REFUTE FALSE BELIEFS....SAVE STUDENTS

(This article has been published in the February 2020th issue of Pallikkuttam Magazine, by Rajagiri media)

A new predicament is looming over the scenario of education in India. Perhaps teachers are not aware of the hazards it can incur.

 A false belief is eating into the consciousness of the student community, leading to slow premature death of their ability to learn. Year after year more and more students seem to subscribe to this belief. This belief has the temerity to derail even the best teaching strategy.

Examination oriented teaching, prioritizing short term goals, eulogizing of students’ performance rather than mastery ---all seem to nourish and cast an illusion of reality over this false belief which is spreading like an epidemic among the student community.

 What is this belief I am speaking of? Let me break the suspense. It is simply this.

A sizable percentage of students in India believe that learning is an activity which must be done just two or three weeks before the examination.

A survey among students in any locality will convince you of this. The worst thing is, there are students who firmly believe that only the stuff you learn the day before the examination can be retrieved on the day of the exam. According to them, this is how the human memory system functions when it has to “learn” something.

Such beliefs mock at the fundamental purpose of education. The scientific definition of learning is “ a relatively permanent change in the person's knowledge or behavior". The relatively permanent change will be a myth for the student who prepares just before the exam. After the exam, within 30 minutes, no doubt, his brain will empty its contents.

BELIEFS ARE HARD TO CHANGE

It is easier to correct a wrong conclusion or concept. But it is difficult to rectify a wrong belief. Beliefs do not often traverse the usual cause-effect synaptic route during their formation. Events leading to beliefs are not always processed in a logical sequence.

Moreover, the human mind “believes” in something of which it has no clue, which cannot be explained by logical thinking (For a moment, think of your belief in God). If one has clarity regarding anything, he/she need not “believe” in it. As it is “real” or “certain” to his/her experience.

For the same reason, beliefs, in general, refuse to comply with the persuasive appeal from any outside agency. Any persuasive appeal to change a particular belief of an individual must be capable of refuting the content of the belief. But beliefs do not hold on to any rational content. So refuting them is a hard task, nearly impossible. The belief among students in the massed practice, usually, does not contain any rational element. Hacking those beliefs is not a cakewalk.

WHAT MIGHT HAVE LED TO THIS?

What might have led to the formation of a strong but baseless belief among students in “amassed learning”? What causes them to believe that last-minute preparation before the exam is enough?

Residues of past experience

Belief in massed practice, often, is a residue of memory from past experiences. There might have happened one or two chance successes in which the student prepared just days before the examination. This might have reinforced the wrong conclusion that last-minute preparation is enough. Reinforcement of a belief needs only one or two concurring events or consequences, especially when the belief serves as a heuristic and promises less expenditure of energy.

Lack of awareness

Lack of awareness of the principles operating behind the functioning of human memory is one of the reasons for disbelief in regular learning habits. Ability to retrieve the learned matter suffers setbacks if the learner is not willing to deliberately take himself through elaboration, repetition, and retrieval episodes. Learners need not be aware of this fact.

The memory system of a regular learner functions very differently from that of non-regular learners and the performance in the academics too exhibits corresponding difference. The student who undergoes massed practice just before the exam never experiences or acknowledges the difference.

Performance-oriented learning

Disbelief in the regular learning habit might have stemmed from a learning atmosphere where performance is overvalued. The learning contexts (classrooms) which emphasize mastery rather than performance will never allow a student to resort to urgent massed practice just before the examination. It will insist on spaced practice where mastery in each micro stages of learning is assured.

Miserliness

Humans are wired to be cognitive misers. They resort to heuristics (mental short cuts) to preserve cognitive energy. Moreover, machine dominated world proliferates short cut culture and reinforce our innate propensity to reduce the expenditure of cognitive energy. We must know that the culture of short cuts has seeped into the realm of learning too. Short term goals are more appealing to the new generation whose intellect is addicted to immediate gratification. Norms of perseverance, hard work or sustained effort do not make any sense to their world. For them, "passing the examination somehow” is more important than acquiring in-depth mastery. For that, preparing just hours or weeks before the exam is more than enough.

MASTERY IS THE ANTIDOTE

A culture of teaching in which mastery (deep learning) is given more importance than the performance itself--is the need of the hour. It must permeate into the very fabric of each classroom activity. Performance in exams must be a natural consequence of mastery, not of rote learning or urgent last-minute preparation.

A student is said to have mastered a particular matter/concept

•  If he can easily RETRIEVE the matter/concept at any time (even after a long interval of practice)
• If he can APPLY the learned concept/matter in many other learning situations.
• If he can IDENTIFY the relationships existing among various similar concepts( e.g. the relationship between mass, energy, acceleration and the maths running through it)
• If he can RECOGNIZE and appreciate the actual life situations where the learned concept/matter has a direct/indirect implication.

On the contrary, a student who has not mastered a particular concept/ skill properly

• May or may not perform well in the examination.
• When in-depth mastery of the concept/skill is tested, his/her performance flounders.
• Once the examination is over, he/she fails to retrieve the matter properly
• Not likely to excel in situations where the application of the learned matter is warranted.
• Fails to acknowledge the relationship between concepts.

WHAT TUTORS CAN DO?

Let the tutors develop the ability to clearly identify teaching strategies which can enhance mastery. Mastery goals differ from performance goals. One of the differences is in the durability of the skill or the content retained in the brain of the learner, which is superior when student aims for mastery. A large number of research outcomes have ratified this fact repeatedly.

The ability to retrieve the learned matter whenever required is the yardstick to gauge deep learning. Convey this fact to students. Confront the students with concrete evidence that refute his false sense of mastery. Crush their illusions of competence relentlessly with the help of direct as well as indirect questions. The act of eliciting responses for these questions must be intermittently sprinkled with proper constructive feedback.

Give the students adequate awareness regarding the fundamental principles of learning. Create abundant classroom situations to exhibit the benefits of rehearsal, elaboration and retrieval practice.

Spread the message that "all-new learning takes place on the foundation of prior knowledge the learner carries with him". So a particular step missed in the process of acquisition of knowledge/ skill can affect future learning and performance.

Introduce students to the practice of metacognition in learning. Metacognition defined as the process of thinking about one’s own thinking---when applied in learning initiates the learner into a process of self-analysis along affective-cognitive dimensions. It will help him to chaff out false beliefs about learning.

Seek the assistance of parents. Make them aware of the importance of parental educational involvement with the help of concrete scientific evidence. Umpteen studies have substantiated the importance of parental education involvement in the academic performance of students. Inform them about the ways to monitor students’ study habits. Periodic communication with parents--make it a professional routine.