Opinion: What a child wants?
08:27AM Wed 22 Jun, 2016
Do good marks in exams decide our life? Shafaat Shahbandari writes about the pressing need to guide Bhatkalli students to think beyond marks ...
A little friend of mine just passed secondary school. Though, he secured what I would consider good numbers, he wasn't satisfied.
He was obviously sad for missing the coveted 90s by a whisker.
His reaction surprised me a bit, but what shocked me more was his utter cluelessness about what he wants to do next.
If, by the age of 16 a boy has not made a decision about what he wants to pursue or is not sure about his interests, then I am afraid he is bound to make a choice that he will regret in future.
I am sure, his is not a one off case. This is a common tragedy of this era.
In pursuit of marks and percentages, we lose the real focus of education, which is learning.
You will never hear a student regret a missed opportunity in learning something, whereas you will definitely hear him rue about his marks.
There is no denying that the high grades and percentages in higher secondary helps in securing seats in the best institutions.
But, percentages are no guarantee for securing the best of future.
It has often been noted that those who are good in life skills or those with better personality traits go on to do better in life than those who secured highest percentages.
There are many recent and past examples of big achievers who were not known to be best scorers in class.
In fact, scientists like Albert Einstein and Issac Newton were doomed as failures by their teachers.
Make no mistake, I am not by any means intending to discredit the efforts of big scorers. What I intend to say is, rather than merely chasing numbers, our boys and girls should be in pursuit of knowledge.
Our teachers should encourage questioning and interaction rather than lecturing.
And schools should provide stimulating, practical learning environments, where pupils can learn by experience and trial.
The environment we have right now in our schools, without any exception, is that of a race to finish.
All a teacher is bothered about is to finish the portion, a school is only concerned about acquiring the best pass rates, while parents want their wards to get the best percentage, irrespective of whether the child is learning or not.
Nobody finds it necessary to know what a child wants to learn and how he/she wants to acquire knowledge.
(Shafaat Shahbandari is Dubai based journalist)
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