The Choices In Learning
A few days ago was the birthday of Pakistan’s national poet Allama Iqbal. And I found myself reading some of his poems, That got me thinking about my relationship with Urdu in school. And not just Urdu but other subjects like history. I used to excel at the hard sciences and English but I was mediocre in the subjects focused around Urdu. And was thinking about why. At this stage in my life like many others I enjoy reading history and literature.
The Identity Barrier
The biggest barrier was probably my own identity. Language has severe class implications in Pakistan. At the top is English. Then Urdu. And at the bottom is the local language Punjabi. It’s interesting that while I’m trying like crazy to have R and M be fluent in Urdu, my cousins and friends are trying to get their children to use English. But for me it was even worse. I was born in America but grew up in Pakistan. I always had it in my plan to leave Pakistan and go back to my country of birth. Urdu was in a way a distraction from where my life was meant to be. Sure I read literature in Urdu and could comprehend it just as well as the literature in English. But I was never compelled to prove myself as much in Urdu as I was in English. And I didn’t get the same kudos from my Urdu teacher as I did from my English teacher. In fact my performance dropped in Social Studies when the subject was changed into Urdu.
The same skills that I did great in one language, I self-selected myself away from in another language. It couldn’t have been skills or talent. And while there were circumstances amplifying my identity factors people from different backgrounds have different identity. The line for the movie Finding Forrester comes to mind, “Basketball is where he gets his acceptance.” And we know this happens in other contexts. Girls self-selecting themselves away from STEM subjects for example. So we must be mindful of how our identities work in choosing our preferences. And if we need to be providing guidance to help students overcome their preconceived notions about their own identity.
No Controversy = No Truth = No Interest
This one is particularly relevant to history. Other than perhaps Germany most countries have a straight forward instill patriotism agenda behind teaching history. And under this agenda, most countries are very careful to not damage the narrative of their nation. And so they drop anything controversial. But the controversy represents, the gray of the real world. So what is taught as history isn’t any reflection of the truth. It doesn’t serve the students in any way. It becomes jingoistic propaganda, and not only does it fail to improve your critical thinking, it becomes boring because it is devoid of conflict so it’s no longer a story. Nothing to make you pause and think nothing to make it memorable. Nothing to make you feel. Nothing to challenge. Of course devoid of all that educators decide to focus on dates because that’s one thing that is usually not controversial.
And there are many things that are controversial. Actions of our own nations. Motivations of other nations. The thoughts and actions of our leaders. For example, we learned that Allama Iqbal had conflicts with the clergy in school. But if you want to see the level of conflict he had you only need to read this poem.
Hypercompetitive Environment
This one fact causes multiple issues in the process of learning especially on more subjective topics. We start with the obvious. It’s something that you have to do. So it’s not enjoyable. There is nothing better at making any experience miserable than making it a requirement.
In STEM subjects with a more objective standard there is a correct answer. But when the answer is more subjective it leaves a lot of room for creativity. Creativity is good and something we want to encourage but it makes measurement hard. Unfortunately evaluations in education are at an equal status with learning especially in a competitive environment. Which means how we test compromises the learning. Because after all we are what we measure. Memorizing dates in history, restricting yourself to the provided interpretation, questions focused on vocabulary, are all example of how the need for measurement compromises the learning experience.
But in a hypercompetitive environment the expectation is to perform better than what normal life experiences would have allowed at that age. And so instead of reading, comprehending, and exercising our own creativity we were forced to leverage the work of someone. With that we didn’t practice exercising our own creativity.
Inaccessibility
I see this problem especially with Urdu literature. A lot of Urdu tries to be inaccessible. Probably a vainglorious gesture to ingratiate to the erudite minds with an abstruse vocabulary. I joke but we forget how new the idea of universal literacy is. There were always many gates around knowledge. For example it was considered heresy to read the bible in your native tongue rather than in greek. Although there is another aspect to it. Some of it is purposely difficult to protect themselves from persecution. But a lot is difficulty to make the content appear more high brow. Hey, who hasn’t
Urdu literature has both of those reasons to be inaccessible. And so I was turned off from the subject. But it just isn’t Urdu. I had to memorize so many words for the SAT and GRE that now they’re a part of my natural vocabulary.
In some of my other posts like “A Tale Of Two Subject” I’ve talked about how in education we steer many people away from Mathematics. And looking back, I was steered away from my own set of subjects even though against the odds I took an interest in STEM. But there is the bigger question. Why are we so good at making sure that learning is a painful experience. Rather than letting it be one of the most beautiful and exciting things we can do.
