Fresh perspective needed

September 24, 2023 by Eric Bradley

Thailand's technology education system is falling behind that of other developed nations, but the real issue isn't the students; it's a lingering perception among education officials that Thai students lack capacity for tech excellence.

In truth, your students may be more capable than you think. Are we overlooking the potential that could give Thais a more active role in the tech revolution?

Have faith in them so you can give them faith

As we've traveled around the country, it has been invigorating to see the impressive array of talent on display from Thai students.

Obviously in the more affluent schools it was easier for talented students to explore their potential. But what we have found is that an even more important factor than wealth is a supportive educational environment where students are encouraged to believe in their abilities.

Therefore we want to encourage all Thai educators to stop limiting the potential of their students. Be open minded to the possibility that students could be more talented and capable than their test scores may indicate.

In fact, test scores don't tell us everything we need to know about student abilities. They simply indicate to us how well a student is engaging with the official curriculum. If the curriculum is not aligned well with a student's interests and they don't feel a strong sense of motivation, even a very talented student might not score well on standardized tests.

A personal case study

One of the most talented students I have personally taught had a history of consistently bad test scores. If I had been the kind of person to simply accept this prima facie evidence, she would have faced a difficult and uncertain future.

Luckily for her, I'm the kind of person where if I am presented with a problem situation, it makes me want to dig deeper and find the causes of the problem. In this case, I found that the student was being bullied by her peers, lacked a supportive educational environment, and received little parental attention at home.

Ordinarily this would represent a fatal combination of warning signs. This perfect trifecta of negativity had stripped her of almost every vestige of confidence and motivation. At that time she regarded herself as, in her own words, "a dummy."

Over the next 12 months I helped her overcome the fear and shame that were holding her back. I had the privilege to watch her transform herself from an introverted teenager to a confident young lady ready to face the world.

In truth, she had always possessed an abundance of talent as an artist and designer, but this is not an area of study that standardized tests aim to find student ability.

Today this young lady is training to be a flight instructor and has mastered a diversity of subjects including English, physics, meteorology, geography, and navigation. Fields of study that previous teachers had already concluded she had no hope of learning.

This was not an instant transformation. It didn't happen without an abundance of tears and tantrums. But once she was inspired with the motivation to learn and keep improving, it helped her believe in herself, and gave her confidence to keep going even when faced with challenging situations.

A lesson for teachers

The above story is entirely true. It is just one example among dozens of similar stories that I have personally encountered or witnessed where students actually had potential they were unaware of and had somehow fallen through the cracks without being noticed.

One of the important things I did was to allow her to make her own mistakes. Instead of castigating her for these mistakes, I encouraged her to think about the problem and look for the solution. Only when she was too paralyzed by fear of giving a wrong answer would I step in and provide the answer. Immediately after the answer was provided, it was evident that she had already guessed correctly, but was afraid to say anything in case her answer was wrong.

This clearly shows the error of taking a punitive approach in teaching. We must allow children to make mistakes and then encourage and support them to find the right answer through exploration and discovery. Ridiculing or otherwise punishing students for giving wrong answers will only cause them to want to withdraw, and they will learn nothing.

When students are punished, especially when the punishment includes humiliation in front of their classmates, the student will focus more of their attention on the punishment than on the content of the lesson. This can leave them feeling afraid to try again in the future.

As a teacher, hopefully you care about the well-being of your students. I hope you will consider giving any "difficult students" you encounter some benefit of the doubt. Most often you will find it is not a lack of ability that is holding them back, but a lack of confidence. This is something that can almost always be overcome if you can find a way to connect with the student and motivate them to try their best.

If this article failed to resonate with you, I ask you to consider the young boy in this photo:

The boy in the photograph failed the general education section of his standardized test that would have allowed him to attend university.

Only his exceptional scores in physics and mathematics allowed him a second chance, and this was rarely awarded at the time of his exam.

This young man was Albert Einstein, who would one day become recognized as one of the greatest minds in science, something only possible due to second chances.