Philosophy of Education For The Post COVID — 19 World
By: Anjali Priyadarshini
Tags: Education, Better World, Covid Diaries, Education Reform, Post Covid 19 World

If we continue with the current system of education in the post COVID-19 world and expect different results, it is ridiculous. The governments are planning to introduce ‘health and hygiene’ into the school curriculum so as to fight against the rapidly transmitting virus. While it is a great move to make children imbibe habitual actions like maintaining hygiene, it is not enough.

The Bigger Picture of Learning

The current philosophy of education does not focus on making children understand how the world operates weaving a complex web, the codependency of us humans on other humans, animals, and nature and does not enable a child to assess the impact created by an action. For instance, the typical questions that a child studying history asked are:

Who assassinated who? Which year did the war take place? And many more objective questions.

I believe that we should start asking the questions other way around.

Why did the aristocrat do the things he did? Are those actions for the welfare of the people or for selfish reasons? What impact had it created? What would it have been like if this event never happened?

It is important for children to interpret their own way to develop a personality. If the education system fosters objectivity, how will a child ever understand different perceptions and ways one can ever think? Discussing the topics subjectively will help a child to evaluate situations, world, people, ideas, to think critically, and to identify personal values. Discussing should become a culture in the classroom.

One might say, developing the ability to solve math problems among children is paramount. But in the current education system, problem-solving is not an ability or mindset but is a process of playing with numbers on paper. Some others might say that science is what a child needs to study to excel in life. Can you imagine a world booming with technology with no order and forgotten values? It is like offering a meal with twenty dishes to a person and forcing the person to eat only two of them. Why offer a meal with twenty dishes in the first place? To show the world how generous we are? The country is in dire need of multi-disciplinary, holistic learning. By adopting such a philosophy in education, we not only create individuals aware of what is happening around them but also who can understand what impact they could create in the world.

Not Titles But The Actions

When you ask a child what he/she wants to become the typical answers in India would be: doctor, pilot, scientist, teacher. Of course, the responses are the limited titles we made them acquainted with and they had to pick one from the pool. As they grow up they learn about more titles: business analyst, CEO, manager, astronaut, and whatnot. But what we make children attach with the end goal itself and not the process. We make children attached to the pay rather than the work they’ll have to do.

In the post COVID — 19 world, it is important to slow down the carbon footprint we are making. The capitalists are getting richer, using up the resources as if there is no tomorrow and the people work for them are being lured by the money and titles. The obsession with titles and paycheck will only make people work for powerful capitalists without even liking the work they do. When everybody wants to work for those few capitalists, we will no more have an alternative better world. We will only have a definite messed-up world.

The best way to tackle it is by teaching children to love the process instead of the end-goal, and by making them understand we work not for the title but to live a life with a passion to create or help someone create things that one he/she envisions. If you want to become a coder make sure coding is what you love to do. Fall in love with actions, be it conserving animals, be it fighting against climate change. One will eventually find a way to earn doing things he/she loves. Fighting against climate change can make one into a social activist or a researcher or a scientist working in Antarctica. There are endless possibilities. But it is the zeal that will make humans happy. It is the happiness that drives people to work productively and perhaps without even using as many resources we are by working for a few individual powerful capitalists whose only motivation is increasing their share prices. By prioritizing passion over titles, we might come with titles that never existed, jobs that can make the world a better place.

See to Perceive

We often want our children to do better than us, our acquaintances, and the others of their age. The chase is to join the better-club. Once one joins a better-club, there is always another club better than the better-club. And a child wants to be a part of the better-club because that is what s/he all knows. We as adults, only show them what is better for them protecting them in a cocoon and blindfolding their eyes. By letting them see what suffering in world is like, we will be able to develop empathy among children who will learn to perceive. Everybody who perceives might not become a leader but every leader must perceive the world around.

Better philosophy of education for better post COVID-19 world.