Primacy of Active Leader:
Informal learning in society builds on the learners’ natural ability to
draw upon and construct their own knowledge, to develop their capacities, in relating to the environment around them,
both physical and social, and to the task at hand. For
this to happen, opportunities to try out, manipulate,
make mistakes and correct oneself are essential. This is
as true of learning language as it is of a craft skill or a
discipline. Schools as institutions provide new
opportunities for all learners to learn about themselves,
others, and society, to access their inheritance and engage
with it irrespective of and outside the access provided
by one’s birth into a family and a community. The
formal processes of learning that school makes possible
can open up new possibilities of understanding and
relating to the world.
Our current concern in curriculum development
and reform is to make it an inclusive and meaningful
experience for children, alongwith the effort to move
away from a textbook culture. This requires a
fundamental change in how we think of learners and
the process of learning. Hence the need to engage in
detail with the underpinnings and implications of ‘childcentred’
education.
‘Child-centred’ pedagogy means giving primacy
to children’s experiences, their voices, and their active
participation. This kind of pedagogy requires us to
plan learning in keeping with children’s psychological
development and interests. The learning plans therefore
must respond to physical, cultural and social preferences
within the wide diversity of characteristics and needs.
Our school pedagogic practices, learning tasks, and the
texts we create for learners tend to focus on the
socialisation of children and on the ‘receptive’ features
of children’s learning. Instead, we need to nurture and
build on their active and creative capabilities—their
inherent interest in making meaning, in relating to the
world in ‘real’ ways through acting on it and creating,
and in relating to other humans. Learning is active and
social in its character. Frequently, the notions of ‘good
student’ that are promoted emphasise obedience to
the teacher, moral character, and acceptance of the
teacher’s words as ‘authoritative’ knowledge.
