Karnataka School Education Minister B.C. Nagesh, chairman of Karnataka Knowledge Commission K. Kasturirangan, and Speaker of the Karnataka Legislative Assembly Vishweshwar Hegde Kageri, along with heads of various educational institutions in the State, at the Round Table Meeting in Bengaluru on Monday.
| Photo Credit: K. MURALI KUMAR
Value education should be an activity-based teaching module, and teachers should be trained in value education first, said many prominent religious leaders and educationists who participated in a consultative round table meeting on ‘Implementation of Value Education in School Education’ conducted by the Department of School Education and Literacy on Monday.
The meeting saw leaders from Hindu, Muslim, Christian, Jain, and other religions participate.
Vishwaprasanna Tirtha Swami of Pejawar Mutt, Udupi, spoke about the need for activity-based value education: “Earlier, Panchatantra stories were taught to the children as part of value education. Now we should adopt value education through small dramas and students should play parts and characters. Telling the stories through cartoon is another way to teach value education effectively to the students,” he said.
Shivamurthy Shivacharya Swami of Taralabalu Mutt of Sirigere said, “Now students are getting only job-oriented and business-oriented education in our educational institutions, but not value education. Therefore, value education is highly needed for our children. Before them, if the teachers are trained in value education, automatically students will be changed morally.”
He also expressed his displeasure with elected representative abusing each other and emphasised on the necessity of value education for them as well. He also proposed a separate Bill for value education for public representatives.
Vishweshwar Hegde Kageri, Speaker, Legislature Assembly, said, “Moral education is needed for legislature, executive, judiciary and media also. The media and social media have higher responsibility for what to publish and what not.”
Sri Shivarathri Deshikendra Mahaswami of Suttur mutt, Mysuru, said, “Instead of teaching, we should execute religiosity and morality in practice. In the past years, Ramayana, Mahabharatha and other mythological stories were part of value education. However, mobile phones have become everything for children. Therefore, to bring them out from that addiction, value education for children, parents and teachers is needed,” he said.
In his speech, Sadguru Madhusudan Sai said teachers are role model for students. Therefore, teaching value education for the teacher is a must. Activity-based moral education is important and moral education should be with spiritual education, he added.
Nirmalanandanatha Swami of Adi Chunchanagiri mutt said implementation of moral education in schools is a demand of many decades. “Moral education is needed for children in the home and in schools from class 1 to the postgraduate level. Therefore, the moral education which is suitable for modern science and technology and also appropriate to our land is needed.”
Bhagavad Gita
Gangadharendra Saraswathi Swami of Swarnavalli Mutt batted in favour of Bhagavad Gita as a part of school curriculum.
“Bhavad Gita will be give its own sutras to the moral education. Bhagavad Gita is not areligious text. Therefore, the government should think about adopting the Gita as a part of school curriculum. Students should practice yoga, pranayama in the house. It will help to concentration to read and write,” he said.
In his conclusion, B.C. Nagesh, Minister for the Department of School Education and Literacy, said, “Implementation of value education to the school children is a decade old demand.
”In 1937, Shivakumara swami, late seer of Siddaganga Mutt, had spoken about implementing the spiritual education to the schoolchildren. This is the fist meeting in this regard and it was very successful. We will consolidate all these opinions and conduct a second meeting at Mysuru. We will constitute an experts committee and then implement value education in school from the academic year of 2023-23,” he said.