asking questions.
Sunday, December 14, 2008
I think I agree with some of the major proponents of more open-minded teaching in Singapore. Many complain of the emphasis on rote learning. It's like, don't ask why, just do. Of course, not all of Singapore's education dissemination is still this way. There is increasing emphasis to get students to know what's behind a circumstance or occurence, rather than simply telling them it was what it was. For me, it's much more effective absorbing information if I know the rationale behind it, instead of accepting things at face value and memorising by repetition.
One case is my recent foray into the UN's role in Somalia from 1992 to 1995 for my History holiday homework. Thing is, the year of study it begins with happens to be only after the UN began taking major action against the situation in Somalia. 'Why did the violence begin?' was a paramount question to me before I wanted to research the UN's role. After all, is UN intervention justified? Maybe the violence was some sort of coup on the government that no Somali had supported, thus making it 'fair', so to speak.
What my concern is with is that seeing some of the students in my History class is a bit irritating. They don't seem to have that zest to know more about the conflict. They can form opinions on it and give an argument, but rarely do they really fully evaluate the situation and see things from seriously different points of view. I make this statement now in saying that I'm quite certain a few of them will just dive straight into the UN's role. But what if the UN had been manipulated by the US into a role that wasn't all that humanitarian in the conflict? It's important to know the beginning and end of the conflict too, and not just center on what topic is being tested! Only when one knows and appreciates the full picture can one form a good argument, no?
And why am I mentioning this? I recently got into the MJC team for an upcoming Financial Budget debate held by the MOF. This guy Andy, whom I must applaud for being the first to actually carry out some form of in-depth research, had sent us an email with his draft of our possible argument context.
"This house supports Lower vehicle ownership and higher vehicle usage charges."
--We are the opposition, representing the Logistics and delivery companies of Singapore.
Again, while he had the most initiative of the 5 of us, I felt that his analysis and draft was deviating from the big picture, and not all that relevant.
For starters, he said that we stood for higher vehicular ownership and lower vehicle usage charges. What makes that so? It does not mean that simply because we are the oppostion, we take up the direct opposite stance of our challengers. We could call for, perhaps, a more exclusive vehicular usage charge system, such that delivery and transport companies can be exempt or pay less.
Also, I notice he used a lot of Economics jargon in his analysis, such as Minimum Efficient Scale, quantity demanded falling, price inelasticity and the like. Why? I suspect its because of the same problem mentioned above. Many Singaporean students are made to think one way, and that is to follow what has been taught in lessons, applying them as much as they can to real world situations. But what for? It's not highly necessary. What needs to be done is a transition from lesson-based text to beginning in the first place with more practical situations. What's more important in this debate is getting across your message in a convincing and easily absorbed manner. Go about spouting all this jargon, and it's not going to impress anyone. After all, the RJC, ACS(I) and VJC students can trump us there any day.
Finally, he also failed to point out what it is that is so important in curbing the charges dealt to delivery and transport companies that will convince the government to reduce charges to them. For the length of the essay he mentions how the delivery companies will be hurt, business will suffer and how overall profiting will decrease should charges be increased. But what problem is that to the government? Where are the figures that state such a change will impact Singapore's growth or economic prospects, in order to make the government perk up and take notice?
Yet again, the problem of rote learning comes about. The topic may be about reducing cars on the road, but the significance of it is lost. The debate is meant to influence Singapore's government budget allocation, not a human geography study on Singapore's overarching effects of congestion charges to companies. Be it in humanites subjects or debates, I still feel that there are quite a few who have to braoden their perspectives if they want to give a convincing argument. And that includes me, too.
posted by joseph at 8:39 PM