Attraction and Motivation of Secondary Level Students towards Shadow Education
(Seminar paper)
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Contemporary Educational Issues(Ed.541),Forth Semester
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Table of Contents
To explore the weakness of teaching in school sector. 8
Preparation for examination. 10
Improvement in quality of education. 11
Development of sense of curiosity and collaboration in students. 11
Support in the course completion. 12
Abstract
In this seminar paper in which shadow education is kept as the area of study, the attraction and motivation of secondary level students toward shadow education is taken as the issue. The objective of this seminar paper is to explore the weakness of teaching in school sector and to study attraction and motivation of students toward private tutions. In order to fulfill the stated objective two methodologies are followed i.e. document review and field work. Under document review, four documents are reviewed whereas under field work, three students are interviewed regarding their perception about shadow education. Students are found to be holding positive attitudes about tuition classes and its role in the improvement of mainstream education. The students came up with the view that tuition classes contribute in utility of extra time, providing opportunity of individualized learning, interesting and effective learning in small group, extra learning, preparation for examination etc. however, they also have mentioned the issue of weak economic status students who cannot afford extra tuition with extra fees. In this way, being based upon the interviews, the students generally seem to be positive regarding shadow education though there appears problem for financially weak parents to send their children to the tution center.
Keywords
Shadow Education, Tuition Center, Supplementary, Mainstream Education,
Introduction
In this seminar paper, I have studied and analyzed students’ perspectives towards shadow education and attraction and motivation of students toward the shadow education. Shadow education is the shadow of the mainstream education and at present, it has attracted most of the children as well as parents. A number of tuition and coaching centers are established. Most of the students are found to be dependent more upon shadow education than on mainstream education. The increasing interest towards shadow education has led mainstream education to the way of improvement to some extent. However, parents may hold their distinct attitude towards shadow education. ‘What do the students feel about the increasing demand of extra tuitions?’ is the major concern of this paper. In this regard, I have interviewed with three students who have joined extra tuition classes in order to solve their queries and to learn extra method in solving the problems.
There are 6 sections in this seminar paper. The first part is the introduction part in which the detail information about the present seminar paper is discussed. It includes the purpose of this paper and also my individual thoughts and concern about the study. The second section consists of the two already set objectives of this paper which guide the whole paper. The objectives of this paper are to explore the weakness of teaching in school sector and to study attraction and motivation of student towards private tution.. The third section is Methodology in which the steps, methods and strategies which are followed in order to achieve the set goals are discussed. The methodology includes 2 major methods viz. Desk Review and Field Work/Study and also the process of data analysis. Fourth section of this paper is Literature Review, where I have reviewed altogether 2 documents, one book and an article related to shadow education to analyze the pre- established policies and studies about shadow education. Those documents and articles are Education Act, 2028 (Education, Education Act, 2028), Education Regulation, 2059 (Education, Education regulation, 2059),’The Shadow Education System: private tutoring and its implications for planners’ by Mark Bray (Bray, Shadow Education:private supplimentary tutoring and its implications for policy markers., 2012) and an article ‘The Origin of Universal Shadow Education: what the supplemental phenomenon tells us about the postmodern institution of education?’ by Baker and Moorey (Mori & Baker, 2010). The fifth section is Findings and Conclusion where the result of the whole study is discussed. And finally the conclusion of the study is kept in the sixth or the last part i.e. Conclusion sections.
Objectives
The objectives of this seminar are listed below:
- To explore the weakness of teaching in school sector.
- To study attraction and motivation of secondary level students towards private tution.
Methodology
In order to meet the objectives of this seminar paper, I have followed 2 methods. The first one is desk review in which I have studied and reviewed four literatures. For the review of Education Act, 2028 (Education, Education Act, 2028) and Education Regulation, 2059 (Education, Education regulation, 2059) I went through the available book itself whereas for the review of the book by Mark Bray and the article by D. Baker and I. Moorey. First of all I thoroughly went through those literatures and then I listed some important points. The time and again reading and analysis of the literatures helped me review the selected literatures. The important and required points are presented briefly in the ‘Literature Review’ section below.
The second method that I followed is Field Study. For the field study, I went to an institute individually in order to get their ideas and attitudes towards tuition classes. I went to life institute ,bagbazar where english and computer classes are running as tution class as well as training classes.I went to their on 21st of Shrawan in the morning at their respective places. I started my purpose of visiting them and took their permission from the Head (Laxmi Pokhrel) for that. They were from my already known circle so they appeared to be comfortable to accept my request which made me comfortable as well. I asked some open- ended questions about their study, tuition classes and their views on shadow education and their attraction and motivation towards the shadow education. Though we had long conversation they first didn’t allow to record the interview but later I convince them and took a short interview. The some part of conversation was recorded in my mobile phone .I transcribed the recorded audio of interview into written form through repeated listening activity. After transcribing the audio taped interview, I went through the transcription and listed the important points from the transcription under coding section. Further, the listed codes were kept together and compared to each other and categorized into different groups according to their similarities and similar nature or meaning which is called grouping. And finally the important findings and themes were found and they were further studied and analyzed.The findings or the themes are presented and described in another section i.e. Findings and Discussion.
Literature Review
In this section, some documents and articles are reviewed which are related to Shadow Education. The aim of this section is to study the selected documents and articles to analyze weakness of school teaching and motivation and attraction of studying at tution center. The documents and articles which are reviewed include Education Act, 2028 (Education, Education Act, 2028),Education Regulation,2059 (Education, Education regulation, 2059), a book ‘The Shadow Education System: private tutoring and its implications for planners’ by Mark Bray (2012) and an article ‘The Origin of Universal Shadow Education: What the Supplemental Education Phenomenon Tells Us About the Post Modern Institution of Education?’ by Baker and Moorey (Mori & Baker, 2010).
Education Act, 2028 (Education, Education Act, 2028) does not state anything precisely about shadow education. There is no word like ‘shadow education’ mentioned in it. However, it is clearly stated that any educational institution, Bridge course, language classes, need to take permission from Nepal government before conducting them in practice. The Education Act, 2028(Ministry of Education,2074) has mentioned that any supporting institution to the main stream education can be established and run but they need to follow the nation’s policies and principles. This view shows the positive side of the Nepalese education policies towards shadow education. However, only the terms and conditions to run those supporting institutions are mentioned and the criteria like infrastructures, policy for quality education, teacher/tutors’ qualifications are not mentioned in the policy. Thus, some more concern and management would be more fruitful in the field of education.
Education Regulation, 2059 (Education, Education regulation, 2059) has stated the policy of allowing extra coaching classes intending to help and improve the quality of mainstream education. Though the term ‘shadow education’ is not mentioned in the regulation, the concept of shadow education is clearly defined with the term ‘coaching classes’. ‘The party who wants to run extra coaching classes need to present an application to the District Education Office with the clear mention of the level and the subject that he/she wants to run. Education Regulation,2059 (Ministry of Education,2074). Furthermore, if the party does not run the coaching classes according to the terms and conditions, the District Education Officer can dismiss the permission anytime. This shows the initiation of education policy of Nepal towards the quality education. But I believe this much of concern is not enough for the quality of education to rise. That means some more provisions regarding extra tuition classes and coaching classes should be made in order to support in the mainstream education.
The review of Education Act, 2028 (Education, Education Act, 2028) and Education Regulation, 2059 (Education, Education regulation, 2059) comes to the common ground that the term ‘shadow education’ is not clearly mentioned but its concept is made clear with the use of the term ‘coaching class’. Both of the documents hold oneness in following the nation’s policies and principles while conducting extra coaching classes and any educational institutions that would support in mainstream education.
Another article that I reviewed regarding Shadow Education is a book called ‘Shadow Education: Private Supplementary Tutoring and its Implications for Policy Makers’ by (Bray, Shadow Education, 2012). Bray in his book has included the introduction, advantages and disadvantages, effect, use and usage, investment and achievement of shadow education. He further has presented the socio-economic and educational effect of shadow education and also its status in different Asian countries. Bray mentions some of the nations like Combodia, Canada, Portugal which have done researches and comparative analysis under the investment in tuitions along with its achievement. Those researches show that a great portion of investment is seen in tuitions if we see worldwide. The parents are found to be under pressure to afford their tuition fees and that ultimately leads to the social inequalities, cause of stress to students due to unbalanced competition to gain the first rank , pair attraction . After reviewing the book we can come to the point that shadow education plays a significant role in improving the standard of education however, it also has limitations like it has become a matter of social inequalities, it generates stress to students. Therefore the education policy makers need to consider the socio-economic status, students’ achievement level as well as the social traits of the particular society while making educational policies in order to get fruitful achievement from shadow education.
(Mori & Baker, 2010) in their article have mentioned that a vast development is seen in shadow education since some years due to which the mainstream education is in the verge of collapse. Most of the countries in the world are following shadow education to some extent. Among them, in South Korea most of the primary and secondary level students are attracted towards shadow education. South Korea invests 56% of total annual income in private tuitions in order to improve the quality of education. That means, shadow education has established as a trend or culture in every country at present. Shadow education is in trend in Japan only after World War II and according to recent survey, around 25% from Montessori and 53.5 % students from middle level students are taking tuitions in Japan. Korea has the largest number of students to engage in tuitions in the world. According to a survey carried out in 2003, 83.1% elementary level students and 56.3% higher level students were found to take tuitions in Korea. The article proves that every nation is attracted towards shadow education at least to some extent. Among those nations, some of them also have prohibited shadow education as shadow education was found to be one of the causes to bring social inequality and disharmony in society whereas some nations also have appreciated the role of shadow education in the improvement of mainstream education. Hence, this increasing interest and development in shadow education can further extend and improve mainstream education.
Shadow education plays a vital role in the production of capable manpower along with the mainstream education. Only mainstream education cannot meet the national goals of education. ‘Shadow education not only remains as the shadow of mainstream education but as a bright education system which aims at the improvement of overall education system’ (Bam, 2075).
The review of above documents and articles show that shadow education holds a significant role in the mainstream education which can be taken further not only as the shadow of the mainstream education but the both should go hand in hand as two parts of the single coin. Nepal government should establish some more policies regarding shadow education considering the parents’ and children’s educational and socio-economic status for the better educational future. That means the perception of parents and students need to be taken into consideration while making policies in education.
Findings and Discussion
In the course of preparing seminar paper on “to explore the weakness of teaching in school sector and to study attraction and motivation towards private tution” two objectives were set. The findings of those objectives are discussed in the following ways:-
Weakness of teaching in school sector
Finding out the weakness of teaching in school sector is the first objective of this seminar paper. In the course of collecting attitudes and ideas from students about their schooling environment. I found that a heavy competition is there in schooling that is in getting high rank and to admit a large number of students in a class. Comparative analysis of three interviews has come to the common ground of though on their view towards shadow education. Those who used to study in private schools, they education is quite better than that of those who study in school sector(government school).In private school, a class is maximally filled by 40 students but in government schools where even desk and benches are insufficient for the students because they are almost in 200-250 students per class. So a single teacher can’t manage the class and also can’t fulfill all the queries of students within the time period and also if the brilliant or talented students understand they just skip other students and forwards the class.
Teacher’s extra earning
Whatever the time and effort given to the school for teaching the students, the teacher will be payable with fixed salary. Their effort and extra time given to the students are not calculated so the teachers get decorticated in showing extra effort for the weaker student’s .so they just bypass such students and goes through in completing the lesion. Also when they join the tution center, they are payable according to the skills, attraction and motivation of students in tution center. As there is a large number of students they will be payable according to that. Also due to increasing economy crisis, only teacher’s income is not sufficient to sustain their family. For that also teacher don’t shows much attraction in the school class but shows more attraction while teaching in tution center.
Utility of Time
From those three interviews, as they could manage their extra time in studying and also they didn’t have any helpers at home so either they would pass their time in watching televisions or by playing. So tution center has managed their free timing towards learning. Also it can be said that when a man is free (free from any works-has to do nothing whole day),then unnecessary thoughts come into the mind which can demotivate in learning or doing anyother types of job. So people engage in any work so that their mind gets some work and they don’t get such time to think so and don’t feel frustrated.
Extra Learning
Tuition classes provide the opportunity of learning extra things in extra time that the children may not get properly in school hours in great number of students. School hour is limited and the school teachers are supposed to teach the prescribed course in limited time but in tuitions, the children get more opportunity to learn some other things that they do not get to learn in school hours. In schools, there is prescribed lesson to be toughed in fixed time but in adjust in the competitive world, only school education is not enough so it can be said that the students have compulsion in engaging in tution center for their betterment future.
Individualized Learning
Tuition classes help children to learn according to their individual capacity and competency level. That means, in tuition classes the number of student is limited that’s why the tutor or the teacher can reach to every individual student whenever necessary. Similarly, the teacher can also consult about the students’ problem individually, what help or support do they need. In the group , student feel hesitation in asking more questions and also due to more number of students in school , teacher don’t give enough time for the individual students. In some sense tuitions encourage their level of curiosity. They don’t hesitate to ask anything that they find difficult because their tutor is closed to them. The tutor remains available to all the students because the number of students is limited. Hence, tuition classes promote individualized learning.
Students attraction and motivation towards the role of shadow education
Preparation for examination
Tuitions help students especially during examination period. It has grown up as the preparation for exam today. The working parents do not get time to look after their children’s study or even if they manage time, helping their children in study is out of their capability. Therefore tuition classes have taken the full responsibility of the students’ examination. The tuition teacher is familiar with the course and also the pattern of exam so it is really effective to supervise the students for their examination. On the other hand, due to demotivating factors in school like in the case of salary, for hiring qualified teacher, the school has to invest a lot but for the fresher the school needs not to pay more salary which salves the school investment. Also in the name of quality education, school enroll the maximum number of student as they can, which obviously decline the quality of education in school which promote the students to involve in tution centers.
Improvement in quality of education
Shadow education is taken as education system that helps to improve the quality of mainstream education. That means shadow education at present is the supporting tool for mainstream education. It emphasizes more on the subject matter provided by school education. According to different students, teacher usually in tution center are highly qualified and teaches more than the course content using more and more new techniques .when the students get familiar with those subject matters and their level of understanding in the subject matter increases which improves in the quality of education. Their viewpoints prove that they are faithful towards the contribution of shadow education in the improvement of their children’s study.
Repeated study
Tuition classes help students to revise the everyday course of school which helps them to conceptualize the course in better way and for long term. Whatever they learn in school is revised in tuition class even in better way because the number of students is less in tuition. Regarding this one of the student said, “Tution teacher helps them to read and write the subject matter in a better way with more practice but in the school class they have limited time as well as a large number is to be toughed so even though the teacher is qualified, s/he can’t manage overall operation as the tution teacher can do to the limited number of students.”This view of students shows that the regular or daily revision of school course helps students to improve their study faster and effectively.
Development of sense of curiosity and collaboration in students
Shadow education builds up the habit of asking unknown things and working within friend circle in students. Since the number of students is less in tuition class, students are free to ask whatever they feel difficult as teacher seems to be listening or addressing each and every student. The students develop the habit of raising questions or let me say they develop the sense of curiosity in them. Similarly, students also develop the habit of working in collaboration. They develop good social behavior among their friends. One of the student said, “Earlier I never used to arose any question in the class so all my difficulty were within me which could never help me in upgrading myself but after joining tuition i have learned to share his things with others as well as learnt to work in collarobuting environment.” From this, we are clear about the role of shadow education in the development of sense of curiosity as well as collaboration in students which would definitely help in school education.
Support in the course completion
Shadow education also plays a crucial role in the completion of mainstream education course. Especially the government schools face the problem of completing course in time. Its further hamper is seen in students’ level of achievement. The tuition classes are found to be helping in completing the academic course of students though they are not taught in their schools. This shows that the students who are facing this kind of problem can be solved through joining tuition class. Hence, shadow education also functions as the support to complete the course of the mainstream education.
Conclusion
In this seminar paper, the weakness of school sector and motivation and attraction of secondary level students are studied. According to student’s opinion and viewpoints, we can say that tuition class at present has become the compelsion as it serves as a supporting tool from providing opportunity of extra learning to helping in course completion. It has established itself as the desire need especially for those students who are studying in government schools and whose parents are unable to provide enough time and appropriate supervision to their children. And also due to weak education system in school sector. On the basis of the students’ opinions, I come to the conclusion that shadow education at present is an essential support to mainstream education and it should be further taken ahead focusing special attention upon the students of government schools as well as by managing and promoting it in the government principles and policies of education. However, for the betterment of their future, students are either self motivated or even directed by their parents for the involvement in the tution center.
References
Bam, D. B. (2075). Parent’s perspectives Towards Mainstream Education and Shadow Education. TU,Kathmandu: Unpublished article.
Bray, M. (2012). Shadow Education. In Private Supplementary Tutoring and its implication for policy makers. Paries: UNESCO.
Bray, M. (2012). Shadow Education:private supplimentary tutoring and its implications for policy markers. Paries: UNESCO.
Education, M. o. (2028). Education Act. In B. Samiti, Kanun Kitab.
Education, M. o. (2059). Education regulation. In B. samiti, Kanun Kitab.
Mori, I., & Baker, D. (2010). The origin of universal shadow education. In what the supplemental phenomenon tells us about the postmodern institution of education. (p. 214). Asia Pacific Education Review.