Cut out elite class labelling

I REFER to the recent issue of mixing or segregating students in classrooms. Most parents support the segregation of classrooms according to grades.

This has been the practice all these years where students who achieve good grades are put in the first class. I feel this is the right move because we are putting like-minded children together. Just as we adults gravitate towards other people who share a common interest, children too feel the same.

Parents send their children to school to learn. Placing the high-scoring children with others of lesser academic ability in the same class would curtail their learning process.

It is an accepted fact that humans differ from each other. Some are good in academic pursuits while others are talented in other aspects like creativity. Some possess powerful memory ability while others are skilful with their hands.

Principals who label their top classes as elite are wrong as they give the impression that students in the rest of the classes are retards. Stick to the past practices of naming the classes A, B and so forth. Just keep it simple. Parents can accept that classes are differentiated in the alphabetical order just as examination results are given out in the same manner. Also, parents would not wish their children to be imbued with a false sense of superiority with this elite labelling.

To parents and those who support the mixing of students in the classroom regardless of their grades, do you want your children’s learning to be disrupted and affected by other students who have no interest in learning whatsoever?

In my support for differentiating classrooms according to academic scores, I wish to state a caveat that we must not give up on those children who are weak academically.

Principals, being leaders of their schools, must find out why some students lack academic interest and tailor different approaches to teach them.

Some students are by nature slow learners. In recognising this, more contact hours should be given to them. Putting such students in smaller groups would also help the teacher to pay more attention to them.

Some fall behind because they simply don’t understand what is being taught.

Some students are unable to read well, thus making learning a difficult process. In such cases, remedial action must be taken fast to prevent the situation from getting worse.

Nipping in the bud this inability to read and comprehend will put the children on the right path to learning. Simply put, reading and comprehension are the building blocks of the learning process.

Students with lower grades can also learn from their friends in the better classes through school activities and clubs. Encourage them to come together through such activities and they might get some insights into the thought processes of the high-achieving students.

We also have to accept the fact that some students are not academically inclined but this does not mean they are incapable or useless. Their interest may not be so much in the academic but rather in the vocational field.

Their lack of academic qualification is by no means a measure of their perceived diminished chances of future success. Bill Gates, Richard Branson, Mark Zuckerberg and many other successful businesspeople who never graduated from universities attest to the fact that learning something according to one’s interest and field can bring success too.

It would be gravely wrong to lump high-achieving students with their less accomplished peers in the same class. This would affect deeply those who truly want to learn in a conducive environment. Educators and parents need to be cognisant of the fact that different people perform differently because some are intrinsically better in their cognitive skills.

Efforts like providing better classroom facilities and materials, using more effective teaching methods and activities coupled with well-trained teachers can help immensely in uplifting and improving students’ scores.

We must endeavour to allow good students to flourish. We must not restrain them because this would be an injustice to them.

Modern societies evolved because they pursued excellence. Talented and high achievers are put together to harness their abilities to feed on each other’s expertise. Those who are less so are encouraged to improve themselves constantly.

Likewise in school, students are encouraged to obtain good grades. It is this focus on achieving excellence that drives societies into improving themselves. K.K. THAM Mantin, Negri Sembilan