@ the II edition of Eduexcellence Conference!

And this session on

EDUCATIONAL IMPERATIVES FOR CLASSES IX - XII

Welcome to IIT Madras

STAGES GOAL(s)Pre-primary Emotional securityPrimary (I-V) Language, Co-scholasticMiddle (VI-VIII) Logic, Co-ScholasticSecondary (IX-X) Board exams, careerSenior Secondary (XI-XII) Career, board exams

Setting the stage … one view

Our proposition –Career preparation is the key!

And the Board exams are part of the overall career preparation (the need for better percentages!)

Thus, IX – XII = Career preparation + ‘Marks focus*’* NO CONDITIONS APPLY – ‘funda’ is not important

Imperatives for Classes IX - XII

School–friendly – ‘All guns blazing – career, marks’Parent-friendly – Career prep primarily @ schoolStudent-friendly – De-stressing Yet ChallengingTeacher-friendly – Marks oriented ‘PM-friendly’ – Skills and job oriented

Only tuition/coaching unfriendly – New-age

careers, and Careers > (IIT-JEE/AIMPT –> IT jobs –

> Happy life!)

Career + ‘Marks focus’ … a win-win

Choice of careers has become really complex – Parents don’t understand (children or career) Counsellors are gapped out about careers Too many choices, Global dynamics …Thus, IX – X – explore and incubate career choicesXI – XII – start to firm-up choices and exam prepThis design could be fun, yet demanding enough in terms of ‘free’ exploration of choices!

De-stressing and Challenging – a contradiction?

Each higher class is NOT about more information but more and better understanding! If ever higher classes = more information, it is totally useless in the ‘Google age’!

By VIII must have secured the foundations for better understanding in higher classes - Every child a LEARNER!

Teacher quality problem also vanishes for higher classes!

‘Funda’ incidental in IX - XII?

My ‘conversation’ will explore three dimensions –

• The new and emerging career scenario

• Resolving the marks-funda-career conundrum

• The reality check – The ‘most likely’ foundation at the end of Class VIII

Agenda for school leaders for IX - XII

A representative future of career

In March, Premji Invest, of Azim Premji fame, led an $80-million funding in US-based mobile startup Cyanogen.

The founder claims his objective is to create a Google-less Android and "put a bullet through Google's head."

And the Cyanogen magic …

Yuphoria has broken the flagship myth and it is the first smartphone that has been designed and assembled in India.

Rahul Yadav, CEO, Housing.com

"I'm just 26 and it's too early in life to get serious about money etc"

“Even 500 big global reality websites are not really solving the housing market need … we’ll aggregate them all and solve ALL housing issues”.

Yesterday … Economic Times

Ambitions are soaring boundlessly!

History is repeating itself with a vengeance – gold rush, ‘land grab’, ‘trade routes dominance’, colonisation of the world etc. are being re-enacted in the virtual world!

Social-economic entitlements are up for grab all anew, is your child getting ready for joining the race!

Fact bear out the great opportunity …

Internet has not reversed the incremental nature of innovations witnessed in the past century.

Innovations are incremental – around known product or people – and within reach of many more people.

The content of my conversation …

We educators have to help our children be on the right side of digital revolution – the ‘wealth digger’ rather than the ‘income digger’.

High incomes very rarely guarantee wealth creation to move up social layers!

Increasingly, income a function of (intellectual) wealth!

Current best showcase of intellectual wealth - Google’s car

IT IS A TRUE AUTO! 11 minor accidents in 5 years! 7 due to others!

IMPACT -Is Google in race to be the biggest car maker?

Is Google redefining car, car industry, ownership?

And who’s an automobile engineer?

Designer IT engineer Electronics engineer Mechanical/

automobile engineer ‘Artificial Intelligence

expert’ GPS expert

End of dreams for many!

A CLIP ON GOOGLE CARS AND MORE

vids\Humans Need Not Apply_8.50.mp4

8.50 MINUTES

Indeed, the Pulitzer prize is threatened!

Computer-written fiction expected to win the literary prize within a decade!

This is a very important development – it changes the ‘efficiency’ benefits of technology!

The winning edge - pace of change

IOS – 7 major versions2007 – 1.0 ; 2015 – 8.1

Android – 11 major ver.

2008 – 1.0 ; 2015 – 12.0

Is your child really getting major upgrade when he/she moves from a class to next!

The crux - Hardware Vs. Software

Hardware changes – a couple once a decades

All phones mostly alike! New Phones a few years!

Software – new versions a few times a year!

Chrome – 42nd edition – 7 year

Mozilla – 38th edition – 13 years

Explorer – 11th edition – 20 years

Of course, the most unbelievable is the

amazing FEMINISATION OF SOCIETY – the

better-half of humanity has not celebrated

100 years of franchise!

Hard is getting replaced by the soft! ... ‘brain is over the brawn’. The war is over the power of the soft!

The unbelievable rise of the ‘Soft’

New ‘soft diseases’ in developed world

Robophobia – an anxiety disorder where the sufferer has an irrational fear of AI, robots, drones

And don’t fall for ‘Luddites fallacy’ – fear of machines … burn factories! It failed.

Humans are themselves getting reduced to software!More importantly, by implication, the ‘human software’ must continuously keep upgrading itself.

That is, be a learner! Anyway you look at it, being a LEARNER is the key!

The key issue is - What can educators do to make their students become great learners!

What does it all mean?

The verdict is out …

“The development of full artificial

intelligence could spell the end of human race.”

THE GROWING POWER OF THE SOFT IS REAL!

The verdict 2

Bill Gates …

“I don’t understand why some people

are not concerned.”

ABOUT THE RISE OF THE POWER OF THE

SOFT !

DeepFace, a Facebook tool we all use now can recognise individual human faces correctly in 97% instances! … T-Shirt image to person! Recognise voices by name in a crowd/protest!

‘Centuars’ – the best chess team – made of humans and computers! Doctors/Lawyer/Artists + AI …

Soft (artificial mind) is already here

I. Incubating innovations @ school – Human + AIFirst-hand experience with future of careers in the digital age – as engineers, doctors, artists etc.

II. Understanding Artificial Intelligence (AI) –What may be called ‘Soft(ware) Robotics’ (Instead of the current mechanical robotics labs)

Two imperatives are very clear

‘Word problem’ pose a serious issue in Math –Language constructs are weak!

Yet, mathematical problem in physics and chemistry (none till IX) pose serious problem –Mathematical language also weak!

The omnipresent symbol of crisis

There are just two things to be addressed:

• Academic level in the language of academics

(Level 1 – basic, Level 2 – Communicative, Level 3 – Literary, Level 4 – Academic)

• Being sound in all the concepts up to the current class in Math

What it takes to be a learner?

LOGIC, REASONING, ANALYSIS

MATH = LOGIC (75%) + ARITHMETIC (25%)In ALL schools it is just ‘arithmetic’ and in IWS we are conscious of the uniqueness of focus needed on logic building in math becauseSCIENCE = LOGIC (40%) + FACTS (60%)

The purpose of math education

• A lot of language in math. Logic needs language! Thinking is best in a language rather than images!

• Addressing the rigid hierarchy in math e.g. nearly a dozen things to know to know square.Concept-based education should be central strategy!

Our approach to math

Math is a unique 'subject', being 'just ok' in math is easily acceptable in all almost societies across the world; being weak or mediocre in math is no stigma or a cause of worry. However, math is not a 'tough' subject.

Math is an abstract subject like language and can only be learnt through discourse! For example,Tribal societies …Crow … 2 apples + 2 Oranges = ? …

Math is abstract and ‘not real’

100 pages / 5 hours – by class V – any text200 pages / 5 hours – by class VIII – any text

The happy news about reading -Reading is a skill, IRRESPECTIVE OF LANGUAGE!ANDReading is like running, you must run to run! A SKILL IS ACQUIRED THROUGH DRILL!

What is good reading skill?

Mother tongue Another tongueLISTEN READSPEAK WRITEREAD SPEAKWRITE LISTEN

DON’T ASK SCHOOL TO ‘MAKE CHILDREN SPEAK’ GOOD ENGLISH IF THEY DON’T READ ENGOUH.

Stages in learning a language

Majority of class VIII has serious reading problems

Cannot ‘Read Math’, Math is all about worksheets

Have no logical understanding of number system, division, fraction, ‘unitary concept’, area …

Evidence – ‘Reading math by VIII

Create new academic context for class IX and X to become self-learners i.e. skilled readers and conceptually sound on all concepts taught (concept-based teaching, assessment, remedial, revision, reporting …) and secure good marks ….

Expose them all to realising innovations using software in their interest areas or family business!

To sum …