Happy Teachers Day

Child-Friendly Assessment

In one of my earlier post, I talked about the need for assessment of learning, and that assessment need not necessarily be a burden.  Just to clarify again, assessment starts the moment we first interact with the child and ends when the child left.  It’s a continuing process, and how you used the findings will determine its importance.

Assessment can be done through our daily observations, activities and interactions with the child.  However, our education system also demands a child to go through some form of written paper-pencil test which are most often standardized, and this is where the issues and gross misunderstanding of assessment arises.

A written paper-pencil test, especially those of the summative nature, are often large-scale, standardized, and more often than not, assesses only the recall and retrieval ability of the child.  Such assessments are a burden and can even have major implication on the self-esteem of the child.   It’s no wonder standardized assessment are often seen negatively because it assumes that every child learns in the same way, took away the autonomy of the child and the teachers, and reduces the whole being of an individual into statistics. 

But large-scale standardized assessment must not be confused with individual assessment (worth of a being) as it has its own objectives and usage.  They are meant to be quantified, and it has its due share of benefits. Large-scale standardized assessment, if designed objectively and executed methodically can yield several benefits, such as: ensuring accountability of the delivery system, monitoring performances at various stages/levels of the schooling system, informing educational policy and planning, facilitating better teaching-learning processes through instructional diagnosis and generating a discourse on quality of student learning.

Large-scale Assessment has often been misused that it has become an exacting experience for the students and the teachers.  Students are habituated to an assessment that can only lead to stress, marking, pass or fail, and a tension for their future. Large-scale standardized assessment must veer-off from that perception, and one way to do that is to adopt a child-friendly approach of assessment.

Child-friendly assessment is a concept that can be defined simply as the deliberate process of administrating a contextualized assessment in a stress-free environment through a friendly process. Child-friendliness must start from the conceptualization of the tools that we used for assessment, on how we present the reports and how we used it.

Child-friendly assessment is a deliberate process, and every aspect of it must be though-out before starting.  It begins from the tool development process till how we choose to present the data at the end.

Elements of Child-Friendliness in the Tool of Assessment:

• Tool must have Diverse questions types with more MCQs than constructed responses: MCQs can cover broad topics, can easily detect misconception and misunderstanding, are more reliable and ease the checking process; while we need few constructed responses to test the depth of understanding.
• Tool must take into account the aptitude and capabilities of the children: The structure, language used, and content of stems are derived from the existing syllabus considering its age-appropriateness.
• Tool must take into account the experiences of the child: The constructed responses must focus on the child’s narrative of their life experiences.
• Tool must respect and acknowledge the social and cultural context of the child: The tools are designed to ensure context appropriateness, and sensitively includes examples and contents from each area of where the tools are administrated.
• Tool must respect and accommodate the prior knowledge and experiences of the child: Besides asking questions that are directly related to the experience of the child, it also asks them question related to topics which they have covered previously.
• Tool must have simple language and design: The papers are designed in such a way that it minimizes room for confusion (eg. No questions are broken across pages, differentiation between number and stems, consistency in formatting and wording, and proper instructions), have illustrations and pictures to make it more attractive.
• An Exhaustive Rubrics for Constructed responses: The rubrics or answer key must consider the child’s point of views.  The tool developer must pilot their tools before finalizing it, exploring all possible ways a question can be answered.  The child’s point of view on an issue will come within a context, and such views must also be assessed from that point of view.

Elements of child-friendliness in Practices and Processes of Administration:

• Be very selective of the Assessor: Be very selective of who you select as assessors.  You don’t want random people to go to school to administer the assessment.  We want someone who is approachable, pleasant and friendly to children, and have had experience of working with children before, and have had basic introduction to the various concept of education.  We also want that person to be able to comprehend the process of tool administration and maintain data quality.
• Emphasis on training of assessors: Assessors must be thoroughly trained for every processes and practiced for a number of days. The training must include mock-sessions for every key process like how to introduce yourself to the schools and students, how to introduce your tool to the students, what to say to the students to assure the students and reduce their stress, how to build rapport with the students, etc.
• Rapport-building with the students: Make it compulsory for the assessor to focus on rapport building with the institution and the children before starting the assessment.
• Have a set of what to do and what not to do: Train your assessors on a set of good practices that includes what to do and what not to do, how to speak, how to behave, and even appearance.
• Focus on reducing the stress/tension in the assessment location: Train your assessors on how to assure the students that the assessment is not an assessment of their worth and talk about how one can change our destinies.
• Reading of Questions: In Primary school, the questions could be read-out by the assessors (just have a separate instruction manual on what to read and not to read, and which word to emphasize, based on the objective of each of the questions).
• Defined Process: Have a well-defined process for tool adminstration that is also documented as a manual and can be referred to by the assessors at all time and ensure that the assessors adhere to the manual.

Large-scale assessments are always expensive, as such it usually come with specific objectives.  They are mostly summative in nature, but many parts of the tools must be used formatively.  Doing assessment only for quantification purpose should be a crime, it’s not fair at all.  The data has so much potential to enhance the learning, so the findings must invariably go back to the teacher so that she can deal with the misconceptions and other challenges.

As we can seen from the above, standardized assessment can be versatile and can also be used for formative purposes also, however, standardized assessment has its own specific objective, as such, a teacher must refrain from using tools of such standardized assessment for assessing their own students, except for preparing them for such assessment. 

No one knows the students better than a teacher, and the teacher is the only qualified person to design a more contextualize tools. Consider the level and context of your child when designing, ask them question in a way they can fully understand what is being asked of them, focus on critical thinking and analyzing misconception, and most importantly, use the findings. 

It is in human’s nature to always want to know if they have achieved their objectives or not. Assessment is done basically because we have objectives.  And all our institutions that sets out with specific objectives, want to see if they are progressing as per their expectation, where and when they need to do course correction, and what remedial issues need to be taken.  Standardize assessment is here to stay, in school and outside school,  and we need to ensure that the tools we used and the processes we followed doesn’t add to more stress for our students.  

The Place of Workbooks in Primary School

The reason usually given as to the purpose of having a workbook was for the students to work in independence of the teachers to follow-up and practice each lesson that was covered inside the classroom, so that the limited time in the classroom can focus on 'mastery'.

This view has it's pros and cons. If students are expected to use the workbooks at home, then it might increase the burden of the children.  However, if the child wants to work independently at school or at home, then workbook are a really wonderful resource to further and supplement the classroom learning.

We also want our students to continously engage with their learning and stay connected, in that sense, workbooks serve an important role. And making our workbook colourful and attactive enhanced students desire to be engaged with it. But as mentioned above, it should not be forced or else it become a burden.

Workbook are really useful for some contents that focus on practice and mastery, especially mathematics. While workbook can also be effectively used for enhancing learning in social sciences and language, engaging them in a real life experience is a much more effective pedagogy for most children to learn language and the social sciences.

Saying that, the whole purpose of having a workbook is to supplement the limitation of the classroom...so a workbook should avoid repeating what is already in the textbook. Even if it's repeated, then it should take a step further.

And for workbook writer and designer, your focus is on making learning vibrant enough so that children would rather engage with the workbook in the face of the various activities available to them.  Make the workbook attactive, vibrant, and interesting -it has to be more interesting than the textbook. Know and organize the competencies you want to focus-on to make life easier for the teachers. And please, by all means, remember that workbooks are not meant to be a replacement of a teacher, so don't prepare the worksheets expected of the teachers.

And dear teachers, workbook are meant for your students to work independently at home (with or without support of parents) or when you're busy in the classroom especially when you're teaching multi-grade. Please prepare your own worksheet and remember, workbook can never replace a well-prepared lesson plan from you. Afterall, a workbook is just a book, while your lesson plan take into account your knowledge and understanding of your students which is the most valuable components of an effective teaching-learning process.

On assessment and the needs

Assessment is often considered a necessary evil today. It is often associated with evaluation, test and examination, and each of these words have become cursed in the education sector. And the reason for that is deeply rooted in misunderstanding and its appalling misuse.

Assessment is a process of gathering and analyzing information from multiple and diverse sources in order to develop a deep understanding of what students know, understand, and can do with their knowledge as a result of their educational experiences (summative). The assessment process culminates when assessment results are used by teachers to adjust their learning-facilitation strategies, and by students to adjust their learning strategies (formative).  

Assessment, teaching, and learning are inextricably linked, as each informs the others. It is a powerful process that can either optimise or inhibit learning, depending on how it is applied. In our current school system, the assessment process is often misused and thus become a burden to the teacher and a bane for the students. 

Assessment is needed in learning simply because we have learning objectives. Assessment in learning is directly derived from the learning objectives; and without objectives, assessment will not have any relevance.  Likewise, until and unless the teacher have a thorough understanding of the aims of education and schooling, and know and understand the objective of teaching and learning a particular subject and its contents, assessment is meaningless.

Education, schooling, teaching and learning have aims and objectives.  We can very well dismiss assessment and keep only the objectives.  But it is in human's nature to want to know where we currently stand, if we are in the right track, or if we have achieved what we set-out to do. If I invest money and time in educating myself, I'll definitely want to know if I am getting my money's and time's worth, and how best to optimized my investment. And the only way to know that is through assessment. 

Assessment is necessary, but it need not be evil.  Assessment is a continuous process, and can be and must be done continuously.  It need not be in the form of test or exam either in written and/or oral format.  Assessment can take any form of interaction, observation and conversation which are very much part of our normal life and can be and must be done as such.

The Basis of Right to Education in India

Prior to India’s independence, education was generally considered a privilege rather than a right. The diarchy system introduced by the British just before independence resulted in education coming under the charge of the provincial (state) authorities from wherein start the need for a uniform national policies on education. 

After independence, the State’s obligation to provide education was constitutionally recognized with the inclusion of a directive principle to this effect under Article 45 in the Indian Constitution as a directive principles. It must be noted that directive principles, unlike fundamental Rights, are not legally enforceable, however, Article 45 come with a time limit that it should be implemented within 10 years!  

Interestingly, the concept of free and compulsory education was adapted from the British law of Free and Compulsory Education (FCE) and was incorporated into the Constitution so that education can be universalized across the country. As per the mandate in the article when it was adopted, education was to be universalized within 10 years, i.e. by 1960.  However, the State and Union budgets continuously treated education as a peripheral subject until the Kothari Commission (1966) changed the outlook drastically.

Since independence, the government have set-up various educational commissions, two national policies, and numerous reforms through programs to universalize education India while education remain under the directive principles, and not a fundamental right. 

It took more than 40 years since the adoption of the constitution for education to be acknowledged as a critical fundamental rights in India when the Indian Supreme Court ruled as such in a few legal cases in the early 1990s. After that, it took the government of India another 10 years to enact the 86^th Amendment to insert Article 21A to the constitution in 2002 to make education a fundamental right as ruled by the Supreme Court. And it took the government 8 years to draft a central legislation that would lay down the practical framework for the implementation for the Right to Education until its final enactment in 2009.

The Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Bill (2008) was passed in both the Houses of Parliament in 2009.  The law received the President's assent in August 2009 and it comes into effect in 1^st April 2010. 

The passing of the RTE Act that guaranteed education as a fundamental right was indeed a historical moment for India, but it also come with the acute awareness that it limited universal education only to those children in the age group of 6 to 14 years of age. India still has a long way to go to universalize education for all its citizens.

Despite its limitation, the importance of the RTE cannot be overemphasized. It provides a justiciable legal framework, guaranteed education of reasonable quality based on equity and non-discrimination. It provides for a free and compulsory admission, attendance, and completion of elementary education. It also provides for an education that is free from fear, stress and anxiety.  

Is there such thing as Indian Childhood?

The worldview towards childhood was captured by the CRC adopted by the United Nation in 1989, and was implemented all over the world, including in India in 1992.  The CRC stance of childhood was directly influenced by the North (western developed countries) and as such, it is individualistic, ungendered, and to a great extend nostalgic in nature. Such construct of childhood has been criticized by activists in the south from the very beginning and rightly so. The CRC view of childhood was criticized for many valid reason, two key criticism includes 

• Not giving a role or importance to the kin, family groups, community which are critical in the south as part of the socialization process of the child (Nieuwenhuys, 1998). 
• And, ignoring the multiplicity of childhood in the south.  

Considering the plurality of childhood in the south, it seems like an individualistic approach in policy paper seems logical, but the childhood in the south is too complicated to be addressed as such in policy papers. So how complicated is the childhood in the south, and looking at India specifically, can there be such thing as an Indian childhood?  

According to Raman (2000), in classical Hindu literature, there’s only one type of childhood i.e. ‘boychild’ as its point of reference, whereas in some tribes in India, the practice varies. She also mentioned that in India, the individuality of the child is acknowledged while deeply embedded in the larger social matrix of community, caste/tribe, kin group and family.  Some key / common feature of childhood that can be observed across India might includes: 

Plurality of Childhood: Childhood in India is marked by its plurality as captured by Raman (2000). For instance, the experience of childhood in India varies horizontally and vertically. Horizontally, there are almost 5000 communities in India which translate to 5000 diverse experience, while vertically, we have the caste, class and gender (Raman, 2000).

Distinct Development task: Also, the distinction of Indian childhood from that of the western concept can be seen in the developmental task of Indian children (Bisht, 2008), for instance;  the  girl child gradually take over the household chores from mothers and in preparation of a marriage life, while the boys get indulgence in their earlier life gradually moving towards an inflexible standards of absolute obedience and conformity to familial and societal standards.

This implies that Indian childhood can be marked by:

• Plurality of childhood: Since childhood is socially construct, then the extreme diversity in India will definitely have an impact on how we construct childhood across the country.  
• Continuity between childhood and adulthood. There's no rigid gap between childhood and adulthood like in the west especially for the girl child, she's expected to perform adult gender role from a very early age.  
• Childhood as a time for preparation for adulthood, especially for girls who are constantly groomed for marriage.
• Unique developmental task (girls priority is household works and preparation for marriage which are not a priority among parents in the west, while boys are indulged at first then move towards familial and social conformity). 

What more can we add to this list...any suggestion?

Religion VS Education: Contradiction or Complementary

Every society need a moral compass to tell its member what is right/wrong, what is good/bad, what should be done under certain circumstances, etc. It acted as a guideline for the member of the society.

Religious beliefs and practices are one such moral compass or guidance in our life. And in any society, we need some sort of moral compass to tell us what is right, what is good, what is desired and what is dignified for the common good of the society based on general belief.  If any society don't have such moral compass, chaos will surely follow.

Moral compass are of course based on the society's general beliefs on what is good or desirable for them as a society. And what the society think is good or desirable changes as they move on and deal with new circumstances, new understanding and inventions, etc. But such beliefs, can also be institutionalized into a rigid frame that makes it hard for it to catch-up with the changing needs, thus they can become the unreasoned or out-dated beliefs, and to stick to that beliefs can hinder our progress as a humanity. Religion is one such institutionalized belief system.

Every religious practice or belief are not necessarily unreasoned, afterall they are based on what the society thought was good for the member of the society at the time of institutionalization. Take for example, the concept of love and peace are taught by all religion, and they are as desirable today as it was then. On the other hand, some religious practices demands that we stone to death a certain people, which are cruel and barbaric. So despite what our religion said about such thing, we decided to ignore them because, as a human, we have the capacity to logically think and reason the implications, and therefore, make independent decision about such issues.

The issue is, most often, religion demands blind faith, and blindly follow the moral compass it made for us centuries ago.  Such moral compass have not been updated to the needs and desire of the society, so it usually come across as unreasoned, even barbaric. The primary aims of education is to take us beyond such unreasoned beliefs and practices. Education too is suppose to provide us a moral compass in the form of reason, logic and rationality that will guide us through life. But considering the current status of our education, is it able to provide us that?

If we are to view the role of the teacher as a facilitator, it doesn't matter how much religion is practiced, education will achieve it's aims. If we are to view the teacher as a mentor/guide/master etc, they might hamper the process of logic and reason, but as long as the student continued their education, and that our curriculum really encompass all the elements of the aims of education, nothing will stop education from achieving it's goal.

Better Citizenship and Disciplining in Schools

When visiting schools and interacting with teachers, one of the questions that keep coming is regarding disciplining of students inside the school. Looking at the need for disciplining of students (whatever the reason might be) and the aims of education especially in the creation of a better citizens, one of the question that arises is: Does disciplining (a strict one) will create a better citizens out of the students by conforming them all to a desired ways?  

One of my views is that, strict disciplining will lead to conformation, which the parents also expected the teacher to do out of their children, will lead to a better citizen who would cast their vote every election, follow traffic rules, and conform to the law everywhere without ever questioning.  

On the other hand, the creative children that we want to raise are taught to be a free thinker, questions everything, and act accordingly.  Free thinker will not blindly follow the rule, free thinker will have the audacity to question the rule...

One of my experiences is that people who are more highly educated and more aware of their rights are more likely to not cast their vote on election days with the excuse that there is little or no choices, or that they break and then questions the law itself.  

Another way to view is that we can say such people are contributing to the nation building though their criticism and actions, which are not always desirable. But then again we can argue that, each rules and laws are enforced only after a proper, if not thorough, thought with a certain goal of common good.

But in the end, we have to have trust on our children and hope that they will, through their free thinking, think of the common and greater good, and contribute to the nation building through their free will.

Reflections on John Holt's How Children Learn (Book)

In the introduction to his book, John Holt wrote that his book can be summed up in two words – Trust Children.  In other words, he’s saying leave the child on their own and s/he will learn on their own.  This is indeed a very simple yet difficult option before any caring and concerned parents.

Leave the child alone to learn? Most parents would ask that sarcastically, but what most parents never asked was how a child learn their language, or to differentiate they variety of dogs (in term of colours, size, breeds, etc.) from one category of just ‘dogs’ to a category of ‘different coloured dogs’, to a category based on the size of dogs, and category of breeds of dogs.  They all are dogs, but they are different, and the child still come to learn and categorize that all these animals of different size, different colours, different looks, and different shapes, no matter, they all belong to the category of dogs.  Whereas, something that is similar to a dog, like a cat, are not called a dog by the child.  We never taught the child how to read our face and facial expression, yet they know when we are angry or happy. The child learns to categorize all these animals on their own, they learn to read our faces, and if they can do all that complex and even abstract thing, all we need to do is trust them to learn on their own as well.

Leaving the child alone to learn is difficult for parents to do because to trust children, parents must trust themselves first, and most parents grew-up to believe that they are not trustworthy.  Since such perception, or lack of confidence become so ingrained in the parents, they are bound not to trust their children.  What parents need to do is break this long downward cycle of fear and distrust, and trust their children the way they were never trusted.

Children have this capacity to learn in the most natural and powerful way, and they know how to use their mind in a special way.  Their way of learning fits their condition, their capacity and physical abilities.  But parents, being concerned that their children are different, and not aware that they had been messed up, will try to school and teach them to use their way of thinking in such a manner that they will end up like their parents.  The child knows how to make sense of their world, but in school setting, we want them and try to teach them to make sense in a way that makes sense to the adult. When we try to teach our children to think and make sense of the world the way we do, we are interfering with their natural way of making sense, and this make the child believes that they are not worthy, making them scared and discouraged.

A school should not change the way the child make sense of the world, but instead, the child should be encouraged to utilize the environment provided in the school to use and enhance their natural abilities to make sense of the world in a much more effective way.

THE TEACHERS’ PERSPECTIVE: FROM A THEORETICAL POINT OF VIEW

It might be wrong to make theoretical assumptions without a proper research, but we can definitely argue about the level of seriousness of the teachers regarding the in-service teachers’ training.  And I think we can safely argue that at least half of the teachers are not serious about the training; and I think, we all can make certain valid assumptions on why the teachers are not serious.  A few arguments could be made that (a) the teachers had attended such training for so many times without any visible or observable benefits, (b) the frequency of the training made them took it for granted, (c) based on their previous experience, they have no or very less expectation from the current training, etc. 

There are two concepts from psychology that can help explain the above behaviours/perception of the teachers, and understanding those concepts will also help us in understanding what we can do. The two concepts are (i) self-efficacy (Bandura, 1977, 2004) and (ii) learned helplessness (Peterson & Seligman, 1993; Fogle,1978).

Psychologist Albert Bandura has defined self-efficacy as one's belief in one's ability to succeed in specific situations. One's sense of self-efficacy can play a major role in how one approaches goals, tasks, and challenges. So, how do our teachers see themselves, their performance and effectiveness, and the challenges they faced every day in the form of their students whose learning need to be facilitated in such a way that we can fulfil the aims of our education?  The aims of education is not only about moving from one grade to another, and then find a job.  Education has a much broader objectives such as those value laden qualitative concept like justice, liberty, equality, democracy, good citizenship, etc. which are practically impossible to be achieved.  Unless one understand that we are not going to achieve those goals overnight, and we can only work towards the achievement of such aims, one is bound to doubt our capabilities in the process.  Besides, the teachers’ effectiveness is measured through observable results inside the class-room, and if the students are not learning or progressing as expected, the teachers are going to doubt their own ability to help the students learn.   

The other concept, Martin Seligman's concept of Learned Helplessness says that people who had tried and failed many times before have an attitude of hopelessness and passivity towards everything, including their jobs, based on their past experience. Such people will fail to respond even when there are opportunities available to them to improve.  Such people have seen and experienced many things, and their attitude is based on their personal experience.  Many teachers started out their teaching careers with high hopes and many interesting teaching methods and/or passion.  They started with much enthusiasm and inspiration, trying to improve our education system.  But in the first few years of their careers, they have seen and experienced an inflexible and unresponsive system, an unappreciative colleague and seniors, etc. and as such, they gradually lost their enthusiasm and inspiration, and become a part of the system that they wanted to change so much.  They tired and made many attempts and efforts to change or help the system, but their efforts were not appreciated or not even acknowledge, and thus ultimately they are forced to give up. Their passivity is learned and thus real, and you have to ‘move a mountain’ to earn their trust and be able to inspire them again.

In both the situation mentioned above, the solutions psychologists gave are very simple, though it is difficult to achieve.  People who have self-efficacy issue must be made to realize that self-belief and self-confidence come from our understanding of our own capabilities and capacities.  Teachers need to be encouraged and motivated from time to time, not just financially, but also verbally; and ISTT is one good opportunity for us to encourage and motivate the teachers, and take full advantage of the opportunity. 

Regarding those teachers with an issue of ‘learned helplessness’ must be assured that they have our full support in their desire to provide quality education, and bring change.  The only thing we can do for them to put their belief back in what they have already given up is to build trust and let them see our seriousness and commitment towards our goals.

And one precautionary note is that, we should try to avoid directly criticizing and belittling the work being done by the teachers during the training, doing so will serve none of us any good.

Random Musing: About Behaviourism and Constructivism

Behaviourist' view of learning (Pavlov, Watson, etc) believed that behaviour can be conditioned, reinforced, etc. which put the teacher in a demi-god position. Also, social learning theorist like Bandura believed that children modelled their behaviour from their social environment.  This put the teacher and any other people in the environment of the child to be a role-model for the child which put the role of the teacher more critical.

But, we now know better through Vygotsky, Chomsky, Piaget, that learning is not one-sided and the child is the centre of learning and that the teacher is not a demi-god or a role-model.

One thing we now know for certain is that the child constructs to learn and not just acquire, model or get reinforced as believed earlier.  However, it gets very complex when we look at the various factors involved in the process of construction of knowledge.

Construction of knowledge, as we know is a process, and that process begins with perception.  The child, in the process of constructing his/her learning, utilizes

his/her innate abilities as can be seen in language acquisition

• Reinforcement of cultural norms and values
• Conditioning of certain practice through social institutions
• Modelling of his or her behaviour through certain role model
• Construction through previous knowledge

Behaviourism, per se, is not a bad theory, nor is it irrelevant.  It is just that it is too limited to explain the learning behaviours.

Personally, my stand-point is that constructivism and behaviourism go hand in hand, especially in the context of India.  For example, cultural norms and values got shoved down our throat –if we want it or not, in various forms and at the end, we have to conform.  This is, in brief, reinforcement and condition at work!  On the other hand, the simple fact that children came to the same, unchanged class-room without getting bored and still find excitement and continue to discover new things to learn is proof that individual constructivism is very much at work!

   

Why Progressive School Works....

Our present education system, with all its drawbacks and imperfections, has survived the world wars, drought, famine, disaster, etc. and it will survive in the future as well.  It is resilient, it is easy to start a new one, and it is easy to organize and manage. Still, that doesn’t mean it’s the best.

Whatever progressive education system that are propounded, be it Gandhi’s Nai Talim, Totto Chan’s Tomoe Gakeun, or AS Neill’s Summer Hill schools, they all are context based, and exist within its context only.

For instance, the Summer Hill School has been around for almost a century now, but if it had been a good, practical, economical and sustainable education system, the schools all over the world must have followed its model by now. Instead the Summer Hill School is confined to its original state in rural England surviving because of its prominent supporter.

And Totto Chan’s Tomoe Gakeun was, pardon my language, only for the misfits who failed to fit into the ‘so-called conventional’ educational system.  Of course, I’m saying too much by saying that, but can you imagine having about 1000 Tomoe Gakuen in present day’s Tokyo which is over populated with shortage of space?

And Gandhi’s labour based Nai Talim is for the rural village only, and it failed to survive a simple test of young India’s industrial economy of those days which was a much lesser version of our present day capitalism.  The major problem with Gandhi’s New Education system is not it’s requirement of labour as a base of learning, but because it called for a new and revolutionized society which as we know, is unimaginable.

I'm not insinuating that our present education system is good and the progressive schools are bad or impractical. It is just that the kind of progressive schools we have seen so far are context based, confined to specific area, and were either usually led, not by the system, but by few good people who were fully dedicated to what they do. 

Every now and then, we saw some very excellent Government School, and if you have taken a deeper look at why the school work, most probably you're going to find some dedicated and passionate people responsible for it.  We need that kind of passion among the stake-holders of our education system.

The Progressive schools are progressive because of its founders or proponents' dedication and passion. Like everything else, we need passion, we need dedication, and we need commitment to put meaning to education, and to make something of our education, and to make our education works!  

Terminology I don't like: First Generation Learner

First generation learner???  Seriously, those people never learn before??? Don’t you ever wonder how the child came into being? Out of thin air, or are you saying that the child was born out of some virgin maiden?

The simple fact that the child, who you called a ‘first generation learner’ existed means the parents learned how to make a child, and they also learned how to nurture the child, and obviously, how to survive.  And since we all do whatever we do to survive, it means the parents had achieved something great.  It also means they learned a lot, and that the child is not a first generation learner, but a first generation school goer.

There is a big difference between learning and going to school.  You can learn, live and thrive without going to school, and going to school doesn't necessarily guarantee that you will learn, live and thrive!

So please stop using the term ‘first-generation learner'!  It’s not fair, and it’s against every possible human rights!

The Integration of Work and Education

I had earlier reviewed Marjorie Sykes’s The Story of Nai Talim about Gandhi's idea of education which I dismissed with one word: “romantic”!  I said the idea was romantic because the education system started by Gandhi’s failed to survive the economy of post-independent India which is an infant version of our current overtly commercialized capitalism.  Besides, I thought of the possibility of having such a school in the city and considering the kind of space it required, I thought it was practically impossible. 

Now looking back on my argument, I was too focused on the infrastructure aspect and not on the ideology of education.  If we take a good look, there is an integration of work and education at all level, and it cannot be separated.  The only thing absent is that raising the consciousness that the thing that we do everyday involved as many knowledge as available to use, the only thing is we are not aware of the knowledge we use, and we don’t know how to categorize them.

For example, a farmer integrated many knowledge in his day life.  He knows about the season, the rains, the pattern of cloud, how crops grows, what crops will be good in the type of soil, how to tilt his land and what to do with pest.  In other words, he knows botany, holti-culture, geography, language, applied science, etc. 

What we can do about the integration of work and education in our school is that, we don’t need a field where they can grow crops, or rear cattle, all we need is a room where we can store all sorts of things and give the freedom to children to do whatever they want to do with it.  For e.g. in the book “To the principal with love”, the author mentioned that we can collect old and used cycles and cycles part and store them in one room, children should be free to bring their own cycle and repair it, or build a new one from the parts that are available.  They should be allowed to tinkle with it, play with it.  We can do the same for computer parts for those of our children who want to be a computer/ hardware engineer, old (but clean) clothes for those of our children who want to be a designer.

What is Worth Teaching?

In ancient India and Greece, teachers were revered as a guru or a master, and most importantly, they were fully empowered.  The teacher decided, based on his understanding of the student, what to be taught, when and how or what not to be taught, withheld, or even refused. But the situation was different in those days.  Education was only for a select few –mostly children from the noble family and the rich got education, and the aim of education was basically for moral development and the pursuit of pure knowledge.

Along the way, two major changes occurred. Firstly, education was opened to the general public, and secondly, the government took over the responsibilities of educating the public. These two factors are critical and become indispensable when considering the future of education.

When education is opened to all, we need to set aims and objectives so that we know what kind of future we create for our students, we need to plan and develop appropriate mechanism for teaching and imparting those knowledge we selected as worth teaching, and most importantly, we needed to decide how best to teach an entire population, and that too, at the least minimum budget level. But the major question is: who are the ‘we’?  

The entrance of the government in education system can be viewed from two aspect; the government is possibly the only institution capable of educating the whole masses in term of reach (every corner of the country), financial power, and Authority (respect demanded) to provide education. On the other hand, the government is made up of people who are not necessarily qualified, with their own ideological beliefs and objectives that influence their world views. Now what, if the government want the education system to reflects its ideological beliefs? And, what kind of society does the government want to constitute through its education system?

‘What is worth teaching?’ may sounds like a fairly simple question, but it hides many complexities.  Education is a crucial social good, a definite avenue for developing individuals and society, and thus the world.  And as such, it is crucial that decisions related to education must somehow be determined by larger social will, factoring in social, economic and cultural concerns.  

To factor in the social will, there is no better representative than the government.  But can we trust the government to decide what is being taught at our school? We can try trusting the government and take comfort in the assumption that the government chooses the most sensible and qualified of people who are charged with the job of selecting and deciding what is to be taught, and hope that they do what they are supposed to do, and that they did a good job!

We must also assume that these sensible people selected by the government has no vested interest, and most importantly, we definitely must assume that the government has no vested interest of its own in the kind of knowledge that is being taught in school. 

The Preamble in the constitution of India has clearly spelled-out what it plan to achieve, that aims, is also the aims that we plan to achieve through education.  It means, the deliberations or decisions regarding what are being taught at our school are not deliberate, but methodical and selective, and validly drawn from the accumulated body of knowledge that humanity has with us.

As teachers, teacher educators or anyone connected with education we rarely get to reflect or understand our work in schools and classrooms within the context of the bigger historical, socio-political setting of the country. It never seems to be part of the training and induction process for the Indian teachers, or educators.

What is worth teaching in school, what is worth learning for our children, and what sort of activities must be considered as worthy, etc. are a crucial issue for any educational system and institution.  These questions has been asked for ages now, and it will continue to be asked, which is a positive sign, because if we ever stop asking these questions, we will never know what kind of future we are creating through what we taught to our children, and thus, the future of our world.

[This is an extract from my review of Krishna Kumar's Book "What is Worth Teaching?"]

Indian Education System: A Critique

A quick and random critique of the Indian Education System!!!

Structure: Indian education system, just like the executive system is hierarchical in nature. The basic characteristic of education system in India goes in this order: Union Cabinet Level, State Cabinet Level, State Ministerial Level, Secretariat Level, Directorate level, District Level, Block Level, with each level having their’ own sub-level.

SSA emphasized on bottom-up planning using habitation as the base of planning and encourages PRIs and Community to take ownership of school and the educational process -but what is ignored is that the structure of Indian education system is hierarchical and that executive system is never decentralized.  

This has two implication, both innovations and critical voices from the community that can meaningfully feed into existing approaches, programmes, and plans are IGNORED IN BLUEPRINT because the implementation aspect is, and has always been, top-down. Secondly, decision making is delayed as it has to go through many decentralized levels. Simple example is, the community can plan the expansion of school, but without approval from the TOP, it will never be implemented!

Decentralization and Convergence: How exactly is decentralization carried out in India?

The RTE and SSA included decentralized system as in integral part of achieving it goals, emphasizing the role of the PRIs, VECs, SMCs, etc. but as mention earlier, the hierarchical nature of the structure mean that no matter what, the voice of the Central Ministry will always over-power the State Ministry’s, and the State ministry will always have a bigger say that the District level functionaries.  And most often, it is the small functionaries within the structures that do all the works, and with the addition of new programmes, the works of the functionaries increased.  

Besides, the hierarchical nature also makes consultative process very cumbersome, often resulting in ignoring of certain level, and also in delay. Finally, the PRIs got certain responsibility related to the monitoring of the schools in the name of decentralization, but it doesn't got the executive power to take actions, e.g. in dismissing or transferring a teacher who frequently misses school. 

Role Confusion under hierarchy: Who is supposed to do what, and what is being supposed to be done by whom? 

As per SSA requirement, certain aspect of the Education system has been decentralized forming a new structure like the SPO, DPO, BRC/CRC, etc. to realize specific programme objectives however the roles and functions, on certain aspect are not defined. For example, the BRC/CRC has done, and is most appropriate for administrative work rather than academic mentoring as required by the SSA, and regarding the confusing aspect, there are multiple reporting structures like the Block Resource Person is required to report to the Deputy Director of Public Instruction (DDPI)-Administration, the DIET Principal, The Deputy Project Coordinator of SSA, and the Block Education Officer for different aspects of his work.  This resulted in failure to fulfill academic/mentoring responsibilities as they are mostly engaged in administrative responsibilities.

Personnel Policies: Transfer of teachers, allocation of teachers, etc. Who decides and how to decide on which teacher serves on which school?

The absence of proper personnel policies regarding posting and transfer, and the politicization of existing norms like using political forces to put pressure for transfer or to get a posting in a better location, etc. demands for the creation of a statutory committees to authorize and administer such process, besides the committees can also create a public database to monitor transfers after taking into account the kind of teachers the community wanted, and the kind of community the teachers wanted to work in.  

There are also certain specifics requirement under the SSA about the kind of teacher to be posted in certain school, community and area like a tribal teacher who speak the local tribal language, etc, as such having a database monitoring system will make the whole thing, if not smoother, but also much more transparent.

Strengthening Academic Cadre: How academic actually is the structure and personnel policy of our educational institutions?

Firstly, there is a continuous tendency to move into administrative positions from academic positions based on the assumed greater power/authority associated with administrative posts. Secondly, within the education system itself, two people who are in the same grade level, one who is in teaching and the other in administrative have different level of work load with the teacher getting a raw deal –a teaching that demand lots of time and work. Thirdly, Personnel recruited or deputed to SCERT/DIET are not always from academic or teaching background so they have no real experience and understanding of the teaching profession or academic requirements to be able to fully comprehend the sensitivity and intricacies involved in their work like curriculum, module development, assessment methods, etc.

Appraisal Policies of Personnel: When a head teacher got a promotion, what did he become? Or, how and from where should the SCERT and DIET and other educational institutions must recruit new employee?

Since seniority is the mainstay of career progress in the department, there is little opportunity for recognition of performance or individual contributions which result in lace of initiative and innovation. Confidential reports need to be done in consultative process. And the statutory committee proposed above for monitoring personnel policies like transfers and postings, must also do appraisal and reviews based on the confidential reports to make decisions on career advancement.

Why School Management Committee Failed

School doesn’t directly engaged parents in the class-room process, and the parents don’t make any effort to get involved either.  But the worst thing is, parents are given the opportunity to get involved in the affairs of the school through the School Management Committee (SMC), but they have failed to take full advantage of that opportunity. 

Most schools have planned for a monthly SMC meeting, and most of the time, the parents never showed up for the meeting.  Even when it was held, they just let the Head Teacher do all the talking, and even worse, when discussing about the class-room process, they just handed everything into the hand of the teacher saying that they know nothing and have full faith in the teachers.

The problem with SMCs everywhere is that, the average SMC members are people who can ill-afford to give up their daily wage to sit around in a meeting in which they don’t see any value, and they are usually illiterate. But worst still, they don’t feel they can hold a government school teacher or anyone in authority accountable as they thinks government school education is a free service, and as such, just a charity.

Also, apart from the charity aspect, parents who are uneducated find it very difficult to question an educated Head Teacher and so are unable to pressurize the HT to correct things, or take steps for grievance redressal if it involves interacting with government officials.

If the quality of our education in Government's schools is to improve, parents must not only get involved with the management of the school, but also must get themselves involved in the class-room processes, and take full ownership of the school and the education system itself!

Reflection based on Reading of John Holt’s How Children Fail

 

John Holt’s HOW CHILDREN FAIL (1964)
Penguin Education Publication

 

“Most children in school fail…because they are afraid, bored and confused”.

John Holt draws upon his observations of children both in school and at play to identify ways in which our traditional educational system predestines our young people for failure. He argues that children fail primarily ‘because they are afraid, bored, and confused’. This, combined with misguided teaching strategies and a school environment that is disconnected from reality and real-learning, resulted in a school system that kills children’s innate desire to learn.

About John Holt: John Holt (1923-1985) was an American author, a teacher, an educator who first propounded Home-schooling, and a pioneer in youth rights theory. Through-out his life, Holt was very critical of the prevailing education system, and has written extensive critiques on it. Despite some of his radical writings, Holt remains a prominent figure in the field of formal education system; and his numerous books and critiques had led to reforms and changes in the education systems of many countries and inspired many of the later progressive education thinkers and institutions.

The Book: The book “How Children Fail” was first published in 1964 and revised in 1982. Even today, it is considered as an educational classic and a must-read for those who are involved in the field of education. As noted by the author in the forward, the book was divided into four major topics: strategy, fear and failure, real learning, and how school fails.

1. Strategy: This part deals with the ways in which children try to meet, or dodge, the demands that adults make of them in school.
2. Fear and Failure: This part deals with the interaction in children of fear and failure, and the effect of this on strategy and learning.
3. Real Learning: This part deals with the difference between what children appear to know or are expected to know, and what they really know
4. How School Fails: This part analyses the ways in which schools foster bad strategies, raise children’s fears, produce learning which is usually fragmentary, distorted and short-lived, and generally fail to meet the real needs of children.

Based on the structure of the book, this review will also follow the same pattern in presentation, discussing the major themes that arose from the reading, and see its practicality in our present education system in India.

1. FEAR AND FAILURE:

Schools promote an atmosphere of fear that not only quells a child's love of learning and suppresses his native curiosity, but also makes him afraid of taking chances and risks which may be necessary for true learning to occur. Some of the steps taken to address the issue of fear and failure in school in our Indian education system are:

• Prohibition of corporal punishment (including verbal ‘name calling’)
• Continuous and Comprehensive Evaluation that evaluate a child’s learning and capabilities in a holistic manner
• Prohibition of test/exam up to a certain class in school
• Prohibition of with-holding/retention of a student

The above mention steps taken are just a step towards reducing fear and failure in school, it still fails to address the bigger issues, that is, the psychological aspects like humiliation from peer groups, and fear of failing our parents and their various expectations.

Secondly, parents are the one who wants and demand that their child be, in the word of Holt, a ‘producer’ that parrots what the teacher says. It shows that majority of parents’ lack understanding of the ‘aims and objectives’ of education, Unless the parents change their perspective of seeing education as an economic investment, school and education will always be a burden for the student!

Thirdly, teachers are also aware of the parent’s expectation, and many teachers took-up the role of a parent to the child in school pushing them towards a certain goals which they have in their mind without ever consulting the students. The achievement of this goal also serve the teachers’ need for a better reputation for their school as a good-mark scoring schools. Besides that, many teachers assumed the role of moral guardian, and think that disciplining the students to be their role. Disciplining students in the name of moral guardianship or to see the reputation of the school goes up, teacher forced their students into a uniform set pattern of behaviours and mannerism which can only kill the child’s unique individuality and creativity.

When I visited Limtara M/S for drawing of greeting cards for teacher’s day, the fear of being wrong can be easily seen among the students who constantly asked what to draw when asked to draw whatever they want, and also, the teacher pushing them by playing vigilant and telling them to do this or that. Such vigilant actions, and disciplining from the school can only result in a confused child who distrust their own ability, and breed a dependent nature in them.

2. BOREDOM:

Schools demand that children perform dull, repetitive tasks which make limited demands on their wide range of capabilities and as such, it becomes boring to most students. Some of the steps taken to address these issues include:

• allowing each states and region to design their own curriculum based on certain frame-work and guidelines
• making each lesson as activities oriented as possible under CCE
• inclusion of teaching-learning materials
• including play/sports at least once a week in our school’s time-table

The synonyms of boredom when it comes to class-room will be ‘interesting’ or ‘vibrants’, and we can’t exactly call our curriculum very interesting or vibrant because the simple fact that we have a ‘uniform curriculum’ for a group of ‘individuals in a class-room’ fails to address the diversity of our students and their capabilities!

Looking at the various progressive schools like Totto-chan’s Tomeo, AS Neill’s Summerhill, Reggio Emelio schools, etc. one thing they have in common is a flexible curriculum where the teacher prepared the lesson plan based on their understanding of the interests of the students.

When visiting Mandroud P/S for class-room observation, I observed a MGML class of Class I & II. While observing, the teacher instructed them to read whatever were written in the wall and left me to take in-charge of the class. The children can, not only read, but memorized each and every word written in the wall and recite them with ease. But before finishing their recitation, most of them stopped and started playing. When I asked them to continue their recitation, one of the class-II students responded by saying that they have been reading it all since class-1 (the previous year). Looking at the small Class-I children, I can observe that peer learning was happening through recognition of word, and association of alphabets and sounds, but in the name of peer learning, we bored the students of Class-II and thus gradually alienating them from learning altogether.

There are various forms of boredom. Totto-chan’s boredom is mostly because of curiosity about the outside world, but some kind of boredom that is commonly observed in our schoolS, including Mandroud P/S, is that of ‘lack of varieties’. There was nothing in their vicinity to arouse their curiosity, they have already explored them including the TLM given to them, and the plants and insects near their school –all they need is a new insights and perspective, and to make sense of it, and that, to a great extend depends on the teachers!

3. CONFUSION:

Once enrolled in school, the child often founds himself being taught things that contradict what he had learned from his parents or other adults, and many other things that don’t make sense. Confusion is a big term, but when it comes to the disconnection between reality and class-room, there definitely is a big gap.

In India, under the NCF 2005, attention has been paid towards forms of knowledge and forms of understanding based on the age-group of a child to ensure that appropriate things are taught among particular groups of children, besides curriculum reform, contextualization of text-book and concepts, activities oriented class-room, field-trips, etc. are some of the steps taken to reduce confusion and bridge the gap between classroom and outside world.

Holts himself talked about his helplessness when it comes to the teaching of various concept which are similar, like a problem that can be solved in different ways. He dryly said that ‘no explanation is better than a bad explanation’. But the ability to explain a concept in the most simple term that will make sense to children require for special skills, and in a big education system like in India faced with shortage of teacher, such skills are not available everywhere.

Also, Holt emphasized that student should be allowed to explore and discover on their own, and to let them learn and own their knowledge they discovered. Most of the progressive school practices such kind of freedom of learning to their students. But to provide an environment for freedom of learning come with a heavy financial cost –the cost of infrastructure, provision of multiple learning materials to arouse children curiosity, provisions of resources to answer their curiosity, and most importantly, we need highly qualified people to manage and stir such environment into a learning environment.

4. REAL LEARNING:

Every expert has different views on what should be included in a child’s curriculum, and furthermore, much of what is taught in our schools is outdated by the time children need to apply that knowledge to real life. This reinforces Holt's belief that there is no single body of information that all children should learn.

It is true that we never know what piece of learning will be relevant to the child in the future, that’s why curriculum are planned for a ‘future just-in-case’ situation. For example, we learn about how to provide basic first-aid because it is important that we know. But left alone, the child will rarely learn by themselves unless they have a practical reason to learn it by getting themselves or someone they know met an accident.

Holt believed that real learning can happen only in the real world i.e. outside of the school and as such he encouraged home-schooling. But how practical and affordable home-schooling is for rural India? And the more important question is, will your real-life learning be counted as a proper qualification when you apply for a job? If we want that real life learning is to be counted as a proper qualification, then the whole concept of formal education and our perspective towards it need to be overhauled.

Besides, to consider a real life learning as a proper form of learning, we have to assume that every adult that the children dealt-with are qualified as a model to the child, and that they are capable of providing the proper answer to the child’s question, which isn’t true at all.

5. CONCLUSION:

How children are systematically failed? Over half a century after Holt criticized our education system, the criticisms still stands valid. Every word that he said are true, but the saddest part is even Holt failed to come out with an alternative system that would provide real learning to our children.

Each and every stake-holder in the child’s learning has failed them. Our education system and our approach to education drive children into answer producer who parrots their teacher through our evaluation and examination system. Parents see education as an investment with quick and observable returns. Teachers see the child’s education as a job, and deliver it as a job. And the community is more than happy to have a ‘producer’ rather than a ‘thinker’.

Here is a look at some of the approach adopted by the so-called progressive school which can give us a quick comparison with our own system, and a quick assessment of their adaptability or the dilemma with the approach when it comes to the Indian education system.

Approach & Process:

• Experiential learning (a lived experience)
• Emphasis on group work and peer learning
• Free or minimally guided learning environment with emphasis on teaching-learning material
• Highly qualified, well-trained and passionate ‘teachers’

Aims & Objectives:

• Strong emphasis on problem solving and critical thinking
• Understanding and ability to apply in practice as the goals of learning as opposed to rote knowledge
• Development of social skills
• Education for social responsibility and democracy

Curriculum:

• Integrated forms of knowledge
• Flexible curriculum focused on thematic units
• Selection of subject content by looking forward to what skills will be needed in future society

Support Systems:

• Educated and highly aware parents and general population
• Active involvement of parents and community

Concluding Remark: After the 2^nd World War, the education systems of many western countries were influenced by the Japanese who enjoyed rapid economic development attributed mainly to its education system that emphasized on rote memorization and curriculum overload. Starting from the late 1980s the Japanese gradually adopted the progressive approach reaching its peak in early 2000s with their ‘room to grow’ approach and constantly appeared among the top 15 in PISA score, however, in early 2012, they reverted back to their previous system allegedly due to its efficient recall power.

Now, can we say that, in the words of John Holt, ‘producing a producer’ is such a bad thing if one of the major aims of education is to create someone who can contribute as a ‘producer’ to the economy, and if that is what the parent’s want for their children?