Children’s Day: Fostering inquiry in children in the age of internet

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The rote representation  exemplary  often   leads to intelligence   exhaustion and boredom to the learner, and mostly   deals with memorisation of facts. Critical thinkers, innovators and inventors usually   look   from a strategy   that encourages inquiry, reflection   and occupation   solving.

The rote representation exemplary often leads to intelligence exhaustion and boredom to the learner, and mostly deals with memorisation of facts. Critical thinkers, innovators and inventors usually look from a strategy that encourages inquiry, reflection and occupation solving. | Photo Credit: Madhuvanti S. Krishnan

Every kid has tons of curiosity. Curiosity is the precursor to learning. While the nourishment for carnal maturation happens astatine home, the intelligence and affectional maturation happens successful school. In the aboriginal signifier of learning, the child’s curiosity is met successful the schoolhouse done enactment with peers and successful the classroom.

The aboriginal method

One of the galore forms of learning is rote learning, which is besides 1 of the earliest methods. This is based connected repetition. This has besides been the preferred method of learning successful astir civilisations since past times. Since this method involves repetition of facts, it helps accelerated recall. This besides works good to amended memory, attraction span and intelligence endurance, peculiarly successful younger learners.

In the Indian subcontinent, recitals of tables, hymns, and verses from accepted texts was a regular workout to Indian children. Traditional cognition was passed done generations by this method. 

This was further a request due to the fact that of the lack of learning material. A caller survey from the Universities of Harvard and Columbia by Dr. James Hertzel and others has shown that the intensive memorisation of Sanskrit texts enhances encephalon operation and cognitive function.

However, the rote representation exemplary often leads to intelligence exhaustion and boredom to the learner, and mostly deals with memorisation of facts. Critical thinkers, innovators and inventors usually look from a strategy that encourages inquiry, reflection and occupation solving. Over-reliance connected rote representation often hinders the improvement of originative capabilities. Models of inquiry-driven learning person besides been portion of past texts.

In a changed world

With the advent of the Internet, memoisable facts are disposable astatine a azygous click and are nary longer a precise invaluable skill. It is, therefore, important to realise that portion keeping a definite grade of rote representation is necessary, it is precise important to adhd a sizeable constituent of inquiry-based learning to process caller information. Learning, unlearning, and relearning are a need.

One of the methods of inquiry-based learning is experiential learning. This is highly personalised to conscionable the gait and benignant of learning of the idiosyncratic child. This is besides a child-centric exemplary for learning. Instead of a teacher talking astir the 3 laws Newton discovered, the kid successful this exemplary discovers the aforesaid 3 laws by the technological method of observation, hypothesising, exploration, information collection, organisation, and conclusions. This not lone enables a technological process of pursuing cognition but gives the joyousness of discovering what the large scientists erstwhile did. Knowing the process of subject is arsenic important, oregon adjacent much important, arsenic knowing the facts of science.

Some experiments done successful this absorption person led to improved attendance successful classrooms, joyful participation, and excitement and comfortableness successful learning.

“Experience is the lone root of knowledge, and everything other is specified information,” said Albert Einstein.

The champion acquisition to our children is to assistance their curiosity grow, fto them research for themselves, and bask learning.

(The writer is laminitis and main mentor, Prayoga Institute of Education Research

Published - November 14, 2025 08:09 americium IST

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