Our third Vimarsh meeting was around the National Focus Group's position paper on the Aims of Education published by NCERT.
As per their stance, there are nine aims of education:
1. Create "vital links between children's experiences at home and in the community and what the school offer them."
2. Initiate the process of becoming more self-aware
3. Live a moral life
4. Respect cultural diversity
5. "Promote and nourish as wide a range of capacities and skills in our children as possible."
6. Learn different ways of knowing
7. Be a liberating process and fee itself and children "from the shackles of all kinds of exploitation and injustice"
8. Allow children in playing an active part in the creation of an aesthetically pleasing learning environment
9. "Foster within the child" pride in their nation and in the great achievements of humanity
Aims 1,2 and 7 generated the most discussion.
What exactly does it mean to be liberated?
Further, the idea that "self knowledge can be achieved only through the knowledge of the other, and one cannot know the other without being just to the other" generated some confusion. If I am the only person alive on this planet, can I truly know myself? What implications does this have for teaching and learning?
The second article we read was Mr. Dhankar's article that asked the question: "Do teachers need to bother about this (the aims)?" I don't think that anyone disagreed that teachers MUST be involved in every part of the education process, including of course knowing and understanding its aims. As Mr. Dhankar states, decisions about classroom practices "cannot be made by the curriculum developers, textbook writers, and the like. They must be made by the teacher herself. Therefore, her understanding of aims of education and relationship between the aims and teaching will determine the quality of education to a very great extent. The lack of such understanding will render her to be a mere instructor of some sort and will strip her engagement of all worthwhile aspects of education, even though she could still be teaching something."
Yet, the question that was asked more than once was, "what happens when I understand these aims of education but my principal, my school, my organization does not?" How much power do I really have as a teacher? And the biggest question of all was HOW do I do this?
We would love to hear you thoughts on any of these points!
As per their stance, there are nine aims of education:
1. Create "vital links between children's experiences at home and in the community and what the school offer them."
2. Initiate the process of becoming more self-aware
3. Live a moral life
4. Respect cultural diversity
5. "Promote and nourish as wide a range of capacities and skills in our children as possible."
6. Learn different ways of knowing
7. Be a liberating process and fee itself and children "from the shackles of all kinds of exploitation and injustice"
8. Allow children in playing an active part in the creation of an aesthetically pleasing learning environment
9. "Foster within the child" pride in their nation and in the great achievements of humanity
Aims 1,2 and 7 generated the most discussion.
What exactly does it mean to be liberated?
Further, the idea that "self knowledge can be achieved only through the knowledge of the other, and one cannot know the other without being just to the other" generated some confusion. If I am the only person alive on this planet, can I truly know myself? What implications does this have for teaching and learning?
The second article we read was Mr. Dhankar's article that asked the question: "Do teachers need to bother about this (the aims)?" I don't think that anyone disagreed that teachers MUST be involved in every part of the education process, including of course knowing and understanding its aims. As Mr. Dhankar states, decisions about classroom practices "cannot be made by the curriculum developers, textbook writers, and the like. They must be made by the teacher herself. Therefore, her understanding of aims of education and relationship between the aims and teaching will determine the quality of education to a very great extent. The lack of such understanding will render her to be a mere instructor of some sort and will strip her engagement of all worthwhile aspects of education, even though she could still be teaching something."
Yet, the question that was asked more than once was, "what happens when I understand these aims of education but my principal, my school, my organization does not?" How much power do I really have as a teacher? And the biggest question of all was HOW do I do this?
We would love to hear you thoughts on any of these points!
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