Students spend all their time in school reading science but you won’t see any scientists in the whole country because science is unfortunately a matter of learning and experimenting
Ashfaque Ali Zardari
Currently, Finland is on the top in terms of educational ranking, while the superpower America is at the 20th place. This year, Finland will be the only country in the world where there is no such thing as a subject in schools. Any school in the country has a maximum of 195 children with one teacher for 19 children.
The longest recess in the world is also in Finland, as the children spend 75 minutes of their school time in recess. It follows 57 minute recess in New York schools. A school gives children such a long break instead of teaching that they would be out of school the next day. Interestingly, these schools only have 20 hours of teaching in a whole week while teachers spend 2 hours a day on improving their skills.
There are no schools in the entire country for children before the age of seven and no formal examination of any kind before the age of fifteen. A math teacher was asked what do you teach children and he smiled and said “I teach children to be happy and make others happy, because that way they can solve every question easily.”
Take the example of Japan, children are taught only one subject till the third grade and that is ‘ethics’ and ‘manners’. Hazrat Ali said, “He who does not have literature does not have religion.” I don’t know how the people of Japan know about Hazrat Ali and why we still don’t know about him. However, the implementation responsibility is currently held by the Japanese.
One of our friends went to Japan and upon reaching the airport, he introduced himself as a teacher and then he thought that he might be the Prime Minister of Japan. The late writer Ashfaq Ahmed once had to go to court in Italy and he also introduced himself that I am a teacher. He writes that all the people present in the court, including the judge, stood up from their seats. This is the secret of the progress and rise and fall of nations.
Social studies is not “taught” in Japan because it is not something to be taught. They are teaching their generation very well how to socialize. In Japanese schools, children and teachers organize themselves for cleaning, from the time they come to school at 8 in the morning until 10 o’clock, the whole school is engaged in cleaning, including children and teachers.
On the other hand, you should look at our education system which consists only of copying and printing. Our children have become ‘publishers’. You see the spectacle of what is written in the book, the teacher copying the same on the board, the children reprinting the same on the copy, the teacher giving the same copied and printed material in the exam, marking the important questions themselves and so on. They prepare the paper themselves and check it themselves and give marks by themselves.
The decision of the child to pass or fail is also made by themselves and the parents keep clapping their hands on this result and sing praises of the children’s intelligence and ability; whose children fail, they keep regretting this result. And they continue to taunt their child with “leprous brain” and “dull mind.” For 13 and 14 years, we make the children stand in a line and do the assembly, and as soon as they leave school, they break the line and do their work.
Students spend all their time in school “learning” science and you won’t see any “scientists” in the whole country because science is unfortunately a matter of “learning” and experimenting. And we call it “Ratta” too. You will be surprised that the first matriculation exam was held in 1858 and the British government decided that the people of the subcontinent are half of our intelligence so we have “passing marks” of 65. So 32 decimals should be for those in the subcontinent. Two years later, in 1860, the passing marks were changed to 33 for the convenience of teachers, and we are also busy finding the intelligence of our children with the same 33 marks.
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