Our teaching pattern are just limited for kids to make them aware of topics and how to solve them, but do we tell them the importance of topic and how can they be helpful in many ways.
1. How are we teaching and how should we teach?
Last Sunday I went to my cousin’s place after quite a long period of
time. I was really curios to see his daughter who had started going to
school. I thought see must be enjoying herself and school would be
like a fun ride for her. But when I got a chance to talk to her, my
cousin told me that tomorrow is her test and she is preparing for it. It
was really astonishing thing for me because she had hardly spent a
week going to her school and she now she was going to her first test.
What she could have learned in just one week? How will she answer
the question as she even has not learned writing anything? Such kind
of practices in the schools is making me worry about how kids feel in
the school and such unnecessary pressure on them is just making the
conditions worse. There are many questions in my mind which I want
to share with you.
Q. Why equation is more important than concept?
We all have seen kids just solving the answer without thinking about
the concept. It’s importance in real life or what are the various fields of
real life where it could be used. Teacher just tells them the equation
which is used to solve the problem and that’s it. How kids will
understand the importance of equation if teacher is not telling them.
Answering the question is important and understanding the question is
much more important.
Q. Why cramming in winning over learning?
Every year we read in the newspaper that high-cut offs of colleges are
making students suffer to get admission in the colleges. I once read
that a girl had 92% marks in her Intermediate board exams, but she
wanted to go for a rechecking of her answer sheets because she
thought 92% marks are not enough for her to get admission in the
desired college. If such high marks are the only parameter to get
success, then kids are pressured to just cram the topic and get the
numbers. Learning is the losing part in all this process, because we
know that such education will not give any benefit to anybody.
2. Q. Why class is important than lab?
When we used to go school there were only 2 lab period for us in
whole week and remaining days were spent in the classroom where
teacher, books and blackboard were our companions. I want to ask if
only gaining text book knowledge is important for us, then why we
bother for practical knowledge when we go for job interviews. This is
the problem with us; text book knowledge does not give us job but our
emphasize on textual learning is not shaking loose. Practical
knowledge is the winner in getting job, so our teaching habits should
be changed.
Q. why answering is important than questioning?
In our schools kids are taught to keep silence and just answer to the
questions of teachers. They are told that we should not speak in front
of elders and keep our things to ourselves. This habit makes kids
hesitant and they start keeping just to themselves. Further it leads to
communication gap between kids and elders (parents, teachers) which
is a dangerous habit.
Q. Why there is gap between teaching and learning?
In schools or even at homes, we have a habit of teaching kids in such
a way that if they get good marks, we think all is okay and kids is
progressing in life, but when that kids goes for any job interview and
any tough questions comes in front of him, he becomes confuse that it
was not taught in the curriculum that how should we answer such
tough questions. This is the gap between teaching and learning which
does not prepare our kids to face real world, but just making them
prepared for a rat race.
These are the questions which keep troubling me whenever we think
about our kids and their future. Are we really helping them in a rightful
way or just hiding behind our fake imagination that our kids are going
3. to school so they are happy. I just want to give some suggestion which
I think can help our kids in a long way.
1. Make concept oriented teaching-
If we start with a concept based education with the start of
schooling and tell kids that how do things work and what are the
real life scenarios where these concepts can come handy, then it
will be a great boost for kids and they will start relating their
subject topic with daily life things.
2. Should encourage brainstorming among kids-
Kids should be encouraged to do their things on their own and
just guide them how to do any particular work. Such
brainstorming sessions give a great boost to the kid’s mind
4. because their young mind really grasp any new thing and save it
for a longer period of time. Such kind of teaching where kids are
encouraged on their own is a great way of teaching.
3. Increase no. of labs period-
I would say that if we increase the number of lab of technical
subjects like physics and chemistry and include maximum no. of
topics in lab’s experiments then kids can visually see things
happening and they can learn better and efficient way. It will also
increase practical learning among kids.
4. Encourage students to ask questions-
It is a really bad habit of elders that they do not promote kids to
ask questions and tell them to stay silent. It is not a great
practice because it can lead to lack of communication between
kids and his parents and teachers. Such lack of communication
leads to many problems in the future.
5. Teaching should be collaborative between teacher and
students-
There are many programs which encourage a collaborative
connection between teacher and students, where students can
initiate rather than teacher and can lead to many topics where
teacher is just a simple guide who just give them instructions
and that too when kids needs it. Such habits are very good for
the kids and their bright future.