Is It Contributing To The Education Problem? Continuous Comprehensive Evaluation: Major Problems And Recommendation To Address The Issue.

Introduction

The purpose of education lies in engaging young minds in thinking beyond and making their mind grow curious to question. An education of this nature can be envisioned by imagining a landscape of education system that offers space for children to grow and think without single focus on scholastic aspect of learning. Learning doesn’t happen in isolation. All the senses work together in facilitating the learning process. We need a learning system that looks at children as equal partners, and not looked as an entity that needs to be ‘only’ prepared. In this piece, we will understand from an Indian scenario what innovative effort is envisioned for making justice to children’s agency by looking at the evolution of the Continuous Comprehensive Evaluation (CCE), understand the problems, reflect ‘why’ they are a problem at first place, and list down the recommendations by exploring different sides to CCE.

Idea of assessment and learning experience: Evolution of CCE

Assessments are always used synonymously with tests. The use of terminology in an interchangeable ways points at the approach we carry towards assessment. In Indian scenario, the assessment is looked as a few hours of written exercise in a controlled environment under strict vigilance to evaluate the ‘reproducibility’ (Sharma, 2016, p. 86) ability of the children. This puts evidently that the idea of this type of assessment believes in finding the ‘faults’ in the children, by labelling them as ‘poor’ or ‘good’ without having a ‘purpose’ on paper to assess ‘exactly what’ and ‘for what’, and later doesn’t leave any scope for an assessor to understand fundamentally to answer ‘what do I know about this child?’. The word Assessment literally means “assessing of value to the object” (Slentz, K. L. et al, 2008, p. 11). Looking at the assessment system that focuses on the reproducibility factor, do you see any assignment of value in a child’s life? The Yashpal Committee report says that children believe that only the “performance in the exam matters” (Sharma, 2016, p. 86). This is a failure on our parts to not show much value to students in anything else so much so that they have built a whole premise in life to consider exams as the only way to decide their worth and value in life. Such a scenario needs to be revolutionized. The education should not burden children to put strains only on their cognition. There is a high probability of not learning enough and growing enough in such high intensity assessment environment. The nature of such assessment environment causes inequity and dropout and makes the entire class learning experience revolved only around preparing students for the exams, and not for the life learning. CCE was the result of such a catastrophic assessment and classroom system with an intention to view education as ‘learning without boundaries to your potential’.

CCE is a framework for instructional assessment. It is built on the essential philosophy that assessment is by no means to be viewed as a onetime mugging exercise. The horizons to look at the assessment into the classroom is envisioned in such a fashion that requires the teachers continuously gather evidences of children’s learning on an ongoing basis as per the curriculum goals or basis the five domains of development. CCE is not only about gathering evidences on an ongoing basis. It also requires to focus on receiving the information of students from the multiple sources. The underlying value behind this action is that the child’s development cannot be viewed only from the lens of teachers. A child is surrounded by different environments and his behaviour, skills, competencies may not be understood only by concentrating your efforts in putting efforts in understanding children in the four walls of the school. The CCE believes that children learn beyond classrooms, and they learn at their own pace. It is directing teacher to move towards a learning that will facilitate in putting efforts in reflecting that every child learns differently. Hence the learning goals also need to be adjusted according to the needs of this individual learner in a group or alone. CCE doesn’t consider textbooks as the base towards evolving learning into a child. The textbook-exam nexus limits a teacher from moving towards a more comprehensive (Sharma, 2016, p. 86) and authentic environment for conducting assessments. It stresses the need for a more authentic and spontaneous assessments, and this will not happen by only observing children in the classroom. It requires collaboration with important stakeholders like community, other teachers, and parents as well. CCE can be incorporated by practically by conducting observations like anecdotal observations, running records (not sure how much would this set into an Indian context), preparing a portfolio, interviewing parents by visiting home or calling them in the school (whatever fit culturally well into the family’s comfort space), or even by use of checklists.

An Indian case: Implementation problem in CCE

At first place as I understand, the implementation problem in CCE is not seen in actual implementation as in order to reach till actual implementations, we are yet to deal with several hurdles in implementation causing problem among different stakeholders. In ‘Reversing the Twin Ideals of Right to Education’ (Sharma, 2016), the four main implementation issues are discussed. I look at them as hurdles in implementation. We will have a look at them, see clearly what problems are they, and try to reflect on why they are posing to be problem for implementation.

Lack of clarity: A new idea like CCE is a new concept for most of us in India as we are colonially trained to look at education from the point of instilling something as if the receiver is the blank slate, and we are too used to a system that evaluates basis our ability to remember things. On the other side, teachers are historically imagined to be the ‘gurus’ whose religious significance is of worshipping them because they are the ones who know how to train a young mind and how to build the character of a young mind. I perceive this deep rooted underlying thought as a first barrier in causing more confusion in the teachers and parents. The major confusion is about the manner in which it has been communicated created a whole lot of bewilderment because such a huge revolution cannot be merely communicated by stating that we will now change the way we look at children. The root of confusion is not just the communication but also the contradicting idea of our deep rooted picture to perceive childhood and education. This contrast to our way of thinking as we are asked to think in a way we cannot think immediately, can also lead to confusion. We are not used to the term CCE. So communicating the idea of CCE doesn’t look easier as it indicates. The sudden change to looking at students as constructivists and collaborator is a huge perception change, and at such times it is not difficult to create ripples of fear among the major stakeholders. At the time of implementation of CCE, I was working with government school teachers in the schools. The officers would come unannounced and would direct teachers in literal sense saying that, ‘CCE shuru karo (Start CCE)’. At that time, we were training teachers for CCE. Now that I reflect back I realised as a support agency even we were not clear about what CCE is. The way I know about CCE now, is not the way we oriented teachers. The most important component of CCE is documentation. I saw teachers seated throughout the day with the huge checklist in a book (which was too huge) to mark children throughout the day. They found it as an additional burden because CCE was implemented as a different entity other than instructional hours, along with separate exams. This is where the training takes the central place.

Teacher Training: Looking at the earlier point about lack of clarity in the teachers, it becomes essential to focus efforts on training the teachers. The CCE article (Sharma, 2016) gives an insight into teacher training by stating how the focus of blame of unable to implement CCE in just put on the teachers. It talks about unavailability of authentic resources to guide teachers in the process of implementing CCE in the classroom. It mentions about lack of efficient institutions in producing competent teachers who would qualify for a serious profession as teaching. Here comes the responsibility of the state and centre missionaries to take serious efforts at improving the benchmark of the institutes. Implementing CCE requires a resource that is trained into different method with a balance of theory and practice and helps them develop a perception to look at curriculum and assessment in a constructivist approach. I interpret that this will continue to be a problem until and unless we don’t do it step wise, instead of implementing in one go.

Lack of Material: It was interesting to learn how the education boards like CBSE are grappling equally to implement CCE in its truest sense. This shows how different agencies should equally be brought on a similar page, and it should be a collaborated effort at developing something that will also fit into the Indian scenarios. The way parent engagement happens in western countries or Nordic countries is not the way it would happen here. There are many components I felt need to be thought about when we think about materials and an outline for CCE. Even the CBSE document discussed in the article (Sharma, 2016) about CBSE’s lack of understanding about CCE. In that, the terms used in relation to CCE are decorated for the purpose of putting across that CCE is seen to be implemented in the schools. As per my understanding and experience, I didn’t come across any comprehensive aid for teacher’s use in CCE as a framework for implementing CCE. If the CCE looks like a mere effort on paper, then it is important to have standardization of guidelines in it.

Teacher’s concerns: As already discussed in the first point of this section, the teachers seen sitting with the checklist register throughout the day along with bearing other responsibilities of filling the several documents. Administrative work is the biggest barriers, and the CCE is viewed as an additional fire to the burden of administrative work. Very well put by the article (Sharma, 2016) that it is “lack of systemic support, workload, and contradiction in different policy measures” (Sharma, 2016, p. 89) that is the major problem in implementation, leaving teacher confused over the dual contradictions put by the state. A huge difference between practice and preaching is evident. Even if the CCE might feel welcomed, the catastrophic administrative system might limit in welcoming CCE with a big heart.

Three steps to address the CCE issue

There are definitely more than three specific steps one can take to address the issue in implementing CCE but on the prioritization basis, I think following three recommendations can help towards addressing the CCE issue. These recommendations can be from a long term or a short term perspective as well.

Working on the behavioural and perception level: As discussed, CCE is a very new idea for a country like India which is used to the century old colonial system of training students into preparing them for clerical work. Even the teachers trained into the educational courses come from the similar background that may or may not be used to seeing the education work in such a fashion. The recent researches brings us to focus much on the continuous, on-going system of assessing students by viewing learning as wholesome and not limited only to classrooms. This new thought might be welcomed by teachers but by giving mere checklist doesn’t bring transformation in the way they would think about children. In order to proceed with the philosophy of CCE, the teachers need to be trained on the behavioural and perception level. I have been hearing teacher talking about CCE to be a waste of time and not contributing to learning because CCE is associated with the idea of ‘playway’ learning. This requires us to train teacher into the education philosophy as a practice for incorporating better pedagogical practices. The pedagogical approaches will reflect teacher’s belief system. Belief system displays the attitude one has about something. So I feel to ingrain CCE, it is must to work on the change level.

Addressing the programmatic issues: We need to first start reviewing the loopholes of our own system that limits the implementation of CCE. A diverse stakeholder’s exercise in mapping the concern, mapping the cause and effect and understanding the ecosystem altogether would be very essential. Different stakeholders like teachers, headmasters, parents, students, officers, ministers, NGOs or any implementing agency, community, local servants, etc. should be a part of such exercise. This exercise can really help us to understand what mess we are rooting into, and would also help us to understand what mess we can prevent by reviewing our own system by collaborating with the people who are at the implementation step.

Guidelines for CCE & Record: A standardized guideline needs to be in place to avoid multiple meanings of CCE considered by different stakeholders. The expectations should be clearly articulated in a comprehensive manner without writing heavy guidelines which will not be ready to refer material whenever required. It should be an easy document to be referred prepared specifically for an audience who implements and designs the CCE. This should atleast help in standardizing the needs about CCE. Another important point is of record keeping. We understand that a system like us would be a little difficult to be changed in a go. But the new additions into the system can definitely add fewer burdens. The ready checklist can again bring limitations on the freedom of the teacher, leaving her less capable to decide what she wants her children to focus on. I think an outline surrounding different informal assessments methods along with training for teachers would in recording them effectively should be arranged. They can also be trained on how to use checklists by connecting it with the curriculum goals. We cannot leave teachers alone to manage everything. Some level of continuous coaching or professional communities meet is equally important for teachers.

Conclusion

CCE is a revolutionary idea towards shifting to a new way of thinking about assessments. A new way of thinking about assessments will change the way Indian classrooms will serve the need of learning. It is essential to address certain important hurdles into implementation so that we are able to take the benefits of CCE in truest sense for the children. CCE is not just a way of assessment; it can be a new way of perceiving classrooms, which in turn will create great thinkers out of this system. We are in die hard need of minds filled with curiosity.

References

• Sharma, G. (2016). Reversing the twin ideals of right to education. No detention and CCE. Economic & Political Weekly EPW, 51(9), 85-89.
• Slentz, K. L., Early, D. M., McKenna, M., Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction Early Childhood Assessment Workgroup (Wash.), Washington (State)., & Washington State Library. (2008). A guide to assessment in early childhood: Infancy to age eight. Olympia, Wash.: Washington State Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction.