Recently, the National Educational Policy Cell of the Directorate of School Education Kashmir issued an order which impressed upon all the school heads and teaching officials to refrain from inflicting corporal punishment on students in educational institutions. The order has been highly appreciated and welcomed by all and sundry. Since educational institutions are meant to provide a positive and stress-free environment to school-going children so that during the teaching-learning process they may not feel any kind of pressure or stress which eventually impacts their learning development. Moreover, education is to draw out the best and to expose the hidden talent. How come it is possible when the child is under stress or any other kind of mental disturbance?
There is a well-known saying “A bad workman quarrels with his tools.” This quote has some relevance in this context. Why a teacher whose job is to teach, facilitate, mentor and guide the child, indulges in corporal punishment or any other kind of mental abuse of children? It means that the teacher lacks the basic professional skills of teaching that he commits such acts. It is totally a non-human act and it must be avoided for the welfare of the student community.
Why are children given corporal punishment in schools? Why do teachers need to punish children while learning? Are the children that much incapable and dull that they are unable to learn things? Or, is it necessary for teachers to beat children to make them learn things? If the answer is no, where lies the weakness then? Does the weakness lie in children or in teachers? These are certain questions that need to be pondered upon. Obviously, the teacher who beats and punishes a child for making him learn lacks motivational and other professional skills. The teacher in question must change his teaching strategies and he must work hard to become a good teacher otherwise he should voluntarily quit the job for being an incapable teacher.
It may not be wrong to quote a famous saying here, “You can lead a horse to water, but you can never make him drink.” This well-known saying is quite relevant. You can take children to school, and make them sit in the classroom and deliver your lesson before them but you cannot make them understand unless they feel motivated towards the lesson or get ready to learn. Motivation plays a vital role in education and without it, one cannot think of successful education and learning. Motivation increases persistence and cognitive processes which eventually leads to improved results and performance. It also increases the willingness among the learners to get ready for learning.
So teachers must work for the development of their own motivation skills so that they don’t get indulged in any kind of mental abuse or corporal punishment of students while teaching. Rather they should work in a friendly and stress-free environment with the students. Only then educational institutions can surely attract children and they can really become the centres of quality education. Moreover, this is a much-needed ban and teachers should remain extra cautious while teaching and they should handle the students amicably and sympathetically because we know that loving nature and sympathetic and empathetic behaviour have always been a driving force behind every successful person and pressure tactic like physical as well as mental tortures have always turned out to be the main cause of increasing rates of drop out and never enrolled children.
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