Remedies in Education Part-II

 

Teachers of Mathematics, Physics, Chemistry, Biology, Computer Science and Technology should learn how to present their subjects in an engaging manner and to engender interest in them. Their teaching should relate to life experience of their pupils and to their level of intellectual development. In all subjects, not just science and technology subjects, computers should become indispensable teaching aids, just like blackboards and chalk have been up to now. With computers, teachers can achieve new dimensions in illustrating the subject matter being taught, also with regard to variability and simulations. Provided, of course, they have learned how to handle and make full use of the potentials of the new technology, and provided they have the right software, something which was often not the case in the past.

In order to allow teaching to relate to the life experience of young people, school textbooks and other teaching materials should be written in language understandable and appropriate to the age group in question. Schools should offer all pupils free Internet access also from home if possible. Ministries should become more involved in software development and multimedia packages and not leave everything to commercial initiatives. The development of good programmes will require ministry-co-ordinated co-operation of computer experts, educationalists, subject-matter experts, and experts on teaching methods.

If basic education in science and technology is to become ingrained and be preserved for a lifetime, we will have to start teaching it at an earlier age than is currently the case, i.e. in primary school at the age of eight or nine. This will require sufficiently well trained teachers and, consequently, involve major teacher training efforts. Teaching staff will have to realize that acquiring science and technology literacy is as important today as reading, writing and arithmetic.