The human desire for knowledge and wisdom has always existed
and rather intensified with the changing phases of sociological developments in
human history. The same is reflected in classroom practices where the students
are curious to know, discover and explore the realities and seek to accumulate
information and knowledge about the various issues under study. Unfortunately,
the pedagogical inappropriateness has done its best to detriment it. It has
affected the curiosity for learning and the desire of seeking the truth and
wisdom in present day. Classroom is currently functioning as a torture house
for many students not only at school but also at college and university level.
This echoed long back in the words of George Bernard Shaw – a 20th century
Irish writer in his book ‘A Treatise on Parents and Children’ who noted that
‘schools are more terrible places than cells. Since people undergo physical
torture in cells, the children go through both physical and mental tortures in
schools.’ He further maintained that in academic places, the children are
taught to be submissive and disciplined without inculcating in them a sense of
inquisitiveness. Furthermore, disciplining children ultimately culminates in
death of naturally gifted talents and their curiosity for discovery of the self
and outer world.
The children fall prey to academic stress when they are
taught to be submissive and expected to give their best in every possible way
no matter they like the field or otherwise. This is quite contrary to modern
research in education. For instance, Howard Gardner’s theory of ‘multiple
intelligences’ in 1980’s maintains that the students are not universally on the
same page in their learning styles and interests; they differ from each other
for having different types of intelligences. These different intelligences
position each child or a student as a unique individual and social being with
his/her identity, personality traits, cultural habitus and linguistic
experiences. Thus, expecting a similar response in performance from all
students in a single class, from modern research perspectives, is quite absurd.
A conducive learning environment provides the ideal situations to the students
where they can recognize their particular potentials and realize them into
positive outcomes. This approach makes learning less stressing. And the students
instead of feeling academically crippled take interest in learning and perform
comparatively better.
Learning is purely a cognitive activity which involves human
engagement in its process at a deeper level. If learning is made boring and
unproductive, it becomes stressful. The students are likely to lose their
interest in several academic tasks such as classroom discussions, individual
and pair tasks and group formations. They do not participate in learning
curiously. They are rather made to be a part of classroom activity. This kind
of boredom in learning has taken place due to our misunderstanding and
mishandling of pedagogy in its essence.
A shift of pedagogical stance from ‘teacher-centered class’
to ‘learner-centered class’ has caused a serious trouble to the classroom
learning practices today in Pakistan. A commonplace assumption holds that
‘learner-centered pedagogy’ works far better than ‘teacher-centered classes’.
It is due to the fact that modern education puts more emphasis on learner rather
than the teacher. In previous times, education was simply considered a process
of transference of facts, information and knowledge to the students. This model
what Paulo Fieri called ‘Banking Concept of Education’ where the teacher is a
depositor, knowledge is a deposit and the student is a depository has been
challenged with the rise of ‘critical pedagogy’ which questions the
authoritative position of the teacher and replaces traditional pedagogy with
‘Emancipatory Approach’. The students in this model are no more passive
recipients of knowledge; they are not anymore empty vessels to be filled up by
the teachers. Learning is rather seen as a dialogic activity. It is not
transference of facts and figures, knowledge and information, it is rather
sharing of knowledge and problematizing what is taken for granted and certain.
This approach proved helpful for students in liberating themselves from the
forces of teachers’ authority and monopoly over their ‘individual experiences’
and ‘identity’.
Unfortunately, the dialogic and emancipatory pedagogy has
been misunderstood in academic circles and thus failed to direct our present
day classes to be in ideal conditions. As a result, we have either more
teacher-centered classes the way they used to be or more learner-centered
classrooms without any productive input on teachers’ part. In dominantly
teacher-centered classes, the students’ experiences are ignored at best and
their ‘presence as a social being’ is fully marginalized. On the contrary, in
learner-centered classes, the learners are expected to be more responsible for
their learning and knowledge generation. Teachers stand as facilitators. They
provide content and materials related to their specific disciplines and expect
the students to grasp the content through peer discussion and interaction.
Teachers’ input lacks to a greater extent in such a class which definitely
demotivates learners and also puts them under academic pressure. Both are the
extreme views and thus not compatible with ‘Emancipatory and Dialogic approach’
as inspired by critical pedagogy.
Teachers in Lev Vygotsky’s sociocultural model of learning
stand as ‘More Knowledgeable Other (MKO)’ who understand the contents of the
subject better than the students who are novice learners with a dire need to
receive intellectual feeding from their MKO’s. Teachers input in their classes
can train their students in academics and help them grow intellectually sound.
With it, learning will become interesting. Moreover, the students will take
more interest in doing the academic activities and would not take it as a
burden. Group formations, peer-learning, academic assignments, projects and
other activities become meaningful only when the teacher assumes the charge of
the class through his/her commitments and serious responsibilities of imparting
knowledge to the students and transforming them into future intellectuals. This
can be done by enlivening the curiosity of the learners for ‘truth’ and
‘wisdom’ through dialogic approach and reducing academic burdens so that real
learning gets to be the essential goal of education and pedagogical practice.
And the teacher and students through their collaboration can revitalize the
lost spirit of learning in modern day Pakistan. To conclude, academic stress
would not yield to an effective learning but the individuals with anxiety and
stressful mind which is incapable of receiving sublime consciousness.
