v
Dr. S. Ganesan
Regional Director,
IGNOU
v
Dr.T.R. Satyakeerthy
Assistant Regional
Director, IGNOU
Our everyday life starting from
sunrise to mid-night needs lot of skills to manage our day-time as well as
might-time activities. The school going children learn such skills at home,
school and outside environments. But, all
the children could not get same or similar skills for their life. Both the
parents and teachers integratelly should try to upgrade the life skill
education for the children. The process should be rapid to meet the growing requirements
of children life.
We all witness the higher level
skills in poor children as compared to rich children. Why it is so? The
compelling situations make the learning fast and strong. Frequent re-occurrence
of difficulty situations moulds the children to handle it wisely and
skillfully. Due to this fact, the poor children are able to enhance their life
skills of higher order.
Getting ready for school,
catching the school van at right time at right bus stop etc, are normal
day-to-day skills required for school children. Managing the school bags, tiffin
box, water bottle, pencil box etc are few real life challenges for them.
Students learn lot many things while travelling from home to school and back.
The real world exposures gradually trains the children to manage the life.
In Mumbai, getting into metro
electric train is treated as ‘Guinness
Record” for new traveler. To go to United States, the skill of cooking,
skill of cleaning and maintenance of kitchen items are paramount important
besides US-Visa. Doing everything independently in US, is not that easy life
for our Indian school children. Even if you purchase a table and chair, you
should have the skill to assemble it yourself without the help of carpenter. In
other words, location –to- location, the life skills requirements also varies.
The following are some of
common, important life skills required for school children:
Self-Awareness
includes
our recognition of ourselves, our character, strengths and weaknesses, desires
and dislikes. It is learning about me as a special person. It is a
pre-requisite for effective communication, interpersonal relationship and
developing empathy.
Empathy
is
an ability to imagine what life is like for another person even in a situation
that we may not be familiar with? It helps us to understand and accept others
and their behavior that may be very different from ourselves i.e. understanding
how people are alike and how we differ. It includes skills like-ability to
listen, understand others needs and circumstances, ability to express that
understanding.
Critical
Thinking is
ability to analyze information and experience in an objective manner. This
include skills like-analyzing peer and media influences, analyzing attitudes,
values, social norms, beliefs, and factors affecting them identifying relevant
information and sources of information.
Creative
Thinking is
an ability that helps us look beyond our direct experience and address issues
in a perspective which is different from the obvious. It adds novelty and
flexibility to the situation of our daily life. It is the ability to analyze information
and experiences in an objective manner. It contributes to problem solving and
decision making by enabling us to explore available alternatives and various
consequences of our action or non-action.
Decision-Making
is
process of making assessment of an
issue by considering all possible/available options and the effects of different
decisions might have on them. It is the ability to weigh the pros and cons of
alternative and accepting responsibility for the consequences of the decision.
Problem
Solving refers
to having made decisions about each of the options, choosing the one which is
the best suited and following it through the process till a positive outcome of
the problem is achieved. In all, it is identifying problems, exploring
alternatives and making rational decision. For developing these skills, one
needs to have information –gathering skills, evaluating future consequences of present
actions for self and others determining alternative solutions to problems.
Effective
Communication is
ability to express ourselves both verbally and non-verbally in an appropriate
manner. This means being able to express desires, opinions, and fears and seek
assistance and advice in times of need. Skills include-Verbal/non-verbal
communication, active listening, expressing feelings, giving feedback without
blaming, receiving feedback.
Interpersonal
Relationship Skill
that helps us to understand our relations with others and relate in a positive/reciprocal
manner with them. It helps us to value and maintain relationship with friends
and family members and also be able to end relationships constructively. It
helps in working with others and understanding roles and constraints of others.
Coping
with Stress is
an ability to recognize the source of stress in our lives, its effect on us and
acting in ways that help to control our levels of stress. This may involve
identifying stress, time management, positive thinking and taking action to
reduce some stress for example changes in physical environment, life styles, learning
to relax etc. This is the important skill to be developed in children of the
present world.
Coping
with Emotions is
ability, which involves recognizing emotions in others and ourselves, being
aware of how emotions influence behaviors and being able to respond to emotions
appropriately. It helps to understand that there are a range of emotions and
the expression of emotions may be different for different people in response to
the same situation. It may include managing anger, dealing with grief and anxiety,
coping with loss, abuse and trauma.
Household
related skills
are needed to carry out our day –today activities in the house. It includes
skills like cooking, balanced diet, washing clothes, sweeping and cleaning,
kitchen gardening, health and hygiene, mending, stitching, thrift and household
remedies.
Family
related skills
that are related to management of all the family affairs. All the family
related skills such as planned and responsible parenthood, AIDS/HIV/ STD
awareness, drug abuse, sex education, menstrual management, handling and
stopping family violence, verbal and physical abuse, child abuse, sexual
harassment, first aid (burn, injuries, snake bite drowning, poisoning etc.)
home nursing, health and nutrition are included in it.
Accessing
Public Services skills
relate to knowing and understanding of accessing and operating the existing
public services for day -to -day functioning of life thereby benefitting
family, community and society for improving the quality of life. It includes
skills like post and telegraphs operations, rail/bus services, banking operations,
accessing health and sanitation service, traffic rules and regulation and
computer literacy including internet ticket booking.
Environmental
Awareness relates
to protection, conservation and preservation of environment, understanding the
close relationship between human beings, their activities and the surrounding
in which they live. The environmental related skills are: protection of
environment, identification of pollution hazards and polluting agents,
conservation of resources, recycling of bio -degradable materials for daily
use, love and care for plants and animals, use of eco friendly techniques and
disaster management (floods, earthquake cyclone etc.).
Legal Literacy is important that children are
made aware about laws that govern human life. These laws are essential to
combat conflicts arising out of continuing deep seated inequalities of caste,
class, religion and above all gender inequalities. It is important to build in
our children, enough understanding and commitment to human progress through the
content and process of school education. The key to all human developments lies
in ensuring observance of laws and not enforcement by external agencies. This
includes skills related to constitutional rights and duties, right to
education, consumer education, human rights, rights of the child, right of
women, personal and social laws, labour laws related to crime against women and
public interest litigation.
Forms
of life skills are
Yoga, Sports and Games, Karate, Dance and Music, Art and Craft, Dramatics/Theatre,
Community Service, Excursions & Adventure Camps, Competitions and
Celebrations and Special Events etc.
Curricular
and Co-Curricular Activities can include knowing Myself, Healthy Community,
Love for Animals and Birds, Nutritional Snack Competition, How to Protect
Myself, Know Your Rights, Managing Stress, Social Sensitivity, Water is
Precious etc.
The IGNOU provides such
life-skill education to parents, teachers through PG Certificate in Value
Education (PGCVE). The moral education, life skill education are part of value
education. Value education has been
designed to inculcate the importance of
value education in teaching learning process among teachers, teacher educators,
graduates, NGO’s and professionals from corporate and other sectors. To orient
the target group of teachers (mostly elementary) for integrating values in
their transactional process of teaching and learning, To generate awareness and
interest for inculcating positive values among teachers, professionals,
students, parents and the community and to develop awareness and societal
responsibility among NGO’s Government servants and civil society organizations.
|
Value
education contains
|
|
*
Over view and perspectives of values
*
Social Dynamics and Value Development
*
Pedagogy of Values
*
application and support skills
|
To train our young ones, such
professional qualifications or relevant education is highly essential. It is
more true for nuclear family set-ups as compared to joint family system. Let us
all try to communicate and transfer our acquired life skills to our school
children.
……………………………………………………………………………………………………………….
(The
authors are Dr.S. Ganesan, Regional Director and Dr.T.R. Satyakeerthy,
Assistant Regional Director of IGNOU, Regional Centre, Port Blair and can be
reached at rcportblair@ignou.ac.in)
