatively new in Malaysia. Nevertheless, the research and effectiveness of drama in education has been proven through the years and there has been a slow introduction and integration within the Malaysian Education system. This research is catered to the understanding of the importance of drama as an education tool specifically as a social egalitarian for underprivileged students in Malaysia. Based on the social philosophy of egalitarianism – which is the removal of inequalities among people; this research examines the impact of drama education in terms of its social-egalitarianism aspect and how it could affect the mentality of underprivileged children. It is to understand the deeper psyche to the role drama plays in helping to develop the mental state of children growing up in unprivileged circumstances by providing them with the necessary tool beyond basic hard skills. The focus of the research is on expression skills and soft skills development where it provides these children with life-skills and confidence through drama that can elevate their fundamental learning abilities. Targeted at Malaysian students, aged 9-12 this research involved students from underprivileged communities. The focus of the research is on specific students from one selected school – Sekolah Kebangsaan Batu Belah in Klang, Selangor that has recently adopted the Enfiniti Academy - Speech and Drama Programme for their primary school students. This is conducted with the intent to further understand how the integration of drama education can affect perception of students towards their current social and economic state between one another and how soft skills education can potentially affect youths in their development that will improve their current socio-economic standing in the future. While soft skills are not confined within the expression of a specific language, this research used spoken English as a measure of the participants’ level of soft skills. Through the analysis, drama can be deduced as an integral part of the solution that will be able to support underprivileged students in this manner. The research findings show that creative drama does function as an egalitarian platform helps improve expression skills, soft skills and confidence through drama activities. The aim is a better quality of life, based on an enhanced potential for developing children from varying social-economic backgrounds through the impact of drama education.

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