Q.1 Discuss elementary education in Pakistan and compare it with elementary education in India and Bangladesh.
Course: Elementary Education
Course Code 8623
Topic: Elementary Education in Pakistan and comparison with Elementary Education in India and Bangladesh
AIOU Solved Assignment
Semester: Autumn/Spring
B.Ed/Bacherlors in Education /Masters in Education / PHD in Education
BEd / MEd / M Phil Education
ASSIGNMENT Course Code 8623
Answer:
Elementary Education in Pakistan and Comparison with Elementary Education in India and Bangladesh.
There
has been much talk and debate regarding quality education in Pakistan.
Ironically, theyall revolve around mostly the types, sources and content of
education instead of stages,particularly the most crucial and decisive stage
i.e., elementary education.
There
has been little progress in recent years in developing new and existing
programmes for adolescent learners in government schools at elementary level.
Exploratory programmes,counseling programmes and health and physical education
programmes are being cut back ingovernment schools.
The
education has been narrowed down to teaching of rote-skills andtransmission of
knowledge. This mere imitation and content-centred elementary education hasshortchanged
the area of personnel development of the learners.
This
fact of failure ofgovernment elementary education has been put in the back
burner in the face of doing what is
easier and less costly,
but the negation of various ongoing sustained social changes experiencedby the
emerging learners has become the practice of the day. These social changes are:
- The family pattern of a mother at home and a father working is increasingly hanging.
- The suicide rate in teenagers are increasing due to different pressures.
- It is estimated that pre and early adolescents spend one third of their waking hours in watching television, surfing social websites on internet and playing online games.
- 75 per cent of all advertising is aimed at promoting mobile brands, mobile networks and mobile packages.
- Lack of a stable home is a big contributor to delinquency.
The
elementary level is comprised of the students with most impressionable age
group wherevarious social changes make indelible prints on their minds. These
years represent the lastchance for the students to master basic skills, lasting
attitude towards learning and assertionof self and individualistic differences.
Success at elementary school, or the future life, can bedetermined and
predicted for this age group.
The
associations such as The National Middle School Association, Pakistan
Montessori Council,and Pakistan Elementary Teachers Association are striving
for a balanced elementary curriculum by organising frequent conferences and
workshops for the educators who are engaged in imparting basic education.
However, the government should patronise the associations and educational
organisations by allocating a large part of budget.
Moreover,
the government educationist and administrative authorities should make sure
that the content is cognitive learning oriented. It must be diversified and
exploratory based on real life situations and indigenous experiences.
Consequently,
it could enhance the development of problem solving skills and reflectivethinking
process among the students. This would also help the students to acknowledge
and appraise their own interests and talents. The areas of curriculum concerned
with basic skills logical, sequential and analytical should be taught through
an entertaining pedagogy.
Other areas
of curriculum like social, moral, emotional, and physical should be developed
through integrative approach towards prevalent social issues and factors.
In
short the elementary level education and knowledge must mirror the immediate
culture, ethnicity, ideology and local socio-economic groups so that the
students can relate themselves and concretize their knowledge coupled with
critical sense.
Besides,
this will assist the student to comprehend what he is and help him realise his
concepts, responsibilities, identities, abstractions and attitude towards
society. Instead of departmentalization of subjects there should be
coordination and inter-disciplines trend among them.
Doubtlessly the teacher’s role is indispensible in modern pedagogy where the teacher is more a personal guide, a facilitator of learning, and a coordinator. The teachers should be trained to practice the methods of instruction which involve open and individual directed learning by accentuating modernly designed arrangements, collaborative work, and respecting individual differences among the students. The list of dos and don’ts is long. However, the ground reality demands more implementation than mere suggestions, planning, revising, and updating the aspects of elementary education.
Pakistan
is definitely poorer in education and development than India. While their per
capita incomes are not that different, $1,550/person for India and
$1,260/person for Pakistan, the economic development, educational resources,
and social structure are very different. To some extent India seems like an
almost-first-world country of perhaps 200 million, including a significant
wealthy elite, a large and stable middle class, and employed working class
people.
Then
there are almost a billion basically destitute people subsisting on a dollar or
two a day in vast slums and tiny rural villages. Pakistan, on the other hand,
is horribly divided, with a much smaller but very rapidly increasing population
of around 187 million people, and a quite small elite of landowners and other
very wealthy people, a very small and not growing middle class, a large and
precarious working class, including lots of farm workers under the control of
the landowners. There is only one giant city, Karachi, with major slums.
Pakistan lacks industry
and significant educational institutions above the secondary school level. I
visited a medical college that reminded me in many ways (age of building, lab equipment,
library size) of my elementary school in the US in the fifties. The people I
visited, in the upper middle professional class, were all planning their
emigration, and have since left.
Teaching and learning approaches
As this
course requires research and study skills, Student Teachers will have to work independently
and in groups to locate resources and do comparative analyses. The faculty will
give lectures on some concepts, such meaning, history, and methods of
comparative analyses, in an interactive way. Student Teachers will maintain a
reflective journal throughout the course and will trace their development as
critical consumers of knowledge.
Primary Education
The
Bangladeshi education system is unusually complex in that primary, middle,
senior and tertiary education are oriented towards general, marsh (religious)
or technical / vocational preferences Even private schools and universities are
heavily subsidized – in fact the constitution decrees that children between
ages 6 and 10 shall pay nothing.
To
complicate things further, local education is controlled by a hierarchy of
school boards. The first phase, fully free primary school lasts for 5 years,
typically between ages 6 and 10.
Middle Education
Pupils aged approximately
11 years of age enter junior secondary school. This is a critical phase in
their young lives, for here they must confirm an educational choice that may
dictate their futures irrevocably.
Secondary Education
Those
who choose to complete the last 2 of their 10 school grades at general
secondary schools may specialize in humanities, science or commerce to mention
but a few. At the end of this they may write a secondary school certificate
examination supervised by no less than 7 school boards. Alternatively, they may
elect to follow the madras religious education route that culminates in a
different series of similar level tests.
Vocational Education
Other
students switch across to vocational training institutes or technical training
centers administered by the ministry of education and the ministry of labor and
employment respectively. Choices here are between longer-term professional
certification and shorter term job-specific orientation.
Tertiary Education
Students
who stay either course have choices once again. These include writing their
higher secondary education certificate after 2 more years at a technical / poly
technical institute where they hone their practical skills further.
Alternatively,
they may enter one of many private or state-funded universities for 5 years of
undergraduate study. Pune city is our new emerging IT center. It is also
included in the smart city projects and there are infrastructure projects going
on there, too. There are more such cities coming up like Bangalore, Hyderabad,
Ahmedabad (Karnavati) etc.
·
Our forex reserves are 400 billion USD. Know how
much that is? If Pakistan were acommodity, we'd have bought it, still have
enough left to spend twice on our defence and then yet have another 10 billion
left. I'm only giving you an idea about the amount.IT sectorof India generates
over $155 billion (I'm willing to bet that's an old figure). Pakistan is around
$5 billion. Clearly no match, India is a giant.
· No comparison in space technology, we are 50
years ahead. We can independently launch satellites. We've successfully sent
missions to Moon and Mars. We have developed independent human spaceflight
capability (I'm currently not able to find the source. I'll include it), but it
was not included in government’s 2012–17 five year plan.
·
Pakistan aims for indigenous satellite-launching
capability by 2040. By then, we’ll probably be 80 years ahead of Pakistan, with
at least two successful missions to the Sun, two to the Alpha Centauri (yeah,
we’re going interstellar), probably with a successful 5th unmanned
and 3rd manned mission to Moon, a second or third visit to Mars (this time with
a lander instead of just an orbiter), a visit to Venus and a worldwide coverage
of IRNSS, if not more. Yeah, our
future in space is very bright, because ISRO is really fast in delivering
output and we’ve the most cost-effective space program in the world.
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