Image Courtesy: Vishal Bhatt: www.facebook.co |
Everyone who has seen the movie, 3idiots, must have
fallen in love with Rancho, the genius who challenged the traditional notion of
“ideal student”. This article is not about 3idiots, but it is about analysing
the central question – “How can we nurture students to be like Rancho?”
My interest in
educational research has led me to design and test numerable studies, majority
of which are unpublished. In this article, I shall share one such “unpublished”
social experiment and attempt to explain its results.
The study goes like this:
·
Ask a group of 3rd graders
what they want to become in life.
·
Ask a group of 12th graders
what they want to become in life.
·
That’s all…
The answers that I have received through
interactions with young children and late-adolescents have raised many
questions in my mind. Responses of young kids would range from police and
soldier to doctor, teacher, and scientist and so on. I have also heard
responses like racecar-driver, cricketer, and music-director. On the other
hand, the 12th graders usually end up with limited responses –
e.g., doctor, engineer, corporate personnel, or “no-idea”.
Now the big question to
ponder upon is –“why does this contrast occur?” Quite obviously, there can be
N-number of reasons like ignorance of small children, limited access to career-counselling
or societal pressure on youth. But the explanation that I find most compelling
is as follows:
The small kids do not think about what
they will get in return. They simply look at the fun of doing the job. They
think – “how would I feel being so and so?” For them, having fun doing some job
is the criteria; whereas, for most of the 12thgraders, the career
criterion is ‘salary and security’ (i.e., SS-mentality). Anything that reduces
likelihood for both salary and security gets out of the option list. I am not
saying that one should overlook the salary, but I definitely feel that one
should also consider – “how would it feel like doing work of so-and-so, and
would it be fun?”
Another question to
contemplate – Are schools playing any role in developing such SS-mentality?
Unfortunately, without much intellectual exercise one can find this answer in
almost every school where Skinner’s operant conditioning is blindly followed.
“Reward the desired behaviour and punish the undesired one” has been the motto
of innumerable teachers and schools throughout the country. I do not doubt the
intentions, but such ‘carrot and stick’ approach develops mental conditioning
in children –“Do something when you find instantaneous rewards. When there are
no rewards, don’t do it”. As we all know, in life, you do not get a reward for
every positive effort, or immediately get punished for every wrong deed.
Individuals are on their own and they either sink or swim. So, when a student
graduates from a ‘carrot & stick’ school, s/he is looking for places which
seem like CARROTS, and there is no consideration for personal interests.
So what is the way out?
And how can schools encourage students to follow their strengths and interests?
J. Krishnamurthy once said – “if a child shows you a drawing, don’t judge how
it is. Rather, ask that child to self-judge and find ways to improve upon it”.
Clearly, reinforcement strategies of giving stars and saying ‘very good’ every
single time have their own limitations. The dependence on external motivation
can leave one confused in life. The instructional practices in schools ought to
encourage intrinsically motivated functioning of students. Some of the
practices that promote inner motivation in students are as follows:
·
School –task/activities:
Learning activities can be selected in a democratic way. A teacher can include
students while making decisions on class activities by providing a gamut of
options, from which students can select their tasks. This will develop a sense
of responsibility in the students as they are the ones who opt for a particular
task. It is important that teacher provides activities that fall in the zone of
proximal development (i.e., challenging but not too hard) of the student.
·
Autonomy support:
Instead of taking charge himself/herself, a teacher can help students to take
charge of their learning experiences. The students must have opportunities to
select tasks, methodologies, resources, and time frames. The teacher is
required to play the role of an active supporter and a facilitator. Most
decisions regarding the teaching-learning processes should be taken based on a
mutual understanding between the teacher and the students.
·
Recognition:
There is a fine line between nurturing self-confidence in children and making
them dependent on external motivation. Regarding reinforcements, mindfulness is
must for every teacher. The teacher may appreciate students’ improvements and
efforts, but should do it privately and preferably in person. Public admiration
or criticism and comparison of different students can severely discourage and
hurt the self-confidence of those who perform below average. Quite obviously,
such feelings of inferiority and loss are unwarranted in a classroom.
·
Grouping:
It can be a great idea to form heterogeneous groups of students for class
activities. Students of various abilities, strengths, backgrounds, cultures can
be put together. It can be taught to students how they can benefit from each
other’s strength and learn cooperatively.
·
Evaluation:
One can evaluate the students based on the quality of engagement in academic
activities of the school. Teacher can always explore the scope of
self-evaluation depending on the tasks. The basic motive of evaluation is that
the students realize their strengths and weaknesses so that they can work on
their weaknesses and sharpen their strengths. The students should be guided to
spot their areas of improvement and the behaviours they need to continue; and
to prepare a plan for improving their performance in the future. Ability to
self-critic and improvise is an excellent life-skill to have.
·
Time:
Consistent with the previous points, students ought to be included in setting
up timeframes for assignment submissions. Of course, they are expected to learn
to work according to their plan but the teacher should keep a margin for
time-extension. This helps students to work stress free and to learn in detail,
and also to demonstrate their creativity and imagination.
These instructional
practices are meant to provide the students with an opportunity to master
knowledge and skills. Such practices promote a mastery-goal orientation, which
is in-depth study, and hinder a performance-goal orientation, which is study
for the test. In other words, students do not study for the sake of the grades
or marks, or any other external motivations.
In 3idiots, we hear
Rancho saying –“Kamiyaab hone ke liye nahi kabil hone ke liye padho. Success
ke pichhe mat bhago, excellence ka pichha karo. Success jakh maar ke tumhare
pichhe ayegi…” [Translation: Study for mastery of the subject not for
cracking the exams. Don’t run after success, but follow the path of excellence.
Success will have no option but to follow you.]
According to
‘Achievement Goal Theory’, students with a mastery approach orientation are
intrinsically motivated to master the subject and to take responsibility for
their learning. They make efforts to satisfy personal interest, curiosity and
to improve. Also, as they are intrinsically motivated, the learning experience
itself becomes satisfying and rewarding. The students value what they learn.
But they desire autonomy, flexibility, relatedness (i.e.,
feeling of belongingness), and competence. The teacher needs to
make sure such needs of all students are taken care of.
Development of a
mastery approach orientation in students will be a great investment, as it is
self-sustaining, and the students’ motivation does not depend much on the external
factors. By adopting instructional practices described in this article, a
teacher can play a vital role in triggering intrinsic motivation for learning
in students. On an optimistic note, someday our 12th graders
will share something in-common with 3rd graders while
contemplating about their career –“how would it feel like doing work of so-and-so,
and would it be fun?” Dealing with a large number of Ranchos will definitely be
challenging for teachers and educators, but what a wonderful challenge will it
be! After all, it will be a true triumph of the teachers.
I welcome your comments....