LSRW: Where And How Rote Learning Starts In Indian Educational System

LSRW is considered a natural way of acquiring a language. A child is expected to go through the four stages of LSRW in sequential order. A child would first listen to the mother tongue spoken around her/him. At the second stage, the child learns to speak – makes sounds, moves on to alphabets, small words and gradually, the sentences. The third stage would be reading – picture books and tactile material, establishing a relationship with letters and words. The last stage would be writing.

The above is how LSRW (Listen Speak Read Write) is expected to function for a child when s/he acquires a new language. However, the Indian educational system has turned this principle upside down and come up with an opposite version for the language learning of Indian students.

Writing as a rote skill

Have you ever considered what is taught to children in the play-school/school? Invariably, in the majority of the schools, writing will be an integral part of whatever the child is exposed to. And that too, it will be in English.

Have you ever wondered why the reading does not precede writing in Indian schools? I guess that reading cannot be dictated, reading cannot be forced, reading cannot be made to order. After all, reading is an age-appropriate skill. The child will learn to read, only when s/he is ready to read. However, writing is a flexible skill and amenable to manipulation.

The schools make the child write alphabets, words and short sentences, even though the child in the natural course of things has not encountered them. Ideally, the child should be able to read and comprehend what s/he is writing, but here the child is made to write irrespectively.

In short, Indian schools force-teach writing, preceding reading and in many instances, even before the speaking and listening happen. After all, the probability of English as a mother tongue for us, Indians, is fairly remote.

LSRW rot starts with NCERT

I was wondering how schools could turn the LSRW on its head and get away with it. Unsurprisingly, they have been given a go-ahead by NCERT, itself. The below two quotes are from NCERT website.

“For a very long time now, we have been talking in terms of LSRW skills as the objectives of languages teaching. This exclusive focus on discrete skills has had fairly adverse consequences.”

NCERT does not bother to list even one of what these adverse consequences are.

“We now plead for a more holistic perspective on language proficiency. After all, when we are Speaking, we are also simultaneously Listening and when we are Writing, we are also Reading in a variety of ways.”

Yes, NCERT is right. When we speak, we also listen, for listening precedes speaking. When we write, we also read, for reading precedes writing. NCERT uses the correct order of LSRW and then reverses the interpretation when it comes to actual implementation. NCERT maintains stoic silence on the holistic perspective on language proficiency and does not go beyond bashing up LSRW.

Thus, NCERT gives its blessing to schools to take up Writing as the first step in language teaching. In the process, NCERT does not cite any study/argument/logic to arrive at its convoluted inference.

The above two points are at actuals. You can see them in execution in schools and read in NCERT’s website, in letter and spirit. The third point is my interpretation of the first two points.

Schools and parents lap up writing

Formal environment for kids in India is big business. They charge a bomb. So, they have to also deliver, something. Unfortunately for them, reading as a skill cannot be delivered. Speaking as a skill takes time. In a short period, what is possible is writing. So, the child writes.

Education and learning are tangible, as well as intangible. We, Indian parents, understand and believe what we see a child doing. We do not tend to bother much about what is indeterminate. A child writing is a perceptible occurrence and it makes us happy that our child is learning. So, the child writes.

Summing Up

The educationists, the parents, everyone bemoans that the Indian educational system promotes rote learning. The basis of my interpretation of LSRW, I believe that rote learning starts early, very early in the Indian educational system.

It starts with the un-natural preference for writing, a skill that should come last in the natural order of skills to be learnt for a child to acquire a language and we teach it first before any other language skill is picked up by the child. I did not find a single article on this on the internet, neither for nor against. Seemingly, it is not a topic of discussion.

We are trying to follow LSRW with our twin daughters. Let us see how it unfolds.

What are your views on LSRW and the Indian educational system?

PS: I am a stay-at-home father to six-year-old twin daughters, neither an educationist nor an expert. The above thoughts are an expression of parenting is having an opinion, getting involved and trying to better.

Stand UP, Speak OUT!!! #IAmAParent.

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