Building the Future generation, and changing needs of Classroom from Grade 1 to 8

[AZADPAKISTAN2009]

Building the Future generation, and changing needs of Classroom from Grade 1 to 8
(Pakistan and ongoing challenges)
By AzadPakistan2009

Pakistan got it’s independence in 1947, and a large portion of that freedom is owed to the educated Muslims of than British and Princely states of than continental Sub continent[1]. It is widely accepted that without the educated minds the social and political revolution would not have been possible[ii]. Education opens various doors of opportunity for you as a person and helps you become a more productive member of society[iii]. A strong education system, builds leaders of Tomorrow, and the people who value other people, believe in hard work and love to learn and help others. The Leaders we forge are a reflection of the education system’s quality. What makes a solid Education System? A proper 8 Month Education curriculum every year, Energetic teachers, Fantastic books which engage students , Sports and Outdoor activities and Introduction of Technology for hands on training and engagement.

The most important element is picking a grand 7-8 month long education curriculum which teaches children new things.Also it needs to be not boring and can capture interest for a child. It sounds very easy , but for adults it is very difficult to understand how does a young mind thinks. Their impression of what is interesting is drastically different than that of adults[iv][v]. Young folks have shorter attention spans but they can absorb lot of information, if the information can be packaged in a nice format, it is possible to enhance their learning drastically vs long boring 3 hour sessions. In Pakistan traditionally the approach is to throw , a fat book at children and youth instead of a focused approach , of short but meaningful goal based learning.

Pakistan also can benefit with better publishers, who publish books on many subjects, diversity of topics is what is drastically missing in Pakistani literary scene. We lack set of books which can develop a student’s after school personal growth. Sometimes the books that students read in schools are the only books they come in contact with across the year. Comparatively in Western society, books are readily available on all topics of interest in Libraries and book stores. The subjects can be science, math , physics , work of fiction like Lord of Rings or Books in different languages. The hardest books to attain in Pakistan are scientific work , papers and books on math which capture the emerging concepts. A majority of Pakistani books are too focused on what happened 500 years ago in sciences and do not spend enough emphasis on modern science. This gap can be bridged with setup of Mega Library network in Pakistan to improve the resources available to users so like me they are not just searching the internet for references , instead they can quote actual books.

Education is not just limited to books but you also need to be aware of your world and your own physical health , and physical programs are helpful to maintain a connection with your surroundings. For schools it is must to have large playgrounds. So students have access to sports activities. A policy is needed in Pakistan to ensure every school has a lush green Football field where kids can play any sports activity freely. Sports activity keeps children from becoming obese at young age[vi].

image: Pakistan's first Mini Tablet a great idea

An emerging gap which is fast emerging is the Technology gap[vii][viii], technology can empower children and youth. In Pakistani schools. While Pakistani schools are struggling with just providing basic school services the world kids are starting early with training on Technology (Touch screen devices, smart phone devices, latest Software and Applications or Apps) . Similarly they kids in western world are getting better exposure in robotics and mechanical applications at younger age. Western world , children getting assemble your own robot type toys are very common. This gap can only be bridged with Government sponsored, Laptop Distribution program for children to bring more technology in hand of younger generation. Similarly, a global Pakistani Digital Library could provide digitized books to greater number of children over a Laptop or Tablet medium, to help bridge the technology gap. Touch screen and Augmented reality is still fairly new to Pakistani Youth , apart from the ones who use SnapChat. However these are just ways the younger generation in Pakistan are falling behind in term of Technology adoption.

Made in Pakistan [9] Tablet an example of great idea but lacked Vision and scope to be implemented across all Pakistani Classrooms.

In conclusion , Pakistan needs a strong policy to promote educational reforms , which are beyond eliminating 1-2 chapters from books, or changing uniforms of students in public school. We need to sit down and plan ahead for 25 years so we are assured that the generation which will come next , will be 100% better then our current potential

[1]Sir Syed's role in Education, ESSAY: THE MAN WHO BECAME A MOVEMENT

[ii] https://nation.com.pk/30-Jun-2014/education-can-bring-social-change

[iii] https://www.cio.com/article/3095287/the-future-of-jobs-and-education.html

[iv] https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/074171366701700202?journalCode=aeqa

[v] https://www.caixabankresearch.com/en/young-adults-21st-century-different-approach-life

[vi] https://www.webmd.com/fitness-exerc...ing-multiple-sports-helps-beat-teen-obesity#1

[vii] https://shininglight.co/2016/09/29/sample-blog-post-2/

[viii] https://wenr.wes.org/2020/02/education-in-pakistan

[9]https://tribune.com.pk/story/331525...inese-military-debuts-in-the-handheld-market/

@Slav Defence or @webaster or @Horus or @WAJsal or @Irfan Baloch

 

[WAJsal]

I really would have liked to read a paragraph or 2 on current classrooms and environment and compare it to model classrooms. Positive content, I've enjoyed reading you last few write ups too.
Kudos

 

[Dr. Strangelove]

Our Current Primary and Secondary Educational System is all based on Memorizing the content Understanding is not given importance at all. Teachers dont know how to teach and students show very little interest due to this. Until we start teaching our Teachers how to teach Concepts to the students clearly and effectively no amount of technology will help very few Students on their own try to learn from the Internet.

Our Grading system is even Shitier all it cares about is how much the Student has written and not on its quality (this has being the case mostly). We need to move away from written exams and start Concept and intelligence based Multiple choice questions this will force the students to brainstorm and try to actually understand what they learn.

Changing the Grading system is not that complicated Automated Machines can be used to check them rather than wasting billions on Grading written exams as we do it mow this will save a lot of Money that could be put to a better use. Changing the Grading system alone will revolutionize Education. This will put the Roots of STEM Education at Primary and Secondary level that could be built upon in later steps.

Give promotions/Demotions to the teachers based upon the academic Performance of their students this will force them to actually put an effort into it. All this Requires a Few policy decisions use of widespread Technology is a long way down the road in a country like ours where already very little resources are used for Education. We are not being able to provide adequate infrastructure for education. Rather than this We should move toward Policy decisions that force the Teachers to Do honest work and change the Grading system so those who actually understand proceed further.

P.S
Going by my Personal Experience very few students actually used the Laptops they were given for learning something. Most of them use them for watching Movies and TV shows.

 

[ps3linux]

Very interesting topic, let me add my two cents.

I have a personal experience of educational system of 6 countries namely Pakistan, UK, Singapore, Thailand, USA and Canada. I did study in Pakistan, UK, USA and Canada and studied educational system of Thailand, Singapore in detail and India just superficially when i visited the 4 states of Punjab, Haryana, U.P and Rajhastan.

So first Pakistan and Indian education system both are based upon memorizing rather than understanding. I have done some research in the area and found that uniform education system was introduced by the British and people of sub-continent followed their masters without question just to please them and it became habit and now it has become genetic, what I often mention as creative impotence. Whatever is written in the book or books has to be reproduced in the exact same way without any change, you cant change it, alter it and question it. When coupled with corporal punishment it kills the creativity of the student altogether.

Then there is the other challenge the language barrier, 70 years and change and we are still undecided whether our curriculum should be in urdu or english. English should be taught to students from grade 1 or grade 6.

Add more confusion to it by a meaningless stupidity that western education is Haram and mention of importance of education by Holy Prophet and the religion was only for religious education.

Add more complexity and confusion to it by the darn rat race of top grades every child is brainwashed and pushed to the limits by the society, the teachers and parents that if they don't get top grades their life is good as over. Use of unfair means in exams is something not unique but prevalent in subcontinent societies.

Majority of our student still go to the public schools political appointments and failure to educate the educators has given us a whole damn crop of teachers who themselves are barley literate in terms of modern world.

Unfortunately, same teachers go on to write book, copy is more like it, still remember the joke by friends from Hailey college that a graduation level book on statistics by a renowned educationist was a word by word copy of an indian author, only difference was the names like sunder lal were turned muslim as saleem.

Although, i feel lucky that decades ago I studied in a closed community school, then did my matric from a private school in fact among the only few private schools in pindi of that time where I was never forced to memorize, rather went on to top the school in matric, excellent marks in Board then went on to do my F.Sc from the historic Gordon College with excellent Physics Teachers like M.S.Deen and superb mathematicians like Sir Sultan and Sir Dilshad. After that UK, then on to job in singapore then Thailand, USA and Canada and I had to undergo further university and professional education in the last two countries in universities like Boston, NYU, Colombia and Stanford.

Their education system is based on understanding rather than memorizing and they take serious offense if the exact phrases from the book are reproduced in the exams. Use of technology in their system is just like a common thing nothing flashy.

In my opinion we need to decide once and for all what will be our language of choice for education with intellectual debate not some retard nationalist or ignorant mullah sentiments, people often quote the example of china that they developed through their national language which is the wrong deduction first they plagiarized Japanese and western product designs, then they started sending out student to international universities who had to learn English they returned to their country became teachers, research scientists even now if I am not wrong over 50 thousand student are send to US alone each year. Then there comes a time when countries start developing their own talent pool. They are close to that point.

Another point is that international studies do point out that a child should be exposed to more than one language in early years of their formal education this helps in their brain and talent development.

Moreover we need to invest in the teachers, get rid of the old filthy toads of the pond.

Then we can work on improving our course material or education system from grade 1 o 8. Long time ago my better half worked on a Pak German Project in KPK where they adopted the german model of phonetic education translated in Pashto even I was impressed with the efforts and the results.

I Know one school in Lahore started by rebels of the norm where education is based upon understanding and not memorizing only a few years into operations and they are successful like anything.

Asking questions in our society is a Taboo be it education, be it religion and be it parenting which in my opinion does come from lack of knowledge at the part of teachers, the mullahs and parents. When we snub a child from asking questions we are basically killing his intrigue and creativity. Perhaps we need to address that as well.

I am tagging @graphican who is making huge contribution in improving the same.

 

[arjunk]

Our Current Primary and Secondary Educational System is all based on Memorizing the content Understanding is not given importance at all. Teachers dont know how to teach and students show very little interest due to this. Until we start teaching our Teachers how to teach Concepts to the students clearly and effectively no amount of technology will help very few Students on their own try to learn from the Internet.

Our Grading system is even Shitier all it cares about is how much the Student has written and not on its quality (this has being the case mostly). We need to move away from written exams and start Concept and intelligence based Multiple choice questions this will force the students to brainstorm and try to actually understand what they learn.

Changing the Grading system is not that complicated Automated Machines can be used to check them rather than wasting billions on Grading written exams as we do it mow this will save a lot of Money that could be put to a better use. Changing the Grading system alone will revolutionize Education. This will put the Roots of STEM Education at Primary and Secondary level that could be built upon in later steps.

Give promotions/Demotions to the teachers based upon the academic Performance of their students this will force them to actually put an effort into it. All this Requires a Few policy decisions use of widespread Technology is a long way down the road in a country like ours where already very little resources are used for Education. We are not being able to provide adequate infrastructure for education. Rather than this We should move toward Policy decisions that force the Teachers to Do honest work and change the Grading system so those who actually understand proceed further.

P.S
Going by my Personal Experience very few students actually used the Laptops they were given for learning something. Most of them use them for watching Movies and TV shows.

Promoting teachers based on grades is going to make a lot of them allow students to cheat, mark them way to leniently etc and make the students incompetent and useless. It's happened before students will accept it esp at higher levels where good grades are a must to get into good unis.

 

[Imad.Khan]

While growing up in Pakistan, i struggled alot with my studies there. The reason was that i wasn't great at memorizing. There was also this competition with-in the family for who was getting good grades. This not only put undue pressure on me and due to me being unable to memorize and regurgitate what ever was in the book word by word, it made me even more demotivated.

This changes abit when just a month before for my matric exams my dad asked help from my uncle (may Allah grant him Jannah) who was a retired physics professor at Karachi univ. He didn't force me to memorize, instead he emphasized on understanding. He used to show me practically from house hold things, like putting oil in a glass of water and showing me how the oil and water didn't mix or explaining what is viscosity by using different house hold liquids. It was the first time i enjoyed physics and i went from zero to getting 93% in by metric physics exam in just one month.

I also had an amazing history teacher, he used to teach history like it was a story and the way he used to tell the story, it made us imagine like we were actually in that period.

After that i came to Australia and i did really well because the method of studying is all based on understanding. And i finally realized that i am not dumb as what my relatives and even my own parents made me believe.

The education system needs to be completely overhauled in Pakistan if it is to become a progressive country. Some of the steps that in my eyes would help in achieving that are

1. Break up the yearly classes to semester wise
2. Have less topics and thinner books. Having a large book is in itself quite scary
3. Each topic being studied should have a video which explains it and after the video is finished the teachers and students can have a discussion about it.
4. There should also be a subject on ethics and morals.
5. Each day after studies there should be time for extra-curricular activities. like sports, learning to play an instrument, or skill based like learning carpentry, painting etc etc.
6. Examination should be multiple choice or short answer. Better if they are online as well.

 

[rana MRL]

AOA.
Interesting and good article.... But not all assumption are accurate .. there is huge gap between policy making and actual field realities...and family and society response matter alot .. Thats why we not get the desired result ...thats one of the main reasons
I my self doing teaching in govt school... To be fair not all points are wrong nor all correct.....

While growing up in Pakistan, i struggled alot with my studies there. The reason was that i wasn't great at memorizing. There was also this competition with-in the family for who was getting good grades. This not only put undue pressure on me and due to me being unable to memorize and regurgitate what ever was in the book word by word, it made me even more demotivated.

This changes abit when just a month before for my matric exams my dad asked help from my uncle (may Allah grant him Jannah) who was a retired physics professor at Karachi univ. He didn't force me to memorize, instead he emphasized on understanding. He used to show me practically from house hold things, like putting oil in a glass of water and showing me how the oil and water didn't mix or explaining what is viscosity by using different house hold liquids. It was the first time i enjoyed physics and i went from zero to getting 93% in by metric physics exam in just one month.

I also had an amazing history teacher, he used to teach history like it was a story and the way he used to tell the story, it made us imagine like we were actually in that period.

After that i came to Australia and i did really well because the method of studying is all based on understanding. And i finally realized that i am not dumb as what my relatives and even my own parents made me believe.

The education system needs to be completely overhauled in Pakistan if it is to become a progressive country. Some of the steps that in my eyes would help in achieving that are

1. Break up the yearly classes to semester wise
2. Have less topics and thinner books. Having a large book is in itself quite scary
3. Each topic being studied should have a video which explains it and after the video is finished the teachers and students can have a discussion about it.
4. There should also be a subject on ethics and morals.
5. Each day after studies there should be time for extra-curricular activities. like sports, learning to play an instrument, or skill based like learning carpentry, painting etc etc.
6. Examination should be multiple choice or short answer. Better if they are online as well.

Points 1,3,4,6 have to be done ..
Point 2, syllabus material should be on we written and compact . Explaination where necessary ..
Point 5 ,, thats where the some intention and overahauling is required
As in my view days are gone when u have to start education start from class one to ur graduation ... Got no skill on any other things at the end have degree but no experience in different field of life
Our parents and society on larger scale discourage this ... "K log kia kahen ga k hmara bcha chota chota kam kr raha "

 

[Imad.Khan]

AOA.
Interesting and good article.... But not all assumption are accurate .. there is huge gap between policy making and actual field realities...and family and society response matter alot .. Thats why we not get the desired result ...thats one of the main reasons
I my self doing teaching in govt school... To be fair not all points are wrong nor all correct.....


Points 1,3,4,6 have to be done ..
Point 2, syllabus material should be on we written and compact . Explaination where necessary ..
Point 5 ,, thats where the some intention and overahauling is required
As in my view days are gone when u have to start education start from class one to ur graduation ... Got no skill on any other things at the end have degree but no experience in different field of life
Our parents and society on larger scale discourage this ... "K log kia kahen ga k hmara bcha chota chota kam kr raha "

I agree, this "Log Kia kahen gai" has killed so many dreams

 

[truthfollower]

Going by my Personal Experience very few students actually used the Laptops they were given for learning something. Most of them use them for watching Movies and TV shows.

Why our students dont/cant buy original software instead rely on pirated software and we have to buy such software at international price for example windows 10 key at 13000 rupees students just cant afford such software at such prices

 

[Azadkashmir]

I like the practical hands-on project not just theory which can be exhausting.

3 different learning centres.
1. for those prefer practical skills learning. like metalwork, brickwork etc.
2. this one is a bit of both theory/practical. like in college, similar to the first one but a bit more challenging job roles.
3. for academic types/researchers/ go on to university become professors.

 

[nahtanbob]

Why our students dont/cant buy original software instead rely on pirated software and we have to buy such software at international price for example windows 10 key at 13000 rupees students just cant afford such software at such prices

with linux and internet most software is free. you have freeware alternatives to all paid software.

At work all my machines are Ubuntu. I make a living off Linux and other open source software to do engineering work