Vivir Y Pensar

To live and to think

A change of perspectives in school system

Nowadays, there is the belief that making students memorize huge amounts of information and follow instructions during primary and secondary school will, somehow, ensure their success in life. However, the realism of that is comparable to the idea that our noses grow longer every time we tell a lie.

From the very beginning, kids have been taught to close-mindedly do as they are told and that this is enough to thrive while, in reality, we all know it is not -and I can personally relate to that. What we should really be doing is to focus on the true basics: teaching how to fit well and live in our society and, more importantly, teaching how to think.

Firstly, what do we refer to when we say "thinking"? Certainly, not simply to the ability of understanding a task, for example; it goes far beyond that. Thinking is the process of taking, analyzing and structuring information in a way so we can do something useful with it - like solving new-coming problems (Cabrera, 2011). Being this said, I believe we can all agree that thinking is vital, yet the problem is that, apparently, it is not even happening inside of our college students' brains; fact which poses a big threat to their careers and every-day life.

The issue will probably remain present as long as we keep on feeding the information factor only and looking away from the application factor. We need to start focusing on the reality students will face afterwards and not on what they are facing during school because that time does not depict, at all, the independent life that awaits them.

How are students supposed to make it in life if they are not able to use all the information they learned? How are people supposed to live if they don't know how to think? It is clear the school system is not working as it should since -according to Cabrera- even the best college students lack in thinking skills. So, needless to say, it is imperative to patch, fix and overwrite the existing system to highlight the teaching of thinking and remove any obstacle that may hinder the process.

The point, besides preparing kids individually for next stages, is to ensure a good future for the country. It's important to know full well that students are the future, and if this future is led by no-thinking people, what should we expect from it? Probably injustice, poverty, high crime rates and failed attempts to improve the country. Why? because we need plans and we need to constantly solve problems that require the use of thinking skills.

If kids are going to stand by themselves someday, they need to be taught how to. That's what school is for. If we don't teach them to think, they will not end up miraculously being thinkers - as Cabrera

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