Educational Interest Trend among Young Children

EDUCATIONAL INTEREST TREND AMONG YOUNG CHILDREN

Abstract

Objectives: To know the educational interest trend among young children and effects of gender differences and environment on interest trend.

Sample: 434 students of Rajasthan were taken for study, in this 158 were girls and 276 were boys.

Tool: Dr. S.P. Kulshrestha’s Educational Interest Record was implied. It measures interest in seven areas- Agriculture, Commerce, Fine Arts, Home-Science, Humanities, Science and Technology.

Result: Thus after scoring and analysis the data obtained, could be said that Gender and environment affect interests. And current educational trend among young children is highest interest in technology, than commerce, fine arts, science, humanities, home-science and least interest in agriculture.

Keywords:Education, Educational interest, Gender differences, Environmental effect, Interest trend, Educational interest trend.

1. INTRODUCTION

Educational interests are demarcated as one’s own pattern of preferences, likes and dislikes preferred in any manner, wisely or unwisely by self or by any other source for a given educational area or subject.(5)

Interests and attention are very closely related; they play an important role in the development of the behavior and personality and are very important to understand the individual and to guide his future plans and activities.

The intelligence and aptitudes are unable to predict educational and vocational success without considering the individual’s interest. Therefore the identification and measurement of interests is very essential for the educational and vocational guidance. It also aid students to adjust themselves to their education by making wise choices of the subjects of study. Only by making a right choice will each child be able to utilize his educational potentialities to the maximum possible extent.

2. LITERATURE REVIEW

Formerly, it was believed that interests reject inborn abilities⁽⁷⁾, but the contemporary trend was to emphasize the fact that interests are the product of individual’s environment.^(1,2,3,4,6) As such, the present study is for identification of the interests of Kota city students.

3. RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

1. Objectives

1. To know the Educational Interest trend among youngsters.
2. To know gender differences in educational interest choice making.
3. To know the environment impact on educational interest.

2. Sample Size

All 434 students, 158 girls and 276 boys studying in class 9^th and 10^th of a public school of kota were taken for study. Both schools are CBSC affiliated, private school, co-educational in nature.

3. Tools

Dr. S.P. Kulshrestha’s “Educational Interest Record “.was used. It is well researched, reliable and valid test which measures educational Interest in seven different areas. These seven areas of educational Interest contain 98 educational subjects/activities. These seven major areas are –

1. Agriculture (AG)
2. Commerce (Co)
3. Fine Arts (FA)
4. Home-Science (HS)
5. Humanities (HS)
6. Science (SC)
7. Technology (TE)

4. Procedure

Permission was taken from the school authority. Then one introductory class was taken of the students to establish rapport. After that the EIR was administered in both the schools on the sample of students. After the students answered the questionnaire, the same was collected and subjected for scoring and interpretation.

The raw scores were calculated with the scoring method as given in the manual. As per manual scores ranging from 0 to 1 were considered as low interest, 2-3 were considered as below average interest, 4-5 were considered as average interest, 6-9 were considered as above average interest and 10-14 were considered as high interest.

5. Limitations of the Study

The limitations of this research are as following:

1. This investigation was conducted in the city of Kota (Rajasthan) only.
2. Present research was conducted in two schools and on 443 students only.
3. This study was conducted on urban students only.
4. The research was conducted only on students of CBSE affiliated schools, managed by private management.
5. The variable under study was used is only educational interest.

4. RESULTS, ANALYSIS AND DISCUSSION

After scoring of all the 434 record form as per the instructions, the analysis of the data was done as per following:

1.First step was to find out the number of students selecting the faculty (total number N and boys and girls wise).

2.Since the maximum score could be 14 for any faculty, therefore, the numbers of students selecting the faculty were multiplied by 14 to get the selection score.

3.To get the percentage of students selecting the faculty, it was decided data divided by the total boys/girls sample number and then it was multiplied by 100.

4.To get the figure selecting the faculty the percentage figure were multiplied by 14.

The number of statistics presented in Table 1 is as:

1. The number Multiplied by 14.
2. The percentage multiplied by 14.
3. The percentage.

Table 1: Educational Area Wise Selection in Percentage

Table 1 shows the percentage of students’ interest in each subject, it also shows girls and boys separate educational interest percentage in each subject. Table 2 shows combined, boys and girls separate highest interest for each subject.

If we talk about our first objective of study that is “To know the Educational Interest trend among youngsters”, As per table we find that youngsters shows highest interest in technology, than commerce, fine arts, science ,humanities, home-science and least interest in agriculture.

Table 2: Educational Interest Areas

As we know Kota is a coaching hub where students come from all over India to take coaching classes for preparation of IIT, JEE, AIEEE, PET etc, they come to Kota to take a dream of becoming an IITian that we clearly can see in the results. In these days because of privatization of banks and insurance company and media influence commerce graduates and professionals are in demand for job and getting higher salary packages so commerce is having second choice. Influence of media, name and fame in art area made fine arts the third interest among the youth after that all traditional subjects’ as science, humanities, home-science and agriculture.

If we take into consideration our second objective of study “To know gender differences in educational interest choice making”, we can clearly see where as boys are showing higher interest in Technology than Commerce, Science, Humanities, Fine- arts, Home-Science, Agriculture, the girls are showing higher interest in Fine-arts, Technology, Humanities, Home science, Commerce, Science, and Agriculture.

In our society there is a role-differentiation between girls and boys so as per that their interests are also different. Generally boys shows more interest in science and technology whereas girls find humanities, fine-arts, home-science more interesting because these subject help them in fulfilling their duties where also helps in doing those kind of jobs where they can take care of their family and profession both.

Boys results are as per expectation but we can see girls are showing second highest interest in Technology this is the impact of that environment where they live means Kota a coaching hub, where every one IITian the dream to be an IITian or engineer. Girls are too in that flow.

Here, our third objective of study automatically proved with first two objectives that Environment affects the educational choices.

5. CONCLUSION

The present study has discussed and shown that youth has interest in Technical subjects, commerce and fine-arts, Environment and gender both affects the educational interest.

1. Suggestions for Further Research

Therefore, the following suggestions are made to look into the effectiveness of counselling should be kept in consideration:

1. The same study on same lines may be conducted on more schools and on larger sample.
2. This study may be conducted in other cities of Rajasthan and other states of India.
3. This study was conducted on urban students only. This may be conducted on Rural students also, and also a comparative study between urban and rural students be conducted.
4. A study also be done on this topic as a comparative study between Government Managed and Private Managed schools.

The study also can be conducted to consider the criteria as socio-economic status too.

6. REFERENCES

1. Bhargava M. (2006). “Modern Psychological testing and measurement Agra”, H.P. Bhargava Book house.
2. Kulshrestha SP. (1967). “Interest patterns of Boys at Agra”, Manika.
3. Kulshrestha SP. (1968). “Values and vocational interests in intermediate students”, M.Ed Dissertation. Agra university.
4. Kulshrestha SP. (1978). “Educational Interest Record manual”, NCERT, New Delhi.
5. Rao DB. (2004). “Educational Interests of School Students”, Discovery Publishing House, New Delhi.
6. Thormdike EL. (1935). “Adult interests”, Macmillan, NY.
7. Woodworth RS. (1918). “Dynamic Psychology”, Columbia University Press, NY.

Vol.1(3) ± June 2013Page 1