A few months ago, my then 7 year old signed up for the Grade 2 "Science" Olympiad and came home with an NSO "Workbook".
Flipping through the workbook, I was hard pressed to find any "Science" in it. It was a mish-mash of topics ranging from "Occasions, Festivals" and "Family" to "House, Housemakers" and "Occupation". As I watched him work through it, some of the questions left me wondering exactly *who* created the material and what the motivation behind it was.
One question was "Who cooks food in a family?", with the options being Aunt, Mother, Sister and All of These. "Who is called the head of family?" asked another. The options were Father, Brother, Mother and Cousin. No prizes for guessing what the right answers were. Now, even if the correct answers to these questions are "Family Dog", not only do I fail to understand how this can be called Science, I am also completely amazed that we choose to thrust gender stereotypes down the throats of impressionable young minds in this day and age, without *any* thought to how the world has changed and how each family may be unique in its own way.
To me it seems that the "Science" Olympiad, although run by a not-for-profit organization, is really a way of making a pretty packet for the organizers, science and sensitivity be damned!
As someone who has her degrees in pure Science, I find it hard to stomach this brutal misuse of the term "Science" to make a quick buck.
Flipping through the workbook, I was hard pressed to find any "Science" in it. It was a mish-mash of topics ranging from "Occasions, Festivals" and "Family" to "House, Housemakers" and "Occupation". As I watched him work through it, some of the questions left me wondering exactly *who* created the material and what the motivation behind it was.
One question was "Who cooks food in a family?", with the options being Aunt, Mother, Sister and All of These. "Who is called the head of family?" asked another. The options were Father, Brother, Mother and Cousin. No prizes for guessing what the right answers were. Now, even if the correct answers to these questions are "Family Dog", not only do I fail to understand how this can be called Science, I am also completely amazed that we choose to thrust gender stereotypes down the throats of impressionable young minds in this day and age, without *any* thought to how the world has changed and how each family may be unique in its own way.
To me it seems that the "Science" Olympiad, although run by a not-for-profit organization, is really a way of making a pretty packet for the organizers, science and sensitivity be damned!
As someone who has her degrees in pure Science, I find it hard to stomach this brutal misuse of the term "Science" to make a quick buck.
Apparently these olympiads papers are there to prepare the kids to take up IIT JEE, but do all those who take up olympiads end up taking up science for higher studies, And more importantly.... do such young children really need to take up olympiads, considering a very small percentage of kids succeed cracking the entrance exam and a smaller percentage actually go on to study at IITs.
ReplyDeleteI think this is just another bunch of so called "educators", joining hands with schools to feed on parental anxiety and ambitions