A Malaysian teacher recently sparked a discussion about the proper use of Bahasa Melayu after discovering that some of her students had written their essays in Indonesian.
In a TikTok post, she reminded Malaysians about the correct usage of phrases in both languages, highlighting the differences between them despite their similar vocabulary.
In her viral video, she pointed out that some of the words used by her students in their Bahasa Melayu essays included “merencanakan”, “teman-teman”, and “rumah sakit”, among other examples.
The teacher emphasised that certain phrases, such as “teman-teman”, make it obvious that the essay is written in Indonesian rather than proper Bahasa Melayu.
“Don’t get carried away writing in Indonesian in your essays. That is wrong,” she sternly reminded her students at the end of the video.
She later clarified that students must follow the Malaysian education syllabus for Bahasa Melayu and use the language accordingly.
The teacher also urged parents to monitor the content their children consume to prevent such errors from occurring in the future.
Netizens supported the teacher’s message, stressing the importance of learning the national language properly. Several users shared how, despite being exposed to various languages through television shows and music, they were careful not to use those languages in schoolwork.
“Back then, we used to watch Indonesian dramas after school, but we never wrote Bahasa Melayu essays in Indonesian,” one user shared.
Another user, a History teacher, recounted their experience marking exam papers that were filled with Indonesian terms and “bahasa rojak”, with students failing to answer in proper Bahasa Melayu.
“In the 1970s, Malay literature was taught in depth, and the Malay language was carefully preserved. Today, literature is still taught at the secondary level, but with a different approach. The focus is more on comprehension rather than deep appreciation,” another user commented.