Educational reforms that reduce burden of study

The idea that education is knowledge from textbooks has changed. At least some have come to realise that students need to gain practical lessons from academy education to face life with confidence, optimism and courage. Yet, news of children committing suicide over an exam failure or a teacher's reprimand is not uncommon. The strangest thing is that the main reason for the dangerous situation where children's lives are limited to school, tuition, exams and competitions is not the children themselves, but the parents!

Although there is nothing wrong with wanting one's child to be smart and number one, everyone should understand the reality that not even parents have the right to confine their child's life to textbooks. The school year is not just about classrooms, but also the school grounds, the temple grounds near the house, the group of friends by the river, playing ball, and climbing trees. It is from such associations outside the school and home that human emotions and capacities such as self-confidence, tolerance, courage to survive, sharing, empathy, compassion, and love for fellow beings are developed in a child as an individual, and they are transformed into a social being. It should be understood that such emotional lessons or emotional transmission are not subjects in textbooks.

The Kerala State Education Department's Curriculum Committee is preparing for a reform that reflects this reality. This reform will not allow textbooks and notebooks to be taken home every day, but will provide facilities to keep them in the classrooms. Parents will naturally worry about what their children will do if they come home without a textbook or notebook. The answer to that is what was said above. Should children who come home after school, tuition, gymnasium and dance classes still sit in front of books? Why can't those who come home and complain to their partners about the mental stress at work think about the study load and mental stress of their own children? The reply will be the question, isn't it for their own good? The answer is another question: Shouldn't children be healthy and confident human beings as well?

The Education Department is continuing its deliberations and discussions on reducing the weight of school bags, which can even cause serious health problems among school students. The discussions for this include publishing textbooks in multiple volumes and introducing a system of writing notes for different subjects in the same notebook. These changes, including making it possible to store textbooks in the classrooms, are to be implemented from the next academic year. Any reform that reduces the study load of children and allows them time for mental relaxation and rest should be supported. Parents should first realise that reforms do not make their children lazy, but rather make them energetic, good people with good thinking and human values, and courageous.