Before We Teach Even ABC

It sometimes occurs to me (and I might be wrong) that even before we decide to teach ABC to a child we should be very clear about what we ultimately want from her / him along all the various stages of her / his education. Where do we, as a people, want to reach and how, ultimately? Sounds very idealistic!? It is, however, unavoidable if we aim at optimum utilization of our resources and getting the desired results. For smaller things in life – and at our personal levels – we ask very pertinent questions and we reason things out. And deservedly so. In the public domain we do not raise much of such queries.

All our efforts at educating our community in myriad ways are commendable beyond description. However, what we finally want to get out of this whole exercise is a question worth considering, I assume. Obviously, we want to reach somewhere. That ‘somewhere’ needs to be clearly defined at the very outset.

We all see what is happening. Let us also try to see what more could have happened – with a little bit more direction and focus. Sir Syed saw what was not happening more than he saw what was happening. It is not that there was no education system during his time. Obviously, there was. But he thought differently and he felt that something was seriously missing. To me Sir Syed Ahmad Khan is more of an example of a different ‘thinking’ than different ‘doing’. It is all about ideas, first and foremost. Ideas release the energy and then we see the actions as a by-product.