Curricular integration of essential subjects and skills

Curricular integration of essential subjects and skills

While students must have a large amount of flexibility in choosing their individual curricula, certain subjects and skills should be learned by all students in order to become good, successful, innovative, adaptable, and productive human beings in today’s rapidly-changing world. In addition to proficiency in languages, these skills include: scientific temper and evidence-based thinking; creativity and innovativeness, collaborative approach, citizenship skills, imbibing of constitutional values; sense of aesthetics and art; oral and written communication; physical education, wellness, and sports; problem solving and logical reasoning; vocational exposure and skills; digital literacy, coding and computational thinking; ethical and moral reasoning; knowledge of India (including Indian knowledge systems); current affairs; and knowledge of critical issues facing local communities, states, the country, and the world. It is recognised that mathematics and mathematical thinking will be very important for India’s future and India’s leadership role in the numerous upcoming fields and professions that will involve artificial intelligence, machine learning, and data science. Concerted curricular and pedagogical initiatives, including introducing contemporary subjects such as Artificial Intelligence, Design Thinking, Organic Living, etc. at relevant stages will be undertaken to develop these various important skills in all students at all levels.

National textbooks with local content and flavour

The reduction in, and increased flexibility of, school curriculum content - and the renewed emphasis on constructivist rather than rote learning - must be accompanied by parallel changes in school textbooks. All textbooks shall aim to contain the essential core material (together with discussion, analysis, examples, and applications) deemed important on a national level, but at the same time contain any desired nuances and supplementary material in accordance with local contexts and needs. Where possible, teachers will also have choices in the textbooks they employ - from among a set of textbooks that contain the requisite national and local material - so that they may teach in a manner that is best suited to their own desired teaching styles and their students’ and communities’ needs.

The aim will be to provide such quality textbooks at the lowest possible cost - namely, the cost of production/printing - in order to remove the burdens of textbook prices on the students and on the educational system. This may be accomplished by using high-quality textbook materials developed by NCERT in conjunction with the SCERTs; additional textbook materials would be funded by public-private partnerships and crowd sourcing that incentivise experts to write such high-quality textbooks at-cost-price. States will prepare their own curricula (which may be based on the NCERT National Curriculum Framework to the extent possible) and prepare textbooks (which may be based on the NCERT textbook materials to the extent possible), incorporating State flavour and material as needed. The availability of such textbooks in all regional languages must be a top priority, so that all students have access to high-quality learning.

Transforming assessment for student development

The aim of assessment in the culture of our schooling system will shift from one that primarily tests rote memorisation skills to one that is more formative, is competency based, promotes learning and development for our students, and tests higher-order skills such as analysis, critical thinking, and conceptual clarity. The primary purpose of assessment will indeed be for learning - it will help the teacher and student - and the entire schooling system - continuously revise teaching learning processes in order to optimise learning and development for all students. This will be the underlying principle for assessment at all levels of education.

The current nature of secondary school exams, including Board exams and entrance exams - and the resulting coaching culture of today - are doing much harm, especially at the secondary school level, replacing valuable time for true learning with excessive exam coaching and preparation. These exams also force students to learn a very narrow band of material in a single stream, rather than allowing the flexibility and choice that will be so important in the individualized education system of the future. The existing system of entrance examinations shall be reformed to eliminate the need for undertaking coaching for ‘cracking’ the examination.

To reverse these harmful effects of the current assessment system, Board exams will encourage holistic development; students will be able to choose many of the subjects in which they take Board exams, depending on their individualised interests. Board exams will also be made ‘easier’, in the sense that they will test primarily core capacities rather than months of coaching and memorisation; any student who has been going to and making a basic effort in a school class will be able to pass the corresponding subject Board Exam without much additional effort. To eliminate the “high stakes” aspect of Board Exams, all students will be allowed to take Board Exams on up to two occasions during any given school year. In this regard, guidelines will be prepared by NCERT, and teachers prepared, for a transformation in the assessment system by 2022, to align with the NCF 2020. A regulatory body will be formed at the national level, under MoE, for all recognised school boards of India, for regulating assessment and evaluation norms and standards, and for ensuring that the assessment patterns of the different boards meet the skill requirements of the 21st century and are in consonance with the stated objectives of this policy.

The principles for university entrance exams will be similar; the National Testing Agency (NTA) will work to offer high-quality common modular entrance exams multiple times each year in various subjects, from logic, quantitative reasoning, and languages, to more specialized subject exams in the sciences, arts, and vocational subjects. The exams shall test the conceptual understanding and the abilities to apply knowledge, and shall eliminate the need for taking coaching for these exams. Students will be able to choose the range of subjects that they are interested in having tested, and each university will be able to see each student’s individual subject portfolio, and admit students into their programmes based on individual interests and talents. The NTA will serve as a premiere, expert, autonomous testing organisation to conduct entrance examinations for admissions and fellowships in higher educational institutions. The high quality, range, and flexibility of the NTA testing services will enable most universities to use these common entrance exams - rather than having 100’s of universities each devising their own exams - thereby drastically reducing the burden on students, universities and colleges, and the entire education system.

Support of students with singular interests and talents

Every student has innate talents, which must be discovered, nurtured, fostered, and developed. These talents may express themselves in the form of varying interests, dispositions, and capacities. Those students that show particularly strong interests and capacities in a given realm must be encouraged to pursue that realm beyond the general school curriculum. Teacher education will include methods for the recognition and fostering of such student talents and interests.

Topic-centered and Project-based Clubs and Circles will be highly encouraged and supported at the levels of schools, school complexes, districts, and beyond. Examples include Science Circles, Math Circles, Music Performance Circles, Chess Circles, Poetry Circles, Language Circles, Drama Circles, Debate Circles, and so on. Funds will be made available for transportation for teachers to take their students to these circles or clubs when these are not meeting at their own schools. Along these lines, high quality national residential summer programmes for secondary school students in various subjects will also be funded, with a rigorous merit-based admissions process to attract the very best students and teachers to these programmes.

Teachers will aim to encourage students with singular interests and/or talents in the classroom by giving them supplementary enrichment material and guidance and encouragement, and will help them to organise such Topic-centered Clubs and Circles through specific funding allocated for this purpose.

Olympiads and competitions in various subjects will be strengthened across the country, with clear coordination and progression from school to local to state to national levels, with necessary funding to ensure that all students may participate at all levels for which they qualify. Public and private universities, especially premier institutions like the IITs and NITs, would be encouraged to use results from Regional, National, and International Olympiads, as well as results from and work in regional and national topic-based programmes, as part of the criteria for admissions into their undergraduate programmes.

Once internet-connected smartphones or tablets are in the hands of all students, online apps with quizzes, competitions, assessments, enrichment materials, and online communities for shared interests will be developed, and will work to enhance all the aforementioned initiatives.