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ASSIGNMENT SOLUTIONS GUIDE (2014-2015)

E.S.-334
Education and Society
Disclaimer/Special Note: These are just the sample of the Answers/Solutions to some of the Questions given in the
Assignments. These Sample Answers/Solutions are prepared by Private Teacher/Tutors/Auhtors for the help and Guidance
of the student to get an idea of how he/she can answer the Questions of the Assignments. We do not claim 100% Accuracy
of these sample Answers as these are based on the knowledge and cabability of Private Teacher/Tutor. Sample answers
may be seen as the Guide/Help Book for the reference to prepare the answers of the Question given in the assignment. As
these solutions and answers are prepared by the private teacher/tutor so the chances of error or mistake cannot be denied.
Any Omission or Error is highly regretted though every care has been taken while preparing these Sample Answers/
Solutions. Please consult your own Teacher/Tutor before you prepare a Particular Answer & for uptodate and exact
information, data and solution. Student should must read and refer the official study material provided by the university.

Answer the following questions in about 1500 words:

(i) Explain the term Education.
Ans. The word education has been defined in various ways. Here are some of the approaches towards its meaning:
Etymological Meaning: The etymological meaning of education can be understood by working at the root
words. Educatum in Latin stands for to train. E means from inside and Duco means to draw out or lead out
or to bring up. By combining the terms means to draw out from within. to make it more clear we can say that every
child is born with certain innate qualities, capacities, tendencies, etc.
Education means bringing these out and to develop them further.
Narrower Meaning: In narrow sense education means providing the child certain instructions by process of
teaching-learning process under the organised institutional manner. A set body of knowledge through set methods of
teaching is given to the child, i.e., schooling. Here teacher is an important factor and child has a subsidiary role. S.S.
Mackenzi has very well remarked, In narrow sense, education may be taken to mean any consciously directed effort
to develop and cultivate our powers.
Wider meaning: Education, in wider sense, cannot be called mere communication of information by the teacher
to the child. It stands for all round development of the child. It does not begin and end with schooling. It begins with
the birth, rather even before and ends with the death only. Each and every experience makes one more learnt. S.S.
Mackenzi has rightly remarked in the wider sense; it is a process that goes on throughout life, and is promoted by
every experience of life.
Mahatma Gandhi, the father of the nation, has seen education in the same way when he says, By education, I
mean the all round drawing out of the best in the child and manbody, mind and soul.
Education holds the paramount position in the progress of mankind. It has ever served as a powerful instrument
of socio-political and economic changes at all stages of human progress. Education is an integral part of the growth
and development of human society.
Ever since man appeared on this planet, education has helped him in his existence by severing him to cope up
with nature for his survival and by providing him ability to understand and comprehend the social needs that arose
with growth of human society.
Education is manifestation of faculties and nobility of human race. Behind the evolution of society, the guiding
force has been education. It is education that led to discoveries and inventions, research and new look-out of the
social and material world in order to make survival of human race.
Education is a social process. It is a process where-by the existing generation passes on its experiences and
knowledge to the next generation along with development of their ability to add more to the existing experiences and

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knowledge. The society, as a whole unit, consisting of components like parents, school, the neighbourhood, temple,
state, media makes efforts to enrich the individual with all it has to make the individual able to contribute further.
Education is a unique process that has been shaping the human being throughout his life. It turns human being
from a biological being to a being of higher level by enriching his mind and soul. Education is transmitter of
civilization across the even or odd influences of time. It brought civilization into existence and has enriched and
vitalised it.
As human beings, our first need is to sustain. The physical survival against odd or anti-environment is the
biggest problem. Education has provided mechanism to face the challenge individually and collectively. These mandeveloped devices and practices have helped not only in survival, but also in comfortable existence. Agriculture,
techniques and technologies have made this possible and education is the process always working as an integral part
of social growth.
Education, too, has different stages of its growth of society as it is a social process. The new members of the
society are given the languages, informations, understanding etc. by the society. Education is a sub-system of greater
social system.
Education is guiding force for human life. Each individual gets right direction, a line of action through education.
Like individual, the society as a whole gets a vision of life i.e., culture from education. Thus, education stands as a
pace setter for human life. Answers to the eternal questions of the universe who made it, why, when, how, etc., make
a man to decide his philosophy of life and education is the dynamic side of philosophy. Thus philosophy and education
are, in fact, two sides of the same coin.
(ii) Discuss role and functions of media as an agency of Education.
Ans. Newspapers and Magazines: The contribution of newspapers and magazines to the education of people
in general is far greater than that of any other informal agency. This is because they can be circulated over a far larger
area than can be covered by films, dramatic societies, etc. Today, the progress of education in a country is computed
by the number and quality of magazines and newspapers published there. It is a matter of no little pride that after
independence, the number of newspapers and magazines, in English and in regional languages has been going up
steadily. This has been made possible by the rapid increase of literacy.
Apart from English and Hindi newspapers, newspapers in almost all regional languages are being able to reach
the masses living in the villages. And in fact, newspapers play the greatest role in making democracy a success. No
other form of informal education can be compared with these as far as political, economic and social education is
concerned.
Radio: In the west, the radio has been almost completely supplanted by the television, but in India it is still very
much in vogue. Transistor radios can now be seen in even the remotest villages, and have become so common that
they are carried out everywhere, to work, to play, to social gatherings, to travel. The radio amuses as well as instructs.
The All India Radio, the national radio network, has conceived and executed a number of programmes to achieve
these ends, amusement, pleasure and education.
Cinema: Cinema is one of the important informal agencies of education in the modern world, for it is an
important form of audio-visual aid.
It can be used by taking the educant to any cinema hall and exhibiting the appropriate film. It is evident, therefore,
that this agency can easily be employed for the teaching of history, geography, civics, political science and comparable
subjects. The Government in India has inspired and financed the production of many entertaining and informative
film documentaries concerning the revolutions in agriculture and industry that is taking place are the country today.
Newsreels also help in the dissemination of news and ideas.
There is no doubt at all that cinema has a comprehensive influence upon the moral, religious and intellectual
development of adolescents. There is need to control this media, so that it may not be misused.
Electronic Media: Recently television has become a very useful medium of education. Various education
programmes are telecasted for students.
Besides this Internet is being used to connect various computers to share educational programmes and share vast
field of knowledge.

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There are certain advanced electronic devices which are utilised by developed countries in their systems of
teaching and learning. Though, many of these are not in frequent use in India. But we must have knowledge about
them as we hope these will be used soon in India.
The recent development in educational broadcasting in India is the emergence of the satellite based communication.
It opened the doors for a new era in audio-visual communication. The first educational experiment to exploit the
potential of satellites in disseminating information was undertaken in 1975. The experiment, popularly known as
site, established that the remotest rural masses can also be approached through satellite based television programme.
Therefore, insat-1a and insat-1b have provided us with the means to strengthen distance education systems in India.
With the satellite technology available to us, India is able to beam television signals throughout the country making
the benefits of the technology available at every doorstep. But not every home in our country has a TV set to receive
the signals and thereby the benefits. The day when every home will have a TV set is still far off. The insat telecast
could help break the feeling of isolation among widely scattered communities. India is quite advanced in having her
own satellite technology and it has helped educators make comprehensive plans for education and development.
The advantage of this system are too many like:
1. It can cover vast areas over in remote unreachable areas with mountains or deserts etc.
2. It can promote changessocial, in attitudes, life-style etc. in a very short period.
3. It is time-saving system which needs minimum time to implement the education in vocations.
4. It has cost effectiveness. In low cost we can reach and cover wider areas for educational advancement and
implementation of educational planning.
5. By clubbing with telephone; we can provide facility to learners to raise their doubts and ask for clarification.
6. Video-tapes can be stored for future and can be used for wide range of teaching-learning process.
Multimedia Packages: The possible use of television programmes as a multimedia package is shown in following
figure:
A third scheme for the distribution of audio-visual component of a multimedia study package is the video
cassette technology which is not so popular in the educational sector in India because of the high cost of video

cassette recorders/players (VCRS/VCPs) and the non-availability of educational programmes on cassettes. Thus, we
see electronic media can be of much use is educational process in our times.
(iii) As a teacher you must have felt wastage and stagnation at school level. Explain the factors affecting
this and suggest ways to minimise this.
Ans. The 45th Article of the Constitution assures that the state will assume the responsibility of providing free
education to all children between the ages of 6 and 14 within a period of 10 years of the adoption of the Constitution.
From this it is evident that India must aim at universal and compulsory education. But there are five main problems
in achieving this target, which are as follows:
(1) Lack of Schools: The students between the age of 6-14 in every part of country do not find school within one
or two kilometres from their residence. Therefore, all of them do not join schools and even those who join leave after

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sometime due to distance.

(2) Lack of Registration: Many children do not go to school at the age as required and many join at late age i.e.,
class one at the age of 8-9 etc.
(3) Parent Unwillingness: Many parents do not understand the value of education or some have taboo for girls
schooling, some being poor cannot afford it, some want children to earn and thus for one or the other reason many
people are not willing for education of their children.
(4) Wastage: Drop out of the children from the school before completing at unsuitable time and stage.
(5) Stagnation: Staying for more than one year in a particular class by a child due to failure in examination.
Meaning of Wastage: After 1921, the problem of wastage in education is becoming steadily more and more
intense. Even the Hartog Report (1929) made it clear that primary education would remain ineffective as long as
each child did not remain in school for a minimum of four years and achieved literacy. The term wastage in this
context means the dropping out of the child from the educational process i.e., his leaving school at an unsuitable
time. This wastage involves a waste of national labour and wealth and its long-term consequence must necessarily
be disastrous.
Thus, wastage is basically problem of dropping out of the children causing illiteracy and checking our aim of
100% literacy of the children between age of 6-14 as desired by the Constitution.
Meaning of Stagnation: It was stated in the Hartog Report that the term stagnation was taken to mean keeping
a child in one class for more than one year, R.V. Parulkar has explained that schools are established to provide
education to children and not to fail them. In other words, stagnation means the continuance of a child in a single
class for two or three years due to failure. This too involves wastage of mans ability and the nations energy
resources and manpower.
Besides, failure encourages a sense of inferiority in the child and when children younger than him become his
classmates his abnormality tends to increase. Every year the level of stagnation in primary classes is between 30%
and 50%.
Thus stagnation is stage of a child in a class more than a year. This makes the child to leave school or to waste
one more year in same class i.e., wastage of his time, parents money and national effort for education.
Socio-Economic Causes
(1) Social and Economic Structure: Indias economic and social structure is of a kind which encourages
parents to send their children for general education. Even today our rural population hold on to the belief that a child
should only be educated to the extent of being able to read and write. Their education will spoil them, they must be
kept at home and asked to help in the household or agriculture work.
(2) Social and Religious Problems: Social and religious problems also contribute to stagnation. In schools
which have a dominance of children belonging to a particular caste, tribe or groupsuch as tribal scheduled castes,
minority language groups etc. Other groups are neglected and this itself becomes the cause of stagnation. It is
neglecting, which keeps children weak and fail and ultimately to leave the school i.e., wastage.
(3) Attitude about Girls: Many parents feel that girls should not be sent to school, but should be trained in
household work as they will go to other home after marriage. Parents feel it to be a wastage money on their education
in comparison to boys education.
(4) Co-education or Lack of Girls School: Some people do not want girls to go to schools where boys and girls
study together. This makes low admission of girls between 6-14. Besides this early marriage of girls also leads to
wastage among girls.
(5) The Child as a Labourer: Children living in villages are the property of their parents who can compel their
children to labour and earn on the fields. For such parents the money earned by the child is more important than their
education.
(6) Indifference of Guardians: About 65% of our population is illiterate. They dont give any importance to
education of their children. They think that to know family occupation is enough for the child.
(7) Poverty: Poverty of the Indian people is the most important factor responsible for wastage in the sphere of

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primary education. Most of the guardians are so poor that they cannot manage even two square meals a day for their
families. It is too much to expect from them to arrange books, notebooks, etc. for their children. On the contrary, they
find it easy to stop their childrens education and put them into some trade to earn money. Thus, a large percentage
of promising children become the victims of poverty and are deprived of even primary education.
Remedies for Wastage and Stagnation Problems
1. Education at the primary level should be free and compulsory and the principle of universalisation should be
implemented in letter and spirit.
2. Provision for general promotion to the next class should be made in the system.
3. The principle of equality with regard to the age-group of children.
4. Schools should not be beyond a specified distance from childrens homes.
5. The date of admission should be specified in advance and strictly observed.
6. The behaviour of teacher should be affectionate, full of sympathy and cooperative towards the student.
7. Student-teacher ratio should be proper i.e. less than 1:36.
8. The school environment should be healthy, attractive and congenial for learning.
9. Student should get individual attention from the teacher.
10. The curriculum should be easy, practical, useful and related to life.
11. Suitable arrangement for the education of girls should be made.
12. Facilities of games should exist in schools.
13. Poor children should get milk, mid-day meal, books, etc.
14. The methods of teaching and examination system should undergo radical changes.
Some Suggestions to Solve the Problem
1. Reorganisation of the Curriculum: Primary curriculum should be so prepared as to be appealing to the
children and generating in them an interest for education. It should be reorganised according to local conditions,
problems and traditions. Its number of subjects should not be too many. It should be practical and useful for the life.
Its subjects for girls and boys should not be same. It should be liberal and flexible so that proper changes and
adjustments may be easily made. For providing impetus to the creative attitude of the student it must include a craft.
It should help the children to understand the dignity of manual labour.
2. Education of Guardians: An uneducated guardian does not realise the worth of education. He cannot make
sacrifice for the education of his children. Therefore, the guardian should be made aware of the importance of
education so that he develops a desire to educate his ward. Mass-media can be used for it. Adult-education programmes
can also help in this direction.
3. Girls Enrollment Problem: Girls leave schools as separate sanitation facilities are not provided for them in
co-education schools.
The following measures would overcome these difficulties:
(i) Girls primary school within a radius of one kilometre from every home.
(ii) Hostel for girls.
(iii) Stipends to girls who are residing in hostels.
(iv) Transport facilities.
(v) Free education for girls upto SSLC Examination (Senior Secondary Level Certificate).
(vi) Increased number of women teachers.
(vii) Creating public opinion in favour of girls education.
Besides, mass media, PTA may also be of great help.
4. Educational Reforms can also help
(a) Promotion on the basis of attendance.
(b) Those who complete course of a class can be given promotion in between.
(c) Children must get free uniform, books, note books, mid-day meals, etc.
(d) Proper inspection of schools, specially in academics, must become regular feature.

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