Who wants a million dollars? I see that hand... and that one... and the one in the back... whoa, steady on there champ! Unfortunately, I can't quite afford to be giving away a million dollars just yet. I was merely grabbing your attention! Now that I have it, please, take a seat and get comfortable. Take a load off, grab a drink (probably grab a drink and then take a load off - drink getting is difficult once you've already sat!), and sit back for bit of a read. Hopefully I can regale you (or at least keep your attention for a few minutes!) with a masterpiece of literature (or the rest of this post).
I was driving to work yesterday, and I got to pondering about my classroom. Nothing mind-blowingly amazing, just thinking about stuff in general. You ever have those times? When your mind just sort of races, and by the time you catch it, you are about twenty-seven thoughts, and five intersections, from where you began and you can't for the life of you figure out how you made it from Point A to Point B. Yeah, I get that a bit. Just start thinking and... whoosh! Time goes on a hiatus and I'm transported to the next point in my thoughts (and journey) instantly.
Anyway, I digress...
As I was saying, I was driving to work yesterday, and I got to pondering about my classroom. Nothing mind-blowingly amazing, just thinking about stuff in general, when I got to thinking about how I needed a haircut (like I said, start with one thought, end with another!), but that I didn't really want to get one. I mean, c'mon. Haircuts cost heaps, take time out of your day, and are a general pain in the arse, because everyone wants to spend the next three days talking about your 'fresh cuts' like you're the first person to ever venture into a hairdresser's.
The very next thought after that, got me thinking about the topic of this post. I'm not sure if you noticed, but in the previous paragraph, I said, '... I needed a haircut, but that I didn't really want to get one.' If you missed that little bit of subliminal mastery, you might have noticed the big banner at the top of this post shouting to all and sundry: 'Wants vs Needs'. Yes, now that I've wasted 3 minutes of your life, leading you to this point, I would ask for a bit more of your time, taking you a little further into the recesses of my mind as we take a quick look at needs and wants.
What About Needs and Wants?
As I thought about needs and wants on that drive to work, I quickly moved from thinking about the need vs want of a haircut, to the needs and wants in society, before further narrowing that down to needs and wants as associated with our education systems (I'm taking a bit of liberty in using the word 'our' here, because I don't know exactly how the education system in your country works, but I can probably take a 'stab in the dark'). The education system as it's currently situated in Australia is quite outdated and is slowly trying to pull itself out of the 'dark ages' to embrace the needs of our technologically advanced students. Now don't get me wrong - it's not that we don't have computers in Australian schools - far from it - it's just that the model of schooling is fairly outdated - it hasn't really changed much since the 1960's - maybe longer. And to this outdated model, our students we send.
In the business sense, needs and wants can be defined as per the goods and services available to satisfy them.
Whilst food, clothing and shelter are traditionally referred to as basic needs required for survival, access to health and education services are considered essential wants in most societies today1.
You see, needs are the basic necessities of life. Think, 'what do I really need to survive?' type stuff, whereas wants are more goods and services that you can survive without, but would be nice to have. We can even further classify wants to include essential and non-essential wants.
The lines of these categories have slowly become increasingly blurred as society advances and changes. What was once a non-essential want, may now be deemed an essential want in today's modern era. Generally, essential wants can be satisfied by items such as washing machines, refrigerators, computers and cars, while non-essential wants are much higher priced items, including overseas holidays, name-brand clothing and gym memberships to name a few2.
So how does this fit in with schooling? Well, I'm not sure it does, in as much as, I'm not sure many people would agree, but remember, this post is the result of a thought that germinated a few days ago. So let's unpack this a bit more.
You see, education is seen as a want, meaning it's nice to have one, and I think we could all agree that this is indeed the case. Being educated is great! For the most part, it opens doors, and generally speaking, gives you a leg up in life (I know, I know, there are plenty of successful people who have never really been formally educated). In Australia, and I'd hazard a guess, most first world countries, education, despite being a want, is available to every child. There aren't many children living in the first world who don't have the opportunity to attend school. Compare this to third world countries, where education is often a want that remains unmet and if it is, often in quite squalid conditions, where learning is not actually easy at all.
I remember while completing my education degree, one of the lecturers commented on the fact that in a classroom, students have the right to learn, and teachers have the right to teach. In many countries, this is not the case because children are so busy, striving to fulfil their basic needs, that they don't have the time to even contemplate their wants. And yet, walk into any given classroom on any given day in a first world country and you are likely to find a student who doesn't want to be there, doesn't think they need an education, or simply doesn't care. All little Johnny can hear is Fortnite calling his name from the PS4.
There's this basic premise in life, where we want what we don't have. The catch-cry of children when asked which one they want is: 'I want the one he's got!', and this is the same with education. You see, driving in my car during my 'though-attack', I got to thinking that the problem is, many governments of first world countries have deemed that students need an education. They force them into often outdated institutions and make them sit through very industrial-era type lessons. Many of these governments have even passed legislation that forces students under a certain age to remain in school unless they meet certain, quite stringent, criteria. In South Australia, education is compulsory. You must be enrolled in and attending school from when you turn 6 until you turn 163, and even then, in order to legally leave, you must be enrolled in another approved learning plan until you turn 17.
Remember 7 minutes ago, when I was so clever and opened this post with that creative hook? You may not, so to save you from scrolling back to the top, here it is again: 'Who wants a million dollars?'. Remember now? Yep, good! I asked who wants a million dollars, because to want something tends to drive one further. Those children growing up in third world nations who cannot get an education really want one. So when they get the opportunity to attend school, they do so with gusto. When they get the opportunity to learn, they listen with baited breath, sucking in every morsel of information.
Huh?
If you're now at the point of scratching your head and grunting out a confused, 'Huh?', then don't panic. My idea, the one which actually took much longer to develop here than I thought, is quite simple.
In a nutshell...
I think that everybody wants an education.
Everybody.
However, in some first world countries, education has been turned into a need. The governments of these countries has determined that students need to be educated, therefore have deemed it necessary to create laws to ensure this happens. So now, what we see is students not wanting education because it is forced upon them. It's kind of oxymoronic in a way, but I think it could be a plausible idea. Like most things - necessity is making school undesirable for a number of the students in our classrooms.
Compare this to images and film footage you see of students in third world countries, where they are so overjoyed at being given the opportunity to learn. I've seen images of students clutching a small blackboard and a piece of chalk like it was worth that million dollars I mentioned earlier. Their little faces so full of happiness that they can actually write on something. Oh, if only our students carried this same demeanour into our classes each and every lesson.
Wrap Up
As I close, I need to qualify and acknowledge that I've been quite general, even stereotypical, in comparing first to third world countries in regard to education, and how students react to being educated in these different environments. I am fully aware that many students in first world countries are also disadvantaged, and struggle to find good education, and vice versa, so please don't feel I'm being ignorant, or uninformed.
I would like to thank you for reading, and as usual, encourage you to comment with any thoughts, suggestions, questions, or simply, whatever, and I'll get back to you as soon as possible.
Remember, this is just an idea. I'm likely way off the mark, and there are also many other reasons as to why we might find some students not craving education as much as others, but I think the underpinning take-away I would like you to get from this is, that I want our young people to love being educated again. I love teaching them. It'd be great to see enthusiasm return to their faces as they begin to reignite that unbridled thirst for learning.
References
- Fusco, A., Business and Enterprise Core Workbook, Adelaide Tuition Centre, Bowden, 2016.
- Fusco, A., Business and Enterprise Core Workbook.
- SA.GOV.AU
- All images from Unsplash.
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