After-school activities will help reduce stress on students

Students carrying heavy backpacks, bogged down under heaps of text and note books, wearing strained and stressed out expressions, is a common sight these days. 

In this era, there is lack of spontaneity and cheer in students. They are busy competing in this fast moving, cut throat educational world, with parents adding to this pressure.  

Over enthusiastic teachers pushing volumes of information down the throats of hapless children, misplaced evaluation of competencies of the learner and needless comparison with peers, presents a sorry picture of a school going student.

Commercially-minded school administrations, an over burdened and stressed out teaching staff and a lopsided tutor-student ratio seems to be the order of the day. 

Unless we act and take decisive steps to stem this rot, the rote-learning focused system of education will take over, killing the exuberance, spontaneity and creativity that every child or student is born and blessed with.

After-school activities and programmes are a great way to nurture and develop social skills, emotional development and hone out academic talent.

There’s more to school life than stress and marks. The real objective of education is to stimulate and facilitate the student to think, rather than expect them to read, hear, memorise, retain and recall - in that order.

With the arrival of digital media, the role of teachers and schools in India’s education system needs a radical shift in approach to imparting education.  

Schools should focus more on stimulating the student’s capacity to think rather than disseminating subject knowledge and information, which is easily accessible on the web domain. There is virtually nothing that is not available online.  

The primary mission of school authorities is to be able to gauge how far a student can advance with limited tutelage and provide the right support that is needed. 

One cannot master a skill without discipline. The goal of school education is to inculcate in a student a number of disciplines. It is in this context that after school activities play a huge role in the personal growth, enhancing thinking capability and inducing discipline. 

After school activities helps students to develop good team and social skills. They help to improve and bolster confidence, making it easier to make friends. 

It will also help them during their school hours. During class, pupils are encouraged to participate in group activity to help them hone out team building skills. If a student can work towards achieving a common goal with teammates, he or she will get a head start on their peers.

There are plenty of team-building options to choose from. These include football and hockey, which help to learn the art of interacting with the others. 

If sport is not their thing, why not try local dance schools? Dance is a fun way to get active, to sharpen team instincts, as well as act as a confidence booster.  

Sometimes, it’s hard to pick which after school activity to participate in. A student can spend time outdoors and work their way up to positions of leadership. Joining after school activities helps to socialise with other students outside their school limits and learn to cope with different situations, play more fairly and focus on working and interacting with the others. 

If a student is part of an outdoor after-school club, they will get the exercise needed to keep them healthy, reduce stress levels and tackle issues like obesity. It doesn’t matter whether a student is a budding ballerina or a football fan, every minute of exercise counts.

Acting in plays or theatre is also a fun thing, involving working through countless rehearsals, which increases bonding with others.

Reading newspapers to keep themselves abreast of current affairs is a necessary discipline that lifts the self-esteem of the student. Reading books is yet another vital exercise that adds to knowledge. 

A recent nationwide study conducted across students revealed that over 85 per cent of school students spend about three to four hours on social and digital media every day, which amounts to almost three school days a week. This is a wake up call to all schools and parents to think seriously on engaging the teens in after school activities.

Author is founder, Scooldudes.com