April 2, 2006

COMBINING teaching with research can be a very useful exercise. Unafortunately, this is one activity which is not practised much in our government-run educational institutions.

In fact, in our schools, colleges and universities, this kind of activity is actively discouraged. The result is that one seldom comes across teachers who are researchers or researchers who also teach.

Notwithstanding all these public sector constraints, faculty at the College of Home Economics in Lahore were able to go ahead with the idea of taking up social research. For this they are indebted to their former principal, Dr Farhat Shah. Under her charge 11 faculty members enrolled in the PhD programme and the college’s M.Sc. research programmes.

Those, like myself, in the department of child development managed to convince most of their master’s students to take up research. Topics were selected from among M.Sc. courses. Most of them were related to education; especially early childhood and pre-school education. Since the state of education in our public schools is not very satisfactory, they were made the focus of the research.

This small effort led to the development of many stimulating experiences for otherwise deprived children. At the end of a few years when all the efforts were pooled together, the effort grew and developed into a comprehensive enrichment programme — one where which could be used as a “headstart” or as compensatory intervention for less-privileged children.

The students who had enrolled for research not only prepared these materials but also tested the impact of the materials on the learning of the children. Assessment tools developed were used to estimate the impact of the materials by attempting to find the difference in learning before and after a particular experience took place. The results were more than satisfactory.

Encouraged by this, a new pre-school enrichment programme began to take shape. It was found that the teaching of the three Rs (reading, writing and arithmetic) was not the only learning need of a child of preschool-going age. Other aspects of education needed to be taught as well. As a result, a multi-dimensional programme was proposed for all schools with limited resources. The areas to be covered included development of skills, language and concepts.

Skills development means the development of the essential but least interesting skills of reading, writing and numbers. They are customarily taught first and foremost in all schools. In government-run schools they become a big burden both for teacher as well as students. This is because of the wrong (i.e. rote) teaching methods being used. Hence, acquiring and learning a new skills becomes a demanding and time-consuming task; so much so that no time is left for any other learning experience. Many children who lack motivation for education lose heart at this point and drop out of school.

The first aim was to change this teaching style to a more pro-active one so that it could make the teaching experience more meaningful. Children were given a choice in workbook activities. They were expected to choose from among different answers and to become involved in their own learning. In this process of decision-making they were required to pause, think, reflect, and make their own decision. This way they not only gained self confidence but also felt empowered. The real effort was to reactivate the child’s mind left dormant by generations of rote learning and to help him ‘learn how to learn’.

Monitoring, testing and compiling of materials at different stages resulted in the development of a series of workbooks (four each in English, Urdu and mathematics) which began with a simple or basic level and worked their way upwards in terms of complexity. Each workbook was further divided into units based on how degree of difficulty. A teachers’ guide was also developed separately to explain to them how to use these books effectively. The purpose was to facilitate teachers to impart the crucial skills that students needed to learn in minimum time and with minimum effort.

The aim was also to spare some school time for the introduction of the other two important cognitive processes: language and concept development.

Language development is another important component of school readiness. This is an area where less-privileged children lag behind their privileged counterparts, and this is where they need special help. They are handicapped because they lack familiarity with the medium of instruction or the school language. They need exposure to this language in order to bridge the gap between the home and school languages.

Language development includes the learning of vocabulary, grammar and syntax. Research has shown that relating stories, poems and nursery rhymes can best enhance these abilities. Besides relating them verbally, provision was made to relate them with the help of electronic (audio-visual) media in the programme.

The main aim was to stimulate the child’s thinking and increase his vocabulary. The change and increase in vocabulary was measured at the end of each unit with specially prepared systems of assessment.

Concept development also has an important role to play in the education of the child. If the child’s concepts are not clear and realistic then he or she may be living in a false world. The child may never gain the confidence required to face the realities around him or her.

In this programme young children were introduced to the basic concepts of mathematics, science and social sciences. Wherever possible, these concepts were clarified with the help of first hand-experience. Colourful books were prepared on all important subjects to facilitate both teaching and learning. Teachers used them to read and explain the text being taught in class with the written material on one side. The students, at the same time, seemed to enjoy the illustrations, which were opposite the text.

Although these areas of cognitive development are inter-related, it helps to keep them apart. The reason is that each has separate goals and objectives and hence it is easier to assess the outcome in separate ways, assessed with special tools.

Application of this programme over the past two years in a local school in Lahore called the Umeed School showed that focusing on these three areas (especially in the preschool years) was particularly beneficial for a student’s long-run academic success of students.

Research has shown that by focusing only on developing the skills of a child his or her progress can become limited. We need not only to make this essential part of education more interesting but also need to add more enriching dimensions things to existing ones.

These will stimulate more learning and awareness than can be generated by the mere learning of letters and numbers. In fact, doing only this all the time in a dull manner at school may be one big reason for Pakistan’s high dropout rate. It is therefore recommended that all schools should use such enrichment programmes since teaching of basic skills alone is not going to give rise to too much motivation among students. n

The writer is a former associate professor at the College of Home Economics, Lahore. She was also head of its department of child development.

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