Seeing the whole child…

…not just the marks.

Hello all. Welcome to the 120th edition of TEPS Weekly! 

In our school system, it is a practice to measure a student’s growth only through the marks they get. But in most schools, marks only assess how well a student memorises, how much they can write and sometimes, how fluently they speak. While these are useful skills, these are only a few aspects of a child’s personality. There are many other skills and attitudes that traditional assessments and marks don’t capture, like curiosity, confidence, perseverance, perspective-taking and so on. So, assessing a child based only on marks can do harm to:

• Students who score low marks: They may feel demotivated and even worthless, despite having capabilities like asking thoughtful questions in class or explaining their ideas clearly during discussions. These are also important signs of  learning and understanding that lead to academic success.

• Students who score high marks: It’s possible to score high marks but still struggle with skills like originality of ideas, critical thinking, empathy and so on. But scoring high marks tells everyone that this student has succeeded, and he/she may miss out on the support they need in other areas. 

Let’s look at what some of these skills are and how they play out in the classroom: 

1. Curiosity: Curiosity is recognising that you don’t know something and the strong urge or desire to know more about that thing.  A curious child asks a lot of questions, picks up books to explore new information, manipulates objects etc, simply because they want to know more and not because anyone asked them to. 

In a Grade 5 Science classroom, students are doing an experiment with soluble substances. They are required to mix different materials in water, like salt, sugar, sand, etc, to see which dissolves and which doesn’t. Vanya is excited and starts the experiment. She asks the teacher a lot of questions: “Why is this happening?” “What if I add the sand little by little?” “What happens if I don’t mix the water?” “Can I use hot water and see if there’s any difference?” Vanya is seen trying out different ideas like these, but by the end of the class, she is racing to fill in her observation log, and she struggles to recall the technical terms like ‘solubility’ and ‘dissolve.’ Instead, she writes, “The salt gets mixed.”

The end product, which is the observation log, is incomplete and doesn’t use the expected terms. But it doesn’t reflect Vanya’s curiosity – asking questions and going beyond what was asked by experimenting with different variations and trying out new possibilities. She immersed herself in the experiment to understand more about how dissolving works.

What can a teacher/parent do?

Appreciate Vanya’s curiosity and tell her that it’s a very important skill to have – “Curiosity is what helps scientists make discoveries.” But let her know that it's equally important for ‘scientists’ to record their observations as and when they are doing the experiment. Teach Vanya the different points at which she can pause during the experiment and give her sentence starters/prompts to help her write down her observations:

• “I tried to…”

• “I saw that…”

•  “I think this happened because…”

• “I wonder what would happen if…”

To help Vanya recall the technical terms, help her get into the habit of spending at least 7-8 minutes before the experiment to note down the terms and their meanings and then actively use those terms while doing the experiment. This way, you’re supporting her with what she needs without diminishing her curiosity. 

2. Confidence: Confidence is understanding and believing in one’s own abilities and trusting that they can succeed if they try to achieve a certain level of performance.  It comes from being aware of one’s interests and abilities. A confident child is generally optimistic, trusts their ideas and engages with learning opportunities instead of shying away from them – whether by asking questions, taking risks or seeking feedback. 

In a Grade 9 English classroom, students are learning how to write formal letters. They  are expected to follow the format strictly, use a formal tone, paragraphing and appropriate punctuation. Rehan submits his letter to the teacher and proactively asks for feedback. His letter was to the local government requesting for more reading spaces in the neighbourhood. He expresses his thoughts clearly: “Children need more quiet places to read. Not everyone can afford books at home, so libraries should be open longer.” While his opinions were strong, he loses marks for the errors in the format and punctuation. And moreover, once he receives feedback on his letter, he asks the teacher whether he can try writing it again. 

While a lot of the focus of learning to write a formal letter is on the format and the structure, which Rehan didn’t quite master, he showed confidence by trusting his ideas and asking for feedback from the teacher because he believed in his ability to improve and was okay with trying again to get it right. 

What can a teacher/parent do? 

Appreciate Rehan’s strong opinions and his confidence in himself. Also, help him see why structure matters. Let him know that if he wants to use his strong voice to bring about real change – like actually sending a letter to someone in authority – knowing how to structure it properly makes sure his message is taken seriously. “Your ideas are powerful. Let’s practise the structure so your voice can truly be heard.” To help him get the formal letter structure correct, support him with formal letter templates, starting with one that has pre-labelled sections such as ‘Sender's Address,’ ‘Date,’ and ‘Salutation’ and then progressing onto sections without the labels, and eventually to just a checklist of the required components. 

3. Perseverance: Perseverance is the ability to stick to a task or a problem and not give up despite challenges or even failures, in order to eventually succeed at it. A child with perseverance completes a task or a goal even if it’s difficult or if they make mistakes and it takes longer than expected. 

Leah is a grade 6 student. On a recent Maths class test, Leah attempted only 2 word problems out of 5. On looking closely at her paper, the teacher sees a lot of crossed-out calculations and steps, which means that she had spent a lot of time trying out different methods until she got the correct answer for the first 2 problems. And then she was left with no time to solve the remaining 3. 

The end result is an incomplete test and a low score, but it highlights a very important attitude when it comes to learning in general, but especially learning Maths – perseverance. Instead of getting frustrated and giving up or shutting down, Leah was open to trying new ways until she got the answer.

What can a teacher/parent do?

First, acknowledge Leah’s perseverance. Let her know that her effort and determination are valuable and noticed. But the struggle with word problems is often with understanding what the problem is asking. For this, you can sit with Leah and model how to break down a word problem into smaller parts for a better and faster comprehension – underline the question part, circle the numerical values and quantities needed for the operations and cross out extra information that is not needed to solve the problem. Tell her that once she is clear on the question, she should apply mathematical thinking and figure out the equation/operation required to solve the problem. To help her figure this out faster, teach her to look out for clues like:

• “Altogether”, “In all”, “Total” - Addition

• “How many more”, “How much less”, “Left” – Subtraction

• “Groups”, “Times”, “Share equally” – Multiplication/Division 

Allow her to practise different types of word problems using these strategies, and over time, with her perseverance, she will become quicker at solving them. 

4. Perspective-Taking: Perspective-taking involves putting oneself in another person’s shoes to understand their thoughts, beliefs, feelings and how they think about a situation. A child who is able to take in different perspectives gets along with children who are different from them and appreciates different ideas and feelings. They avoid judging others too quickly and can think from different sides during a conflict.

A Grade 7 Social Science classroom is having a discussion about ‘Child labour in India.’ Ravi participates actively in the discussion and puts across points like, “I don’t think any child wants to work. Maybe their families don’t have enough food, and they feel they have to help. I also think the parents must feel sad sending them to work, but what other option do they have?” He also listens to and is accepting of his peers’ perspectives on the issue. For example, when another student brings up the point of lack of quality education also adding to this problem, Ravi nods and says, “Yeah that’s a good point. I didn’t think of it like that.” But Ravi scored low on a class test on the same topic because he was unable to recall key dates, names of schemes and the timeline of events. 

Judging from his marks alone, Ravi doesn’t seem to show enough competence for the subject. But from the group discussion, we know that Ravi is able to:

• Think from other points of view – the child’s and the parents’ 

• Think of reasons behind social issues

• Accept others’ views on the topic

This is the essence of studying Social Science – understanding other human beings and why they do what they do. 

What can a teacher/parent do?

Acknowledge Ravi’s strength and use it to help him to retain and recall key information. Since Ravi is good with understanding people’s feelings and motives, attach a story/person/feeling to every fact and timeline. For example: Instead of memorising, “The Child Labour (Prohibition and Regulation) Act was passed in 1986,” help Ravi imagine, “A 10-year-old boy working in a factory in 1985. He falls sick. There are no rules to protect him. The public protests. That’s when leaders decided to pass a law called The Child Labour (Prohibition and Regulation) Act in 1986.”

Test scores alone don’t capture all the skills and attitudes that contribute to the overall development of an individual. Looking at how a student learns something, how they interact with others, what they think/talk about the most, what their interests are etc., helps us see them as a whole. Test scores should help us use students’ strengths to support them better, not define their worth. It is time we start observing students’ process of learning along with their product of learning.

---

If you found this newsletter useful, please share it.

If you received this newsletter from someone and you would like to subscribe to us, please click here.

Edition: 4.27