Janajit Ray,
Principal, Yadavindra Public School, Mohali, Punjab
We need a student-centred, skills-based, enquiry-oriented personalised mode of learning
During the last few years, the world has witnessed many new advances in Science and Technology. Today’s children are not expected to do their learning by the same process through which we were taught; today the classrooms are more technology oriented. New approaches towards education have been taken.
The gravest challenge in Indian education system is that education in India is adult-centred. We are following a rather content-based, exam-oriented one sided model of teaching. We need a student-centred, skills-based, enquiryoriented personalised model of learning.
Technology is nothing but a tool. It delivers within the confines of the learning space, be it personalised learning or holistic learning. For maximum benefits, the entire school has to be space for personalised learning. You can’t just segregate one area as the space of personalised learning.
We have tradition of learning in this country. The word, Gyan, which means knowledge, is derived from the term Jigyasa, or curiosity. We have to start with a question. But what are we doing in schools? We are programming answers into kids. We are expecting the kids to go and parrot the knowledge. We are not doing anything to turn them into creative thinkers. The human personality is the most basic thing for personalised learning. We must understand that whether something is being verbalised today or not, learning has always been a personal process. It has never been anything else.
There are various aspects, or dimensions of the body, mind and the spirit. In order to achieve effective learning outcomes, we have to develop a system of moulding the entire personality of the child. The child has to be fully engaged in the learning process. His or her mind, body and spirit must be able to empathise with the learning. To ensure a comfort zone for students, there should be one teacher for 10 to 15 students. This can only be done, if we have a proper tutorial system.
