Nothing is simple (when deciding what our children should learn)!

It is often taken for granted that we sent our children to school to learn.  But the question we never asked is what are they going to learn, and who decide what our children are going to learn, and most importantly, based on what criteria they selected the subject matter that our children are going to learn?

I never bothered to ask these types of questions, and considering myself being educated, I often assumed that I can easily design a curriculum for primary students.  Now I realize that I have been making too much assumption –none of them with a single strand of foundation!

For example, when we had session on “Learning Environmental Science”, it made me think why we treat various subject matter as a single subject in school, on what basis, and what make them so related that we can put them together.   Besides it also made me wonder what are the policy and what are the thought behind all that. 

If you are wondering why EVS is being taught at Class 3, 4, 5 only and no other classes, I’ll tell you my view and what I learned, which will also talk about the other reasoning behinds the subject and subject matters.

EVS is a subject that deal with our immediate environment and their relationship among themselves and most importantly, with us.  It is important to be taught because children are in constant interaction with their environment, and we want the children to be aware of their environment and being able to relate them and to develop a sense of enquiring mind.  

Besides, we practice a progressive education system or a child-centred education system and we want the child to be prioritized and as such we are using the child’s environment not only as a subject matter (content) but also as the means to understand and learn and related them with their everyday life.  In simple words, we want the child to have a firm foundation, develop an enquiring mind and most importantly, we are teaching them how to learn.

Also, children in class 3 - 5 are in the age-group of 7 – 10 years and as such, it is the time wherein they start developing a sense of identity and their cognitive ability to analyze and think critically are being in the process of developing.  We want them to analyze and think critically the interconnectedness of everything that surround them, and want them to relate their classroom learning with their immediate environment and have a firm foundation before we start teaching them a more complex concept and specialized kind of knowledge once they reached class 6.

Through EVS we are contextualizing the social relationship, the cause and effect of nature, norms and values (that exist around the child) for the child so that it gives them a sense of self-efficacy.