If you dive deeper in the meaning of the word, ‘student’ means in Latin – ‘eager to know’. But today, student has lost all of his eagerness to know. It may well be a matter of thinking and a subject of a wide & profound research why our student has lost this interest. Whether the student has been active or even passive in this losing. I present here some of the reasons that may be blamed for the alarming situation:
- We are going to be more and more syllabus-oriented.
- Again our syllabus is going to be more and more burdensome, sounding repulsive rather than attractive.
- We are unfortunately taken the passing in a competitive exam to be a sure token of being a genius.
- Our present society tends to be focused on securing a government job, no matter even through shallow knowledge.
- We have altogether lost all the means of checking the innate qualities of our young ones.
- The study is becoming more and more boring.
Now what we can do? Let’s look deep in the problem and try to find out some of the solutions.
Knowledge should be the goal:
Knowledge should remain our goal in our study. If we have acquired the knowledge, the rest of things will be set by themselves. Read to learn. Read to gain more and more knowledge. After a while, you will find yourself hungry for knowledge and the very question of increasing the interest will fall.
Lessen the burden of the long syllabus:
A pile of books and a long syllabus always proves to be distracting and it lessens your interest. Before it lessons your interest in the study, you be the first to lessen it. Choose your books carefully. Go through the syllabus thoroughly. Divide the syllabus in small parts, on the grand level, on monthly basis, then weekly and finally daily. This will greatly help you in settling the target. The study will become easy and the easiness will produce the interest.
Relaxing the mind:
Abraham Lincoln is said to comment, “If you give me 6 hours to cut a tree, I will spend the first 5 hours to sharpen my axe.” It is necessary to prepare the mind to learn. Only then the learning can be made enjoyable, sustainable and natural. A little meditation, music, especially instrumental music, and sitting for a while motionlessly can help a lot. Once the mind is calm, ready to learn, then direct it to your study; the results are sure to be amazing.
Set the best time for your study:
You should fix a time for study, when you usually find calm and undisturbed by visitors, friends, mobile calls etc. When you find yourself motivated and creative. Learning is also a great creativity.
You can better divide your study time in sessions:
- 1st session – in morning
- 2nd session – in afternoon
- 3rd session – in night
And again, you can divide the syllabus according to these sessions, as it suits you the best.
Knowledge itself will ensure a career:
Today’s student remains under a constant pressure of ensuring a career. To him, the career has become primary, the knowledge secondary. And all this has made the study very poisonous. He learns to gain something. Here Bhagavad-Gita has something to say:
“Focus on your work only, the work itself will reach its aims. Enjoy the journey.”
The learning and the life are constant processes. We are to go on. The real bliss lies in keeping going on, and not in reaching somewhere.
Extra Books:
Today the society, the parents and even the school system has taken the marks, degrees and the career as the sole purpose of the study. The syllabus you go through serves only as a guide, as a path-finder, the rest of the work is to be done with the extra books. You are to understand one more thing that everybody around you is going through the syllabus, if you are to prove yourself superior, it will be done only by the extra knowledge. Extra books will give you an insight into study area, and then you will start enjoying the study really. I bet!
Role of learning an Art:
Life and learning are also arts. Learning an art gives charm and beauty to the life. Here it must be noted that everyone cannot be a master of that particular art, but still practicing an art increases the aesthetic values. We start to consider the world as a great piece of art. The creation is after all a master-piece of the greatest Artist. You can pick up painting, drawing, playing a musical instrument or singing according to your taste. And if you don’t find yourself at home, with neither of the art, then who is there to stop you to be an admirer, a fond follower, an lover of the art. Then enjoy the watching the paintings, and listening the music. It will make you a passive artist. Not less fruitful either!
Read while in leisure:
We are in a habit. We actually don’t study. We have to study. Exams have knocked the door. No way out now! No escape! Now we HAVE TO STUDY. But if you look to the advanced countries, they have only a little difference, as far as the study-habit is concerned. They study in their leisure time. When the mind is in a free mood. The mind is ready to grasp. But we waste our most valuable free and fertile time on the social media. No hope with the present scenario!
If you cannot enjoy the learning, you cannot go far. Enjoy is must. Be serious about the joy-element in the study. A student’s life comprises mainly of the study. If he takes the study as a burden and pain, all his life becomes lifeless. The results are horrible at all the planes.
Teachers, parents and the elders in the society must decide what they want from their students. What they want them to become. The terrible thing is that burdensome and so-called success-oriented education has turned our young ones into machines. What a society they would form in future.
The hour is ripe when a rebellion is necessary, a revolution in the education, especially in determining the aims of the education.
Why should we study?
We should study to learn. We should study to become perfect and help the world fill up its gaps, its incompleteness. learning should be such as to pave a path and enlighten that path through the darkness. Learning should fill us with a zeal, with an enthusiasm, with life itself.
Kasa kara joyan