Prof Siddiqur Rahman, former director of the Institute of Education and Research (IER) at Dhaka University and member of the National Education Policy 2010 formulation committee, talks to The Daily Star's Naznin Tithi about the challenges we may face in implementing the new school curriculum, the outline of which was recently approved by the prime minister, and how we can solve them

Several major changes have been made in the new curriculum, such as scrapping exams for students up to Class 3 and cancelling any kind of public exams before Class 10. What do you think will be the main challenges in implementing these changes?

It is only natural that the curriculum would be changed and developed with the changing needs of time. The last time the curriculum was revised in Bangladesh was in 2012 and the government started implementing it in 2013. We have since continued with that curriculum, although some of its provisions were revised along the way. But let's not digress from our topic of discussion. Looking at the new curriculum, I think some of the major changes that have been introduced will be difficult to implement. The first important change is that there will be no summative evaluation, meaning that there will be no exams up to Class 3. It is, however, not the first time that this change has been brought to our primary education. Thirty years ago, under the government's second Primary Education Development Programme (PEDP), it was decided that there would be no exams in Classes 1 and 2—instead, there would be continuous evaluation. It is still in the curriculum officially, but not in reality. What the government is doing now is basically the same thing, but this time it has proposed to implement the system till Class 3. The challenge is that not enough research has been done to know why we could not implement it before, and what should have been done to ensure this.

Personally, I don't think there should be any exams till Class 3, and I am in favour of continuous assessment or evaluation. It is essential to improve the quality of education as well as to ensure education for all. What we need to remember is that we cannot get any benefit from continuous assessment, unless we introduce remedial assistance. Say, for example, there are 50 students in Class 1 in a school. Forty-five of them have fully understood the lesson given by a teacher, while the other five have not. Now, if the teacher goes on with her next lesson without making these five students understand the previous lesson, they will fall behind in the class. That's why we need remedial assistance, meaning that teachers must ensure that everyone in the class understands the lessons properly. Either the teacher will have to give them extra time after the class hour, or other students who have learnt the lesson well will help them understand it. Nowhere in the world is continuous assessment done without ensuring remedial assistance or teaching.

About the PECE and JSC exams, we were against them from the very beginning. Public exams at such a young age only create fear and stress for the students, which impedes their overall development. At this age, what they need is joyful learning. That is also the reason why we were advocating for cancelling the annual exams in Classes 1-3. In the past, there were no central exams in Classes 5 and 8; there were only scholarship exams, and not all students had to participate in those exams. So, we really appreciate the decision to do away with the PECE and JSC exams. However, cancelling these exams is not enough; continuous assessment and remedial assistance should also be introduced in all classes.

In the current curriculum, 80 marks are earmarked for half-yearly and annual exams and 20 marks are kept for continuous assessment in every subject. This is applicable from Classes 1 to 12. Sadly, the government has not been able to implement this to this day. So, it will definitely need immense preparation to do it now.

As per the new curriculum, students will choose the streams—science, humanities, and business studies—in Class 11. Do you think it would bring about any positive change? What about vocational and technical education?

When I sat for my matriculation exams in 1962, there was single-stream education till Class 10; we chose the streams in Class 11. But later that year, it was decided that students would choose the streams in Class 9. Now the government is thinking about doing it again. No doubt, we need to change and update our curriculum according to the needs of time. But there needs to be a logical explanation and research before bringing this change, which is absent here. Did we do any research on this in the last 60 years? No.

However, I personally believe that there should be single-stream education till Class 10, because we need to ensure a strong foundation of education for our students. Understandably, five or eight years are not enough for the students to have a strong foundation and choose the stream for themselves. Ten years seems to be a good amount of time for the students to understand which stream of education they would like to pursue. This time is needed for the development of values, knowledge, and aptitude in students.

Moreover, not all students need to pursue higher education. The rate at which we are producing university graduates from public and private institutions is mind-boggling. No government can create jobs for so many university graduates. Don't we need educated farmers, fishermen, bus drivers? We need educated people in every aspect of life. So, I think it should be the government's policy to provide single-stream education to all till Class 10. After completing their SSC exams, 50 percent of the students should be allowed to pursue higher education according to their values, interests, and aptitude. The remaining 50 percent should go for vocational and technical education. There should be enough vocational training schools for them. The training period would depend on their subject of education. While a six-month training may be enough for poultry farming, learning about fish farming may need a one-year course. After receiving their desired training, they should be given financial assistance/loans to kick-start their career—which they can pay back with their earnings. This is how we can have skilled manpower.

The new curriculum is supposed to prioritise experiment- and activity-based learning. How can we prepare our teachers to implement this in the classroom?

What we generally do here is start a new system without taking proper preparations. We introduced creative questions in school exams without even preparing the teachers in creative education methods—and also without making the curriculum creative. For answering creative questions, students need to be taught to think creatively in the class first. A decade has gone since this system was introduced, but still there are teachers who don't understand what creative teaching is. They are still following the old method. Why? Because they were not trained properly.

About experiment- and activity-based lessons, not all the lessons in a class can meet these criteria. There will be lessons that will be information-based. While you are teaching the students about the divisions and districts of the country, there is nothing to experiment with. However, there are many things that can be taught through class activities and experiments. Say, for example, a teacher is teaching their students about three types of soil: loamy, sandy, and clayey. What they can do is give the students the three types of soil and tell them about their characteristics. Observing the characteristics of the soil types in class, students will identify and learn about them. This is called activity- and experience-based teaching. For this, teachers need to be trained so that they become skilled in delivering this kind of lessons properly. There are many teachers who are already skilled, but there are also those who are resistant to upskilling. Also, the training that is provided to teachers is mostly theoretical, which should not be the case—teachers should also learn through activity and experiment.

Currently, 96 percent of our secondary schools are privately run, where the quality of teachers in general is not satisfactory. If we recruit inefficient and unskilled teachers, no matter how well we train them, they would be incapable of internalising that training and won't be able to teach creatively. I was a member of the National Curriculum Formulation Committee in 2010. At that time, we included a number of important provisions in the curriculum, most of which remain unimplemented. One of the most important suggestions we made at the time was to form an education service commission, just like the public service commission. The commission would consist of renowned educationists who would recruit skilled teachers through proper process, and after testing the candidates' professional aptitude. If that can be done, it will make a big difference in our primary and secondary education sectors.

Naznin Tithi is a member of the editorial team at The Daily Star.