By:Gideon-Nii Ayi
We have all heard about how redundant the educational system is in Ghana and in Africa as a whole. We have toyed practically with the minds of children over and over under various educational systems/models.
None of these educational systems seem to be working very well. If it has, the problem of unemployed youth, managerial incompetence and a great lack of simple common sense would be a thing of the past. If it has we would not be going around begging Cuba to send us doctors. And neither would we rely on the Chinese to build us a hydro-electric dam. (The Americans built one for us 50 years ago and we still haven’t gotten the capabilities to build one ourselves)
If I had my way the educational curricula up to the age of 16/17 would consist only of Maths and English . That is every Ghanaian who reaches the age of 16/17 should be able to communicate efficiently in English.. As to whether it is 4 years of JHS/SHS (Junior High School or Senior High School) I would leave this to the politicians to decide.
My reason for this is that most pupils who complete schooling of the JHS and even the SHS are not able to read well much less communicate effectively. I am not talking of Accra schools. Accra by the way is not Ghana, just pick a school few kilometres outside Accra and you would understand what I am talking of. Basic reading skills is lacking even in 20 year olds.
The study of English would not be limited to grammar and a few passages (like Mr Alidu and the goat!) for comprehension class exercises sake. Pupils would be encouraged to read books (both African writers and other classics) which would be for further discussion in class.
If one is not able to read and understand English, of what use is Social Studies, Integrated Science, technical Skills etc to them. They would settle on rote learning, cramp it all inside and just pray to God to help them pass. They would come out all right but to what end?
Secondly with the lack of teachers facing us, the student teacher ratios could be increased simply by redeployment. A lot of the teachers who are not adequately equipped to teach the so called vocational skills subjects could be retrained to start teaching Maths and English.
Once the love of learning is ignited in an individual no matter the educational situation (ie lack of classrooms or teachers), they are be able to learn on their own. I know a lot of people who went through so called village schools and attribute their ability to break through the educational/poverty barrier mainly because they were able to read and write very well. We all know of people who did self study on their own and went on to achieve greater things.
Once an individual becomes literate and numerate there is no stopping to what they can do. We have emphasised various problems causing poverty in the world today. At the root cause of poverty is illiteracy.
Space would not permit me here but there are various changes which could be made all the way to the University level. For example instead of our universities focusing on subject specifics we could turn our attention to problems specific studies for a semester even at the undergraduate level.
In a humanities class a subject could be breaking the poverty cycle. For the engineering class it might be making electricity available for all in Africa. Mathematics students might study, teaching maths in our local languages. Computer science students would also study for whole semester-“Speech translating software for our local languages’’.
Through this we would start discussing our problems our selves in thorough manner and not leave it to a few civil societies/think tanks/ development partners. It is a fact that most of the graduating students end up leading our country. Let them start discussions in the classroom and a bit of it might stick with them years afterwards.
Which of us knew exactly the kind of job he or she would be doing today? At most one may have liked to work in a bank or telecom sector but the specifics of the everyday job were unknown. On the job you have to learn from scratch.
The fact is that the world is changing very fast (yes I know this is an old cliché) and the most important thing is to be able to adapt ourselves to the situation or problem we find ourselves in. The most important skill today is the ability to think. Think well and you would be able to thrive successfully in any environment!.
Gideon, this was an interesting read. I do agree with you that we need to start taking certain courses more seriously and that basic education in Ghana should be given greater or perhaps exclusive attention than we're currently experiencing. But to focus exclusively on English and Math no matter how important will be detrimental to the creation of a 'complete or total student'. We're not trying to build a mechanical or esoteric society but one in which all the parts of the larger body will come together to create a much functional unit.
ReplyDeleteI do agree with you. However my point of view is that the aim of education is not to create a complete or total student. Rather it should aim at creating independent and unique individuals who are capable of making a contribution to this life of ours.
ReplyDeleteTeach a man how to fish and .... That is give them the basics and they would fend for themselves.
Secondly there are subjects taught in classrooms which are not really helpful but a waste of time. Topics such as ethics and morals are simply not teacheable. We might make attempts at doing so. The values from ethics are only learnt in the school of life and everyday experiences.
I will rather have a reasonable man with good ethics and upright morals than a crook accountant or pigheaded scientist because while the former can be taught the latter will only end if destroying the world.
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