The following ways can help you to succeed in doing that:

1. Be open about your life story: Parents must have healthy communication with their children where they can be open about the events of their lives to their children. By that, we are not asking you to stick to the positive aspects only. The stories of failures are equally important because they will only teach them how their father or mother has made mistakes like everyone else but risen from there and not given up. It acts as a catalyst to inspire them in various ways. The unrealistic positive image is not something that your child will benefit from. Rather, portray yourself as human; maintain transparency and honesty to influence them in a positive manner.
2. Patience: This is the most important virtue that you must have as a parent. To deal with a child, a parent must have the required patience that would allow them to rectify the mistakes of the young ones with a positive attitude. Everything lies in the approach. The kind of approach you adapt to while dealing with a crisis is certainly going to reflect on your children.
3. Affection: With patience comes affection. It is extremely crucial for parents to give the desired affection to their children so that they feel cared for and loved within the family. This will help them see why their parents are the perfect role models and how they possess all the virtues to be one.
4. Encouragement: As children, they require a lot of encouragement from their parents to succeed in life. Even the smallest things have a large impact such as appreciating them while they make a painting, trying to boost their confidence when they fail once, and many more. The boarding school in Delhi NCR has mentors who are of an encouraging nature that will never let the morale of the students go down. If a child receives encouragement from his/ her parents, it will have a lifelong impact on their minds. That will not only make you a role model but also a savior. It is important to believe in your children and express that adequately through words of encouragement so that they don’t give up after the first failure.
5. Pampering v/s praising: A good parent will always understand the difference between pampering and praising. Appreciating them for a good deed is a good idea but going overboard and pampering them can have negative consequences. As a result, the children can develop a perception where parents will be taken for granted which will call for clashes. To avoid those, one should always maintain a healthy balance of pampering and praising.
6. Impart kindness: In all possible ways, try to deal with people kindly. It will help your children learn a lot from you and look up to you in times of need. Treating people with respect and kindness is going to induce good manners in your children who are observing you throughout their lives.
7. Be a listener: It has been stated previously that parental activities have a tremendous impact on children. Being a listener will only teach them how to be compassionate towards others. If you give your child an open space to talk, they will do the same with others who might need help in the future. As a parent, your contribution must be towards making your child a good-natured benevolent person that will make them see their role models in you.

If you want your child to be the best version of them, the boarding school near Delhi NCR must be considered for their education. The positive environment of the institution and proper guidance from faculty members will only aid this process. That’s where Swarnprastha Public School comes into the picture. It ranks top in the best boarding school in Haryana and aims at shaping the future of your children in all the best possible ways. Their all-inclusive curriculum and efficient teaching methods are only known to yield the best from the students and lead them towards the path of success.

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Not all news on the papers are meant for children today

Digital media has trumped the popularity of print media. This caused the latter to evolve in a way that became detrimental for readers. Two decades into the 21^st-century when social media has taken over as the main source of news providers, digital media has also followed a similar path as print to keep their heads above the water. Today, most news is directed to insight public fear and polarity. Most papers take a side and bash the opposite, giving up their once-famed feature of being able to stay neutral. Exposing children to such biases naturally modifies their mindset towards the world and society as a whole and negatively affects their well-being.

Plus, along with social media, both digital and print media has become susceptible to fake news. In their scuffle to print exciting and engaging news, even the respected news channels across the world pick up misinformation and print without verification. When the fees of boarding schools in India are trying their best to educate the students against the menace of fake news, a daily intake of such information from a presumed-trusted source breaks the spine of all the school’s hard work.

Lastly, newspapers today are glorying the overhyped lifestyles. Instead of promoting free thought, most papers are painting only one side of the pretty pictures that are driving students towards meaningless engagements and pastimes. In all, newspapers have evolved beyond the level of being student-friendly where information was once presented as it is without the infusion of the media house’s agenda. Students do not need opinions to be enforced upon them. They need to read the facts and form their own ideas.

But not all newspapers have lost their integrities

Fortunately, there are still a handful of newspapers and media houses around who are functioning in exactly the way they should be. They are still bringing well-researched hard facts to their readers without superimposing any side’s agenda on the news. These are the papers that students should spend their time with daily and these are the papers that students should pick up to improve their reading and comprehension skills. The best boarding school in India has subscriptions for these in its libraries. And students are repeatedly given examples of reports from these newspapers to direct them towards these actually trusted resources that publish ethically for the readers.

Magazines and books are other alternatives

Along with newspapers, today’s students must have the habit of reading magazines and books. These also serve the same reading and comprehension benefits. What books do, as opposed to newspapers, is that they do not bombard the students with a bunch of new information daily and they comprehend the matter at hand better than the standard news reading children. 21^st-century students require knowledge depth. News is a great way to catch up but never build a knowledge trove. When complemented closely by great books and magazines, newspapers can serve the very purpose that it is supposed to in the first place.

The benefits of reading newspapers are real

But caution is necessary at all levels. Reading daily, newspapers or books increases vocabulary. It keeps the students informed and leads to better discussions. Their education becomes more application-oriented. The routine is way better than mindlessly spending time in front of the television. But reading news that incites fear, hatred, polarity, bias, adulterated opinion or fake perception of reality is a direct threat to the students’ well-being and this is where today’s schools must step in to ensure that reading the news daily remains a good habit for the children. When the industry has evolved, the students’ education must evolve too so that critical thinking takes precedence overall.

Swarnprastha Public School, thus, does not blindly advise its students to read newspapers daily. Neither are they encouraged to collect all their information (and believe them) from the news only. SPS has a modified approach to increase their students’ vocabulary, reading, and comprehension skills where the trusted newspapers just form a part. The information that students consume today ultimately shapes their vision of the future. SPS maintains that they are directed towards the right and authentic facts.

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1. Subject knowledge

No longer can students just pass with high grades and no understanding of the subjects? Marks are gradually losing their prominence and subject knowledge is becoming the demanding aspect. Schools, thus, need to focus on engagement and retention more than results and advancement. Without knowledge of depth, students will struggle later.

2. Extra-curricular activities

Pursuing extra-curricular activities is more important now as the world is slowly acknowledging its potential to teach soft skills. Education now encompasses involvement in sports, music, drama, and dance as these are considered as performance boosters rather than result inhibitors. Each student must pursue at least two activities aside from academics.

3. STEAM

STEM subjects shot to fame in the early 2000s when technology took over almost all industries. Schools shifted to teaching science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. Although STEM is still a trend, the best boarding school in India now identify the importance of Arts among Science. Going forward, STEAM has to replace STEM.

4. Future technology

If the idea is to get students ready for the future, then teaching present technology only will not complete the job. Along with computer programming, students must gain exposure to robotics, 3D printing, data science, cloud computing, and other such areas that are slowly taking hold. The foundation of future technology must be built in schools.

5. Soft skills

Proficiency in mathematics or literature is known as a hard skill. Critical thinking, leadership, and problem-solving are placed under soft skills. At a time when recruiting companies are stressing the need for emotional intelligence, schools of the 21^st-century have to prioritize soft skills. Workshops and events are great ways to build these. As stated, even extra-curricular activities help.

6. Foreign language

Globalization is not a new concept. Right now, it has evolved into a structure where people of different countries are working together and companies are expanding rapidly to become multinationals. Knowing a foreign language is already seen as a perk. Obviously, the future will make it a necessary skill where every student must speak at least one foreign language.

7. International curriculum

Preparing a student for a global world cannot happen with a local curriculum. Hence the best boarding school in India includes a global program along with the domestic syllabus where students get the opportunity to reap the benefits of both worlds. The international curriculum needs more penetration. Or else, students will feel lost in a connected world.

8. Environmental awareness

The alarm bells on climate change are already tolling. And the current batch of students will be more affected than any other previous generation. Environmental awareness is thus an obvious priority. Equipped with the knowledge and understanding of how to protect the environment, students can act to apply their skills to sustainable development.

9. Entrepreneurial approach

Teaching students to have an entrepreneurial mindset will make them go-getters. They will be action-oriented and have a unique approach to problems. This is a skill of the future. Companies are no longer looking for employees but want to hire entrepreneurs. If the training starts at school, the approach will become a habit and such students will be invincible in life.

10. Self-learning

In just two to three years from now, students will not be able to afford to stop learning right after college. Down the lane, learning will become a continuous process. Modern schools must teach students to be self-learners first and then instruction-followers as the skill to research and explore has already become highly valued.

These priorities make a school the perfect educational institution for any student. This school is capable of forecasting rights and teaching as per the necessities of the 21^st-century. And no other name can surpass Swarnprastha Public School which has always been ahead of the curve ever since its inception and prepared students to thrive in their lives and careers no matter which timeline they stepped into. SPS is preparing its current students through programs like the Duke of Edinburgh’s International Award, ATAL Tinkering Lab, and Microsoft Imaging Academy. SPS students will be the best placed to deal with the challenges of the 21^st-century.

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As evident, a sync between knowledge demand and school curriculum is vital. To make the students fit for the future to come, schools must take up the onus to teach content and skills that will convert the children into thriving professionals. In the absence of sync, recruiting companies will find a knowledge gap between fresh graduates and their job needs. The demand for knowledge and skills is bound to change with changing times. Schools need to foresee this, act, and try to maintain the required sync.

The ace in the schools’ hands – infrastructure

Consider a few modern-day knowledge and skills that students need to have today going forward.

• Science, technology, engineering, arts, and mathematics or, in short, STEAM
• Creativity and problem-solving skills
• Excellent communication skills, both written and verbal
• History and geography, not as a theory only but as an application as well
• IT knowledge in fields like data science, cloud computing, and more
• And social awareness of pressing world issues

The demands of the above are irrefutable. Tomorrow’s students need to be efficient in most, if not all, to lead a healthy and successful lifestyle. Here comes the question as to how can schools incorporate the aforementioned knowledge and skill demands into their curriculum? Is mere theory enough, an approach which most schools of the country are already following? The answer is no. Even if taught the content, students can hardly derive any value from the knowledge unless the application is thrown into the mix.

And how do the best school in Sonipat create applicative knowledge? By creating a standout infrastructure around the knowledge demands that take education beyond the boundaries of textbooks into the real world. One typical example is language labs where students can learn grammar from various resources rather than solving a worksheet from the textbook. Interactive media are called into action to sharpen the students’ language and communication skills. Robotics and 3D printing labs are other examples. Good schools are teaching coding in these labs where students are writing programs to move a robotic arm rather than printing a pattern on the computer screen. Infrastructure is thus the ace in hand for schools to create the necessary sync between knowledge demand and school curriculum.

The way of teaching needs to adapt as well

So, a top school in Sonipat will identify the subjects that need to be taught. And it will develop the infrastructure necessary to impart the required knowledge and skills of those subjects. The connection between these two elements can only be drawn by the pedagogy followed in the classrooms and that is how the demand is met by the supply. Creating digital citizens of tomorrow cannot happen through teaching with a blackboard. Creativity cannot be expected if students are not given the freedom to imagine and explore ideas. The way of teaching needs to adapt to the changing knowledge demands to make the school curriculum fit for the future job world.

For instance, say the students successfully moved a robotic arm in the robotics laboratory. They now know about writing a program of the same. But do they understand what all worked inside the robot to cause that effect? What laws of physics came in to create such a marvel? Physics lessons thus have to include what was taught in the computer and robotics class. This science subject can no longer teach the laws and the examples given only in the books. Pedagogy forms the associations between knowledge and skill fragments. With the links established, the sync between knowledge demand and the school curriculum is complete.

Swarnprastha Public School boasts world-class mathematics and language labs. SPS also houses an ATAL Tinkering Lab that teaches 3D printing, robotics, IoT, and more. Plus, it has signed an MoU with Microsoft to create the Microsoft Imagine Academy within the institution which concentrates on IT and computer science knowledge like data science, cloud computing, Microsoft Office,  and software development. These are Swarnprastha’s infrastructure arsenal. Combined with its experienced teachers and progressive curriculum, the school is best placed to meet the evolving knowledge demands.SPS educates its students to thrive. And it is visible in every nuance of the school.

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The function of the counselling cell

Let us ensure the discussion with the help of an example. Consider a primary school student who is showing the following behaviour traits.

• She is often inattentive in class. She also struggles to note down her homework deadlines and thus rarely completes her assignments.
• The student is also disruptive in the class. Talking to peers while the teacher is teaching or denying to follow rules is frequently noticed.

How should a school deal with such a student? Write a note to the parent and go for suspension? Your logical mind will immediately tell you that there are no solutions. Instead, the counselling department should step in to find out the root cause of the student’s behaviour.

The above are typical symptoms of a learning disorder. It can vary from ADHD to dyslexia and can be brought under control through focused personalised lessons. The counselling department of the best boarding school in India does just that where an expert psychologist converses with the student to find out her difficulties and then collaborates with her parents and teachers to formulate a lesson plan. The is no job for a career counsellor.

The function of a career counsellor

Now suppose this very student has reached her senior standards. She has passed her 10^th board and has a decision to make about which stream to pick in the 11^th class – science, commerce or arts? She is still unsure about the career path that she wants to follow in her life and takes her confusion to the school’s career counsellor.

The career expert notices the following:

• The student exhibits a flair for creativity. But she also has talent in analytics, problem-solving and mathematics.
• The student is not an academic, she dislikes spending time with books.
• She is shy, maybe an introvert, and enjoys listening to music.

Now, combining the flairs of creativity and music, you can say that the student should take up arts and pursue music. But she also has talent in analytics which can drive her to become a successful computer programmer. A career counsellor possesses the expertise to make such suggestions by digging deeper through psychological evaluations and aptitude tests and keeping all stereotypes aside.

The noticeable difference

Career guidance comes into the picture when a student is thinking about her career. Counselling can step in at any point in a student’s life. Plus, the two experts will have two different sets of expertise and one can never dawn the role of another. Counsellors must be trained psychologists. They need to observe behaviour to figure out underlying issues. Career counsellors, on the other hand, can be veteran executives who have worked in an industry for a long time. They can take up the role with basic training in psychology.

This is why the best boarding school in India always maintain two different departments for counselling and career guidance. There might be times when the expert of one may have to collaborate with another but their roles cannot merge. The psychological evaluation for career guidance can be done by the psychologist but he/she will rarely be in a place to suggest a career path having never worked as an executive in any company or seeing a number of them work from close quarters. If smart boards and expansive playgrounds help children’s daily education, then both counselling and career guidance aid in the progress of the same.

Out of the many institutions in Sonepat, Swarnprastha Public School features among the very few where counselling and career guidance departments exist independently. Their exclusivity preserves the value of the experts and the guidance that they bring for the students. In the 21^st-century, no school’s infrastructure is truly complete without priorities given to learning disabilities and career counselling and the fact that they exist in SPS as separate departments show the school’s progressiveness. Scientific research has connected students’ mental health with the quality of education received. Facts have shown that students need career guidance right in their schools. Denying these are never the mark of a great school.

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When the notice does come to go back to school, we will all have to overcome our fear of the virus, maintain safety precautions and be responsible for the health of the teachers, staff, students, and parents alike. For a smooth transition into normal schooling, here are 6 tips for parents and students.

Tips for parents:

1. Communicate clearly with your child

The top CBSE schools in Sonipat will ask you to clearly communicate with your child about going back to school as they will when the students return. It is illogical to assume that the children do not fear the virus. Chances are that they are more scared than you are. Talk to your child and explain the facts. Tell him/her that the chances of catching the virus reduce if he/she maintains personal hygiene habits like wearing masks and washing hands. And on the possibility that the student catches the virus, he/she is likely to heal completely with rest.

2. Get him/her into a disinfection routine

Set a few rules for your child when he/she is outside. For instance, ask the child to wash hands thoroughly with soap before touching any food. Also, use the santiser in the bag frequently after touching a hard surface. Teach him/her to cough or sneeze in the elbow and never to take off the mask when in spaces filled with people. Try your best to turn these into a routine. Keep close watch and practice at home. Once the practices become a habit, your child will maintain these safety measures without any type of adult supervision.

3. Teach the essence of responsible reporting

The COVID-19 carries symptoms similar to the common cold. This is where you need to step in and teach your child the importance of responsible reporting. Although schools and parents will carry the responsibility of keeping any sick child home, students sitting in the mix must also understand that a normal cough is not COVID-19. Here again, talk to your child to report any such instance to the teacher instead of spreading the news around in the class. Make sure he/she understands that rumours can cause chaos.

Tips for students:

4. Follow the school’s health rules always

All schools in Sonipat will hand out a set of rules to be followed strictly while on the premises. And every point on that sheet will be for the benefit of your health. You must ensure that you follow them closely and encourage your peers to do the same as the question of safety concerns the community. Practices like social distancing, sanitising at the gate, not forming a hurdle in the corridors or coming to school with masks will help to keep the threat of COVID-19 away and keep education on track without any more hiccups.

5. Take your issues to the teacher

It will not be easy to get back to the routine of schooling again. You might be facing problems settling in or struggling to concentrate in the class given the uncertainty. With time, these feelings might go away but you should immediately report your issues to the teacher. Arrange online individual sessions, if required, or share your concerns with the school’s counsellor. You may also help a friend to seek counselling so that the entire class can move forward without anyone staying behind.

6. Focus on facts

The top 5 schools in Sonipat teach critical thinking to make students responsible citizens. You must use that skill to focus on facts about the coronavirus and keep the myths away from your life. When you are returning to school and stepping into society again, you will come across various news from different people. Think over them critically, discuss them in class. Avoid assuming every word of what you hear to be true and spreading fear in the process. Logically analyse and then believe.

The disruption has caused a pandemonium. But with proper guidance, everyone can fit in again. Swarnprastha Public School is currently focusing on just that as the priority is not only on physical health but on mental well-being as well. Once open, SPS will work closely with the local authorities, teachers, parents, students and staff to maintain a healthy ambiance in the school and bring education back on track through efficient collaboration.

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For managing their classrooms filled with young students, the schools and their teachers typically employ the following methods.

Strategic classroom layout

A disorganised layout can quickly throw the entire preschool classroom into chaos. One incident can spread like smoke among others. Hence, proper management must begin with creating a strategic layout where every student has ample space to move around, form queues and walk up to the blackboard to write a letter. The required tools must be available nearby. Clear labels must distinguish the colours from the pencils. Organisation prevents unnecessary disruptions and helps the teachers to save valuable time. Plus, the children stay safe and interact better. Obviously, learning stays at the forefront rather than maintaining order.

Clear goal setting

SPS, the best playschools in Sonipat follows a goal-oriented curriculum in all their grades but the emphasis increases in its preschool classrooms. Having clear goals solves two purposes simultaneously. One, the young students derive a sense of achievement every time a goal is met, which motivates them further to tackle the next goal. And two, goals help the multitasking preschool teacher to stay on track and progress the curriculum without lagging behind in the intended schedule. At this stage, the goals need to be small and achievable. Many teachers also set daily and weekly goals to make education more manageable.

Technology infusion

In preschool classes today, technology not only exists in the lessons but also finds its way into management. Along with smartboards and audio jacks, modern schools use performance tracking applications, online database management systems and virtual communication channels to increase the efficiency of classroom flow. Preschoolers develop at an unprecedented rate. They show new signs of learning and unique behaviours almost every hour. Keeping track of all such signs of progress of each and every student is obviously beyond the human capacity of any preschool teacher. Here, technology comes in to eliminate redundant tasks. With the help of such management applications, the schools can personalise their lessons better.

Activity-based collaborative learning

Preschoolers are often filled with energy. During such times, it is counterproductive to make them sit on their benches and listen diligently to the teacher. The top pre- and nursery modern school Sonipat thus applies a strategy known as activity-based collaborative learning that provides both the scope of imparting the desired lesson and give an outlet for those pent-up energies to flow out. Going by the moniker, the teachers typically involves the students in group activities where they are to engage in a learning activity either in the classroom or on the playground. Learning alphabets start happening by identifying entities in the nature around or completing craftwork together in small teams.

Having behaviour expectations

Unlike popular opinion, preschoolers are remarkable instruction followers. If a child is disruptive, he/she is generally trying to communicate something which an expert preschool teacher can understand. Otherwise, when clear behavioural expectations are set, the young students try to follow every pointer to their best or learn from each other as to what is allowed and what is not. Modern schools hand out clear behaviour expectations from day one. Their teachers reiterate and reinforce every rule from time to time. Every nuance of preschool classroom management comes together when the behaviour of the classroom is orderly and this is the tactic from which other aspects start diverging.

The current era has given schools more tools and resources to work with than what was available a decade ago. Modern schools can tap into almost anything instantly to raise their benchmark of effectiveness. Swarnprastha Public School functions on similar lines where it elevates its preschool education quality by employing effective classroom strategies and enabling the teachers with the autonomy to implement them. SPS’s preschool wing is a thriving batch for good reasons and it has been so for a solid number of years. The school is all about modern academic systems and using researched-backed strategies to teach its students.

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This is why you are likely to find that the best school in Sonipat is co-ed. Educational institutions that are not blindly focussed on the academic end-result believe that girls and boys need to study and grow together to become better citizens of the future. Out of the many stated by educational psychologists, a few benefits of coeducation are undeniable and their success rate draws the conclusive line as to this is indeed the right way to go.

We live in a co-gender world

If schools are supposed to prepare us for the future, then how can our children learn to survive in a co-gender world by learning from a single-gender school? This is the fundamental benefit of co-ed schools, the aspect from which the concept stemmed. Research has shown that students from an all-boys school found it difficult to interact or make friends with the opposite gender when placed in a group of both boys and girls. The all-boys school’s students sided with the views of the boys of the group and steered clear whenever the opportunity to interact with a girl came up.

Co-ed advocates argue that such tendencies lead to gender inequalities and stereotypes in the workplace. They also say that single-gender school students find it difficult to establish a happy family in their personal lives hinged on communication. On the flip side, in that same research, boys from co-ed schools had no such difficulties to mix in the group. They interacted freely and made friends with girls and were not judgemental when the opposite gender presented an idea to the group.

It removes gender stereotypes

Another benefit why most modern schools in Sonipat prefer to be coeducational than single-gender. To understand this phenomenon, another group of researchers conducted a survey in two academically similar schools. One was a co-ed and another all-girls. Their results showed that a majority of the middle school students of the all-girls school believed that they were weak in mathematics and stated the reason that girls are supposed to be weak in computation than boys. No such belief or reason existed among the girl students of the co-ed school.

In fact, neuropsychology says that girls’ brains develop before boys. There is no evidence of any sort that such a computational difference can exist. Yet, due to stereotypes or social upbringing, both sides continue to stay with that distinction which they carry on to their college and workplace. The girl students of the co-ed school could compare themselves with the boys directly. Even if they were told otherwise, they could prove consistently that mathematics is not gender-dependent. In the girl’s school, however, the students missed out on the opportunity to compare which could break their beliefs.

Academic success depends on the curriculum

To counter the suggestion that single-gender schools have always outperformed coeducational institutions, expert educational researchers suggest looking beyond the gender factor. All the performing single-gender schools also had a strict curriculum, lay massive focus on extra-curricular activities, and taught with the help of veteran teachers. The researchers pinpointed that placing those same factors in a coeducational school and one is bound to see similar results. Evidently, the co-ed schools in the list of top 5 schools in Sonipat perform at par with the single-gender ones. With the same infrastructure and curriculum, nothing can truly suggest that gender was the reason for improved performance.

Swarnprastha Public School naturally believes that a coeducational background is necessary to thrive in the future. Students must learn to coexist together by sitting in the same class, learning in diverse groups, and exchanging ideas equally without any gender bias. SPS has always been a coeducational institution. With appropriate boundaries, SPS encourages intercommunication and co-learning. The concept of separately learning and working as the developments are not similar are truly obsolete. As stated, the overall benefits of coeducation can bypass the opponent any day. Co-ed schools are the present and the future.

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Yet, the top 5 boarding school in India continues to follow the standardized pattern. The CBSE board itself has no other way of judging students’ educational growth. Then, should you be terming these schools and institutions as backward? Or should you remain skeptical about enrolling your children in schools? The top schools have their own reasons to hold onto standardized tests and naturally, they do not merely focus on these as absolute methods. In good schools, standardized tests continue to matter, but with certain modifications.

To present a clear picture, let us first properly define what standardized tests actually are. That will set the foundation for exploring the two sides of this coin. With that knowledge, you will be appropriately placed to contemplate the school’s reasonings and better understand the validity of standardized tests. Let’s get started.

What are the standardized tests?

Most of the conventional examinations that you have taken in your educational and/or professional career were probably standardized tests. To state it simply, every candidate is required to undertake the same task, answering a group of questions or clearing a few obstacle races, and the evaluation is done as a comparison against one another. In the Indian education system, all students taking a particular exam are required to answer the same question paper and their performances are compared depending on the grades they receive. The core expectation of these examinations is that students are required to meet a particular standard or benchmark which serves as the evaluator’s guide to judge a student’s performance.

Generally, there are two major types of standardized tests that most Indian schools follow.

1. Standardized aptitude tests
2. Standardized achievement tests

In the first category, the exam is set to predict the difficulty level of the next grade, and accordingly, the questions are assigned. For instance, a school testing its students in the annual exams judges the difficulty level of grade 6 that the students are likely to face and the questions they set for the grade 5 students are obviously as per that predicted complexity. The students who meet the basic standard, or clear the passing marks, get promoted.

In achievement tests, the exams measure present development. They are the class tests that most schools carry out periodically. Standardized achievement tests measure the overall progress, compare the growth with the previous test scores, and pinpoints the strong and weak areas of students as compared to a given standard. Teachers get an insight into the class’s present knowledge levels as the tests are precisely designed based on that.

As evident, both the above forms of standardized tests are necessary. In fact, the boarding school in India combines the results of these two tests to create the final result. The weightage may differ but the insights achieved are enriching. And this is one of the many reasons why the Indian education system continues to favor standardized tests.

Then, why are standardized tests seen in a negative light?

As the famous saying goes, if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its entire life believing that it is a failure. Non-believers of standardized testing are basically questioning the reliability and validity of the system. The argument that they are constantly bringing forward is that a standard exam cannot measure all the unique skills that students possess. And the reasonings are undeniable. There are indeed a few factors that standardized tests do not consider during the evaluation.

1. To date, soft skills remain outside the testing boundaries

The global education system as a whole agrees that today’s children need to learn soft skills in school. Yet, standardized tests do not incorporate the evaluation of skills like creativity, critical thinking, and collaboration ability. In the 21^st-century, these skills are as vital as in-depth knowledge of science and schools are continuing to struggle to test students including these. The ultimate result is that, without evaluation, the incorporation of 21^st-century skills is becoming generalized. Everyone knows that they are brought taught by the school but hardly anyone is being to test their existence or growth.

2. Educational diversity also stays outside

A survey conducted in schools of Michigan, United States, showed that almost all standardized tests set by those institutions were textbook-oriented. There were a few preferred books, the questions were framed from their chapters, and students were directed to study only those materials for passing their exams. It is no news that one book cannot cover the entire required scope of education. Students must feel the freedom to study from any resource that they are curious about. Standardized tests have the tendency of making students bookish, thus, preventing them from exploring other diverse academic options.

Plus, there are other profound drawbacks of standardized examinations.

3. They are unreliable to some extent

Consider a student who suffers from exam anxiety. He might know the subject matter completely but the lack of nerves will prevent him from answering the questions in the exam hall. Another student may be suffering from a reading disability like dyslexia. She will take more time to comprehend the questions as compared to an average student. Understandably, both these students will not fair well in standardized tests where the questions and the time to answer them are fixed. Their grades will also not reflect their true potential or knowledge. In such scenarios, standardized exams become an unreliable evaluation system.

4. They negatively affect student confidence

Which is inevitable. The grades that ultimately come out are, after all, comparisons. They either compare the students against each other (the percentile method) or against a set benchmark (the percentage method). If owing to anxiety or a disability, a student does fail to perform in the standardized exam, he/she will gradually start deprecating his/her self-worth. This starts a negative loop. The anxious student will feel more anxious. The student with dyslexia will recoil. Education will suffer in the end when the fault was never with the student, to begin with. Standardized tests do bring down motivation. And this is a negative impact that still plagues the system.

Fortunately, the best boarding school in India identifies these drawbacks. And such institutions do take the necessary steps to combat them. But the reason why they continue to carry on with this assessment system is the benefits that it provides to schools and boards as a whole.

Positives of standardized tests

1. The system is highly efficient

Think at schools’ levels only. Designing a personalized assessment system that will take into account the unique skills of every student will be a herculean task. Now, multiply that with the number of schools that function under the CBSE board and the number of students the central authority has to administer. How possibly can the institution design a personal assessment for everyone? Thus, standardized exams are still an efficient system to evaluate a large number of students fast. It might not be a perfect way, but it is also not totally inaccurate as well. By testing students through a set of questions, any educational establishment can quickly form a general report of the overall performance.

2. Comparison is required to evaluate progress

What is the metric to measure development? Can anyone call something progressive without having a standard to compare it with? Hence, to evaluate educational progress, a boarding school in India still prefers standardized tests. These are some of the best ways to evaluate a student’s present potential and predict his/her future capacity. As already stated, the questions in standardized exams are set keeping in mind the outcome of the exam, to evaluate a student’s present knowledge and his/her ability to cope with higher complexity, and hence, the grades actually reflect and filter students who can and cannot meets those ends. All-inclusive exams are partly counterproductive here. Especially, when the volume factor exists.

3. Standardized tests provide accountability

When all students of a particular class or a school sit for the same exam, the results reflect how well the entire class or school is doing. This gives rise to accountability. If the whole class did well, then the teacher can conclude that the lesson plans are working. If the results were poor, then the educator feels the need to bring in a few modifications. Similarly, at the school level, good standardized scores portray the institute’s academic effectiveness while mediocre marks go on to show that the school is probably doing a few things wrong. Standardized tests are again an efficient way to extract feedback. Concerned authorities depend on this system to constantly evaluate their performance and role out beneficial academic programs for the students. The alternative may not provide such deep accountability as schools will not have one metric to depend on.

4. There is no room for human bias

With standardized tests, human bias immediately vanishes. Take a simple example. Say a teacher, who is also the evaluator, finds a student disruptive in class. Naturally, he/she will form a negative bias towards this student owing to the continuous bad experience that he/she faced. Now, when this teacher has no set metric to evaluate the student with but is free to include classroom behaviors, skills, and other such non-standardized parameters, his/her human bias is bound to work. Note that this is totally unintentional. The teacher may try hard to keep the past behind but the experiences are bound to influence his/her evaluation. Standardized tests have no room for such inconsistencies. With just one accepted system, human bias is automatically kept out of the loop.

In short, standardized examinations come with both pros and cons. And unfortunately (or fortunately), both sides are equally heavy. Even when a lot of negativity surrounds the concept, the boarding school in India understand the system’s value. But as with most things, the decision is never binary. No one can simply state that going forward with standardized tests is the right path to take or totally abolishing it is the solution. What can act as a fix is to continue to reap the benefits of standardized tests, concurrently managing the drawbacks on the side.

Possible evaluation approaches that schools can adopt

Various approaches have been suggested by numerous educational researchers and some of them are already in use. The motive is to combine the best of both worlds and include the involved interests of both the schools and the students. Here are a few ways in which the prevalent standardized exams can be modified. As will be evident, each approach tackles the issue of the unique needs that students face, simultaneously preserving the efficiency and accountability factor that schools wish to involve.

1. Giving equal weightage to various topics

Instead of just testing the fish’s ability to climb a tree, why not include swimming in the exam as well? That is what equal weightage means. The boarding school in India employs this system in their standardized tests, similar to the manner CBSE follows in its exams as well. In mathematics, for example, an equal number of questions come from the three general sections – arithmetic, geometry, and algebra. There are options where the students are free to choose from which section they want to answer the most, giving them the freedom to play to their strengths. And every student is also required to answer at least one or two questions from each where the basic knowledge of each section is tested. The pattern is followed with every other subject, thus combining standards with skills.

2. Mixing up the question pattern

Not long ago, schools and the boards started incorporating MCQs and short questions into their exams instead of just keeping the papers long-answer based. This made room for those students who possess comprehension difficulties and could score just by ticking the right option. It also freed up time in the standard slot, giving more freedom to students with difficulties to space out their answers and take them easy. Mixing up question patterns by keeping all the student’s needs in mind and providing choices here as well modify standardized exams positively. This is where the all-inclusive factor comes in that the other side so desperately wants to include.

3. Setting partial weightage to projects

Project-based learning takes care of a lot of loopholes that standardized exams tend to have. When students are allowed to pursue projects and their efforts are marked, all other aspects that were initially absent from standardized exams come into the fray as well. With projects, students are given the scope to research topics beyond their textbooks. They are also made to work in a group that involves collaboration into the mix. Creativity is taken into account by how well the project is presented and critical thinking comes in naturally when students are forced to decide what to include in the report and what not to. Plus, the project-based evaluation does not have to be standardized. Every student or group can choose their own topics.

4. Provision for counseling at school

The boarding school in India houses a counseling department within its premises. If such schools are to follow standardized tests, they are willing to deal with the repercussions as well. If a student is indeed becoming demotivated with standardized tests, the counselor can help to identify the possible reasons and assist the student to fight those issues. Plus, as the interaction is always one-to-one, a school counselor is best placed to identify a learning disability, guide the teachers in educating the child and also help parents to be patient. Suggestions from the department can go to the management as well to modify a few systems to accommodate the needs of this specific student.

So, finally, coming to the question – should standardized continue to exist in schools? Yes, along with the above measures. As a standalone system, the method is definitely not effective. But overall, it is efficient and productive. The CBSE board in India is doing its very best to modernize the existing system. And good schools are also following suit to allow proper education to take center stage.

Swarnprastha Public School falls on that list. Being a boarding school in India, it naturally follows the board-directed system of standardized exams. Still, SPS is modern enough to follow an all-inclusive assessment procedure that personalizes exam parameters to required levels and seeks to test students depending on their individual mettle. The school maintains a top-notch infrastructure to give the ultimate academic exposure to students. Internally, SPS conducts skill-based assessments to develop abilities along with knowledge. This is where standardized exams exist in their modern form, but the pros of the other side find inclusion as well.

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1. Make a list of scholarships that you can apply for

The top 5 schools in Sonepat will always help you with this by already pinning the relevant list on its notice board. Or, you can simply search on the internet and create a curated list for you by including all the university and private scholarships that you can apply for. The initial sheet will definitely not be detailed and you might have to add or eliminate a few names along the way. But having the list will help you to narrow your vision. Focus on all the available scholarships. Even of less popular countries where Indian students do not go.

2. Carefully read the included details

Pick one name at a time from your list and read the instructions thoroughly. You will not be eligible for a few scholarships while others will require you to know an uncommon language. Create an excel sheet if required or maintain a notebook where you jot down the key necessities of each scholarship and can compare all side by side. This is where elimination will begin and you get to focus on only those scholarships which you possess the highest chance of securing. The rest will merely consume your time without delivering results.

3. Find out the similarities and differences

American and Australian scholarships might want proficiency in English as an eligibility criterion. If that is already your model of education in school, these are the first scholarships you should apply for. Next, a few European scholarships might want French. The best school in Sonepat teaches that under its foreign language curriculum and places you ahead of the curve. On similar grounds, a few scholarships might seem totally out of place from the others, and managing these along with your boards might become cumbersome. Keep them for the last and prioritize similar scholarships first.

4. Frame your essays as per the colleges’ needs

Universities ask their applicants to write essays about themselves or answer questions that can give them an insight into your personality. Avoid writing similar answers to all your applications. Your evaluators are smart people who read hundreds of essays every year and they simply ignore general answers like hardworking and talented. Read the college’s mission and vision. Show them, with your answers, what you want to learn and what all do you bring to the table. Do not copy-paste but write fresh every time.

5. Apply as early as possible

Sure, the above steps will take time but you should not wait for the very last day to send in your application. Your candidature is ultimately judged by humans and they tend to skip and skim when the deadline arrives and they are flooded with essays and answers. If possible, do all the necessary research when you are still in your 11^th standard and have the list ready by the time you are on the 12^th. As soon as the application opens, take a couple of weeks to fill in the details and send them way before the mentioned deadline.

6. Diversify your options

You might want to study in America but Australia is easier to get into. The UK curriculum might seem enticing but Sweden is doing great as well. Keep in mind that popularity increases the number of applications and diminishes your chances. However, when you look at the BRICS countries, Latin America, or Northern Europe, your chances open up due to decreased competition. Judge the surrounding parameters like safety and career prospects and diversify your scholarship portfolio to guarantee a result.

Lastly, your school also plays a massive role in pushing your desire to study overseas. You will need an international curriculum combined with the right exposure and proper skill development sessions. Swarnprastha Public School, one of the top-ranking boarding schools in Sonepat, mentors its students on such grounds. SPS teaches French, has collaborations with Microsoft Imaging Academy and the Duke of Edinburgh’s International Award, and maintains a counseling cell to assist students in their personal career ambitions. You can only study abroad if you know the proper application channels. If your school keeps you oblivious, you will almost always find yourself in the dark.

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