‘Education must be of a new type for the sake of the creation of the new world… The brain must be educated through the hand… Craft, art, health and education should all be integrated into one scheme. Nayi Talim is a beautiful blend of all the four, and covers the whole education of the individual from the time of conception to the moment of death... Instead of regarding craft and industry as different from education, I will regard the former as the medium for the latter… If I were a poet, I would write poetry of the five fingers… Why should you think that the mind is everything and the hands and the feet nothing?’

– Mahatma Gandhi

South Asia’s demography in the 21st century makes it a subcontinent of the young, although only a few of them have the privilege of formal schooling. At the cusp of a transition in a region riddled with conflicts related to geo-political, environmental, gender and identity based issues, the youth remain unsure of their future. Tentative about discovering their role as responsible citizens, most are indifferent about the ethos nurturing the struggle of earlier generations to define the building blocks of an inclusive society. The path ahead for those studying offers no challenging perspective as ‘change agents’. While much is being touted about a demographic dividend of the region, there is a hiatus between what the young learn at school and what life has in store for them.

Detachment from contexts at all levels of pedagogy contrasts the nostalgia of ‘older times’ with concurrent media propaganda. This adds to the situation, introducing elements of cognitive incongruities. Key notions like ‘considered resolution’ and ‘confidence building measures’ require an academic expression.

Although the education system is now undoubtedly increasing in its outreach, the race for quantity against quality is becoming compulsive, geared to achieving more competitive deliverables in a corporatized world. Notwithstanding the dismantling of barriers between individual areas of study to enable entry into multiple spheres, academic curriculae allowing for a practical interface between disciplines remain elusive. The formats appear homogenizing, potentially threatening the future of work for millions not able to make the ‘cut’. Certified and merited outcomes recognized across known areas of study are clearly not functional.

 

More crucially, serious note must be taken of an unsubscribed shrinking of the creative space with a devaluation of the world of traditional systems of transmission. Their inherent capacity to stimulate the senses and create emotional linkages is on the brink of erosion. Although there has been an explosion of information emphasizing primer aptitudes, a formal direction giving impetus to holistic learning experience remains undelivered. Much has been deliberated over time by educationists on the importance of the three R’s and conventional teaching methods. However, the capacity to absorb the value of life skills and imbibe wisdom of virtuous action continues to remain unknown and its cultural context unrecognized.

The World Health Organization (WHO) has defined life skills as ‘abilities for adaptive and positive behaviour that enable individuals to deal effectively with the demands and challenges of everyday life.’ They represent the psycho-social and creative skills that determine valued behaviour and effective abilities, reflecting skills such as problem solving and critical thinking, and personal and interpersonal skills such as self-awareness and communication.

Since the turn of the millennium, a sentiment favouring life skills has been gathering acceptance among policy makers with the hope to reap the advantages of an eager young populace. With the target of skilling 500 million youth by 2022, the UPA government established the National Skill Development Corporation in 2008. The current NDA government has mooted an equally ambitious ‘Skill India’ scheme.

In India, the National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT) in its National Curriculum Framework, 2005, introduced skills with the aim of ‘empowering the young people to respond to real life situations in positive and responsible ways.’ Since 2004, the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) has repeatedly attempted to introduce value based education in several classes and school programmes furthering the formalization of this trend. Continuous and Comprehensive Evaluation (CCE) based evaluation pattern for life skills was also introduced for children in the senior classes with varying results. CBSE’s circulars no. 80/11, 50/10, 23/2014 etc. promoting heritage programmes in schools and proposals to conserve material heritage, classical performing arts etc. have been repeatedly sent with a list of ideas and guidelines including the role of holistic education, ostensibly cultural-centric and open to interpretation and dialogue with live interface.

 

Notwithstanding the resolve, the real challenge is to bridge the gap between intentions and implementation. In the CBSE circular no. 57 dated 01/09/2010, the use of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) in classroom teaching has been emphasized. The tools, content and methodology to implement them remain disparate and mostly out of reach.

A functional curriculae of high quality driven by South Asia’s unique cultural context is difficult to come by as few experts are available to prepare detailed teaching modules. On the other hand, the mapping of latent talent of ‘unlettered’ trustees of traditional knowledge systems as teachers in a fragile ecology of education has not been explored scientifically. These invaluable repositories include the ustaads and gurus of oral histories and traditions such as craftspeople, weavers, artists, healers, performers and storytellers. Their varied skills require to be deconstructed for discource in educational fora so that unrecognized potential is integrated with time honoured lateral thinking and age appropriate range of topics. These need to encompass everyday values, real life situations, self-development, moral science education, social skills, adolescent pedagogy, citizenship, diversity, national integration among others.

 

A formulated practice of life skills juxtaposed with the cultural context will lead to qualities such as self-esteem, sociability and tolerance, thereby augmenting competencies to take considered action generating change. The freedom to decide what and when to do and who to be, requires physical or perceptual motor skills that are contextual and practical, opening a world of choices in emerging livelihoods.

With ‘content-industry’ as the cornerstone of the modern-day knowledge economy across the globe, South Asia is indeed in a position of vantage with its varied legacy of skills in the creative and cultural industries sector. These skills, reconfigured with appropriate educational innovation in application of traditional and evolving knowledge systems and an astute understanding of what the world needs, can generate national value and millions of livelihoods in the non-farm sector. This calls for an intricate integration of pedagogy and life skills to promote the regions rich cultural heritage through a renewed infrastructure of school programming while configuring a live media of instruction as a positive influence of the past on our future.

Over the years both cinema earlier and now the world wide web has had a great influence in our society, its traditions, cultures, clothing, language, etc. Interactive multimedia greatly impacts audio-visual storytelling, emotions and entertainment. The moving image provides an effective, holistic medium engaging the child, the parent and the teacher together in both rural and urban South Asia.

However, audio-visual based programmes ought not be reduced to the mere formation of culture clubs or film forums for entertainment and awareness alone. They need to go deeper to provoke critical understanding while initiating peer group/community action. Media exposure to digital platforms should be followed up with live discussions, activities, lesson plans and out-reach projects with direct relevance to the feasibility of work options in the future. While adhering to common guidelines for learning programme evaluated for their formative and summative impact on students, successful case studies from around the world need to be collated and shared.

In the above context, the announcement of 2010-2020 as the decade of innovation by the Government of India has great potential for innovation in appropriate education for both rural and urban milieu. Attaining any wealth in human resource requires developing competencies among the young while ushering the national objectives of original and novel thinking. Reasoning and critical aptitude developed at school level are prerequisites for innovation.

Imaginative programmes in arts and crafts, heritage and resource management, entrepreneurial skills rooted in traditional know-how, coupled with vocational education related to making, doing and being, need to be devised as complementary to life skills and vice-versa.