Article Review-“जेंडर संवेदनशील शिक्षकों का सृजन” “मधु कुशवाहा”

“जेंडर संवेदनशील शिक्षकों का सृजन”

“मधु कुशवाहा”

 

In this article “जेंडर संवेदनशील शिक्षकों का सृजन”, the writer मधु कुशवाहा discussed the various issues related to gender prejudice and gender stereotypes, which is an oversimplified  prejudgment of others. The writer took a few classroom situation examples of the practices where teachers used some statements which are gender stereotypes. 

This article shows that in order to achieve the goal of gender equality, education and teachers play a huge role. In this article the writer wants to draw attention towards gender prejudice and gender equality. She discussed the statement of NCF 2005, which has the goal to achieve gender equality, but there are many limitations in school education during the socialization in schools. Schools themselves created a few limitations. NCF 2005, focused on gender sensitivity, the new textbooks do not include any gender prejudice content, pictures, or language. The textbooks are gender sensitive. The writer discussed the various things we usually see in schools, Gender equality and school have a greater connection, and teacher plays a huge role here, generally teacher prepares boys for the challenging life and job while prepares girls to remain inside the home to do the house chores. During socialization in school, children are most likely to be influenced by teachers . If a teacher uses gender sensitive words and statements then it will create the sensitivity towards gender equality among the students, and hence they would not differentiate among themselves. The writer also shares experiences of teacher training. She talked about class 6th Hindi chapter by Tulsidas Ji, the questions in this chapter are not gender inclusive, but here the responsibility and creativity of teachers begin, teachers can put some constructive and gender inclusive questions in front of the students, which should be open ended and enhance the awareness of gender equality So that students can answer accordingly. Another example she discussed is if there is any girl who is beautiful but intelligent, it shows the gender prejudice, and signifies that a beautiful girl cannot be intelligent. So again, a gender prejudice and gender inequality come. So, it draws the attention of the teachers towards the understanding and awareness of gender inclusiveness. Teachers can put some effort by taking responsibility and using gender inclusive language and ensuring an environment free from gender prejudice. Teacher's language should be gender inclusive, as it affects the student’s self-concept. Generally, teachers use male centric language, which influences students directly. In the classroom during the teaching-learning process, many times the teacher uses the language which is male centric. Teachers are habitual of using such sentences in schools which include male centric language. As we know that children are great observers and as school is the place of socialization. Teachers make a huge impact through their words. They should be aware of the language they are using and ensure gender sensitivity. They can give some open-ended questions for students to write which shows and raises gender sensitivity and gender equality. Teachers used to give examples like - “ Meera is a beautiful but intelligent girl” during English grammar class, which shows gender prejudice. It created the perception that beautiful girls are not intelligent. Teachers could also use different nouns in the sentences, for example- “Ramesh is a handsome but intelligent boy”. So, through such things, we can draw attention towards the gender difference and androcentric language. Teachers have a great responsibility to use gender inclusive language and to ensure an environment which is free from gender prejudice. The writer also discussed the various pointers she used to discuss in the classroom during the teaching -learning process, these pointers are very important to discuss because they include the various aspects of society. They are Democratic teaching, development of critical thinking, to discuss the self-experiences of gender socialization, to design and implement the activities of critical thinking. Through this student can understand that gender inequality is a social construct and we people can erase it with our efforts. Also, it is possible to remove such orthodox gender roles and inequality. There are many ways to engage the students in classroom to motivate them and develop a better understanding of gender sensitivity. Teacher should give them opportunities to put their own experiences in discussions, let them express themselves openly in school. Teachers should let the students engage in different discussion on gender equality. Students can also discuss on the gender roles in their surroundings. To achieve the goal of gender equality teachers should set such examples in front of them which sows seed of the value of gender equality. The writer concluded that it is very important to prepare the teacher and make them gender sensitive by giving the proper training, else we would not get the positive results of correcting the books and syllabus. Teachers are the ones who can bring the positive change in this field of gender equality by giving the proper environment. • Teachers can decide some specific days for children to read, write and speak the different contexts of gender equality, which includes their own experiences. 

 Reflections-

 • Teachers are the role models of the students hence teachers should use gender sensitive language, which motivates children to follow the same. 

• Teacher training is must to develop the gender sensitivity. 

• As per NCF 2005, teacher should teach beyond the textbooks, and can put a few questions which are constructive, open ended in nature and make them more gender sensitive.

 • While taking the examples in classroom, teacher should use the sentences which develop gender equality among all.

 • Use of nouns and pronouns should not be male centric. 

• Teacher should not differentiate among the students regarding any work, He/She