Everyone expects it to be tough. But no one expects to break down in the middle of it. Well, it happens and so, I'm here to put forward a student's opinion as to why "Studying is not easy"... Especially, when that's your prime objective, like in the 10th and 12th classes.
Problems at Home
Okay, I know this is something all of us give as a reason. But believe me, this is such a wide topic that I've divided it into several categories:
Comparison:
Imagine a person who looks at you and rebukes you for not being as good as your rival. Even worse, imagine someone asking you to compete ferociously with a friend, while you yourself are fighting all surges of jealousy. And the worst case - Imagine that "someone" to be a person whose words mean more to you than you yourself would like to believe. You'll have a very good idea as to what a normal 12th standard student is forced to undergo.
Domestic troubles:
Studying is not equivalent to many types of work... No matter how horribly your parents fight at home because of you, no matter how many times your superiors constantly remind you about your own worthlessness, no matter how much emotional strain you are under, you will always be able to exert your physical powers. But studying will be like an insult to your feelings. Not studying and writing stupid stuff during exams will be an insult to your intellect. In the end, the student ends up losing his/her sense of self. And when that happens, studying will be the last thing on the planet that a student really wants to do.
Discouragement:
Many students have a problem - right when they want to begin their homework or exam preparation, their parents with all sincerity order them to start studying, and sometimes accompany it with a rebuke about their laziness. For some reason, this makes the student lose all interest in studying anything and their mood changes. Some brave teenagers, hoping their parents would understand try to explain this weird phenomenon. But their parents get hurt... "He says he didn't learn just because I told him to!" Then they begin to snidely mention it at every opportunity and also take it to mean the student's arrogance and heedlessness. But what the student really feels is individuality. The student wants to learn because he wants to learn... Not because he is ordered to do so. The minute a mom or dad tries to remind him of his job, he becomes demotivated and any passion he had for academics simply evaporates.
There's also the other common form of discouragement - "Yeah, as if you're going to study", "You're useless", "You're going to flunk the test", etc. It gets nastier and nastier, that's why I decided to leave it to your own memories/imagination.
Distractions:
I mention this at last because, this is by far the least destructive in my opinion. Many parents start having paranoia about the child spending time watching TV or on the computer or chatting over phone and such kind. They fail to realize... the student's problem is not in the distractions. It is in himself - the fact that he's not committed enough to restrain himself from temptations is important. But then, I just don't know how to say this without raising skepticism... but distractions don't matter. I used to watch Hollywood movies till 2.00 AM and didn't even have a geography or maths note in 10th standard. But I got more marks than all the students in whose homes the TV lines and LAN lines had been cut. I got more marks than everyone in the district, so it's fairly a good argument.
Expectations:
Well, this heading cropped up in my brain right after I wrote that line above. Expecting a person who's getting 90% to get 95% is fair. Expecting a person who's averaging just 85%, to get state rank in the board exams... is not. Nor is expecting a barely average student to get into renowned colleges through merit. It is possible, yes... But the demands and expectations are mostly detrimental to growth. For some reason, no matter what mark a student gets on an average, all his relatives, close family members expect him to do so well as to bag the district first rank at least. They say it for a joke, I suppose... or maybe to motivate. But quite frankly, in most cases it doesn't work. Over expectations just makes the student want to shut himself in a crappy cupboard and never come out again. They forget what they're studying for and focus their energies in fighting their fear of not living up to the expectations.
I have so far talked from the point of view of a student, regarding problems at home. It is quite true that a student with true strength and all that will hardly have these issues. But the problem is, where does that strength come from?
Okay, I know this is something all of us give as a reason. But believe me, this is such a wide topic that I've divided it into several categories:
Comparison:
Imagine a person who looks at you and rebukes you for not being as good as your rival. Even worse, imagine someone asking you to compete ferociously with a friend, while you yourself are fighting all surges of jealousy. And the worst case - Imagine that "someone" to be a person whose words mean more to you than you yourself would like to believe. You'll have a very good idea as to what a normal 12th standard student is forced to undergo.
Domestic troubles:
 |
| The Result |
Discouragement:
Many students have a problem - right when they want to begin their homework or exam preparation, their parents with all sincerity order them to start studying, and sometimes accompany it with a rebuke about their laziness. For some reason, this makes the student lose all interest in studying anything and their mood changes. Some brave teenagers, hoping their parents would understand try to explain this weird phenomenon. But their parents get hurt... "He says he didn't learn just because I told him to!" Then they begin to snidely mention it at every opportunity and also take it to mean the student's arrogance and heedlessness. But what the student really feels is individuality. The student wants to learn because he wants to learn... Not because he is ordered to do so. The minute a mom or dad tries to remind him of his job, he becomes demotivated and any passion he had for academics simply evaporates.
There's also the other common form of discouragement - "Yeah, as if you're going to study", "You're useless", "You're going to flunk the test", etc. It gets nastier and nastier, that's why I decided to leave it to your own memories/imagination.
Distractions:
I mention this at last because, this is by far the least destructive in my opinion. Many parents start having paranoia about the child spending time watching TV or on the computer or chatting over phone and such kind. They fail to realize... the student's problem is not in the distractions. It is in himself - the fact that he's not committed enough to restrain himself from temptations is important. But then, I just don't know how to say this without raising skepticism... but distractions don't matter. I used to watch Hollywood movies till 2.00 AM and didn't even have a geography or maths note in 10th standard. But I got more marks than all the students in whose homes the TV lines and LAN lines had been cut. I got more marks than everyone in the district, so it's fairly a good argument.
Expectations:
Well, this heading cropped up in my brain right after I wrote that line above. Expecting a person who's getting 90% to get 95% is fair. Expecting a person who's averaging just 85%, to get state rank in the board exams... is not. Nor is expecting a barely average student to get into renowned colleges through merit. It is possible, yes... But the demands and expectations are mostly detrimental to growth. For some reason, no matter what mark a student gets on an average, all his relatives, close family members expect him to do so well as to bag the district first rank at least. They say it for a joke, I suppose... or maybe to motivate. But quite frankly, in most cases it doesn't work. Over expectations just makes the student want to shut himself in a crappy cupboard and never come out again. They forget what they're studying for and focus their energies in fighting their fear of not living up to the expectations.
I have so far talked from the point of view of a student, regarding problems at home. It is quite true that a student with true strength and all that will hardly have these issues. But the problem is, where does that strength come from?
I wanted to say about something seriously which we can ponder upon, every year we see the state toppers flashing v sign and giving interviews in the newspapers, if u see where they stand in 10 years of time many of them would be just one another 9-5 working man and not a researcher or a well known person, but those who never flashed the v-signs do become that, isn't it quite paradoxical?
ReplyDeleteThat's true. Most often, a student's mark doesn't really reflect on his performance or on his knowledge and his life definitely doesn't depend entirely on the marks he gets.
ReplyDeleteRead ur post just now.. The last three subtopics are very true.. I had faced those situations several times in my twelfth std.. we r out of it now.. hope it doesn't happen to us anymore
ReplyDeleteOnly very few people can wield the pen so well..And u own the art Meenakshi :-)
Why should there be this much stress in twelfth std?... i'm sure this was not case when our parents did their schooling.. The word "Stress" is becoming more common these days irrespective of the age.. This word is too powerful.. it's very deterrent.. we should wipe this word out of our minds and dictionaries too.
ReplyDelete