Stop killing creativity in Pakistan

‘’The joy is in creating, not maintaining’’.  Unfortunately, our current education system is based on rote-learning. Creativity is not seeded in child behavior even in early school life and throughout his education career. A kid of grade-iv is compelled to memorize obscure words like ‘osteoporosis’, ‘lukewarm’, ‘decomposers’, ‘constriction’, ‘reproduction’, ‘pollen grain’, ‘ammonia’, ‘kingdom’, ‘measurement’, ‘rectangular’, ‘transformer’, ‘ammonium’, ‘chloride’, ‘sulphuric acid’ etc. Here is, where murder of creativity starts, whose consequences remain with the children throughout their lives.



As far as curriculum is concerned, despite of having significant number of PhDs in sciences, still the text books are written in “anti-Science” way. Text with vague diagrams, memory-based exercises are the pattern, which often looks like a guide for teacher not for the student.

Not only the curriculum, highly paid teachers are also unable to develop a creative and innovative environment in classrooms, labs and even in research centers. Many teachers teach with the help of notes. Many help their students cheat in exams.  Almost all of them are ‘Creativity Killers’ as their routine dialogs are:

“Follow the rules. Don’t be different. Stay within lines. There is only one way. Don’t be foolish. Be practical. Be serious. Think of your image. That’s not logical. It’s not practical.  It’ll never be done. It can’t be done. It didn’t work well. We tried that before. We can’t afford to make a mistake. It will be too hard to manage. We don’t have the time and money. Failure is final. Yes, But…!”



A 9-year-old kid carries a bag of 12 kg on their shoulder. It can physically tire children and upset them mentally as anyone can see their sober and serious faces in the school. Doing homework in 12 notebooks can exhaust children and there is great possibility of psychological pressure and stress on them.



Where are we? People complain about load shedding, lack of food quality, high inflation and the government services but I have ever never heard parents expressing concern about the improper education of their kids; instead they rely on the education system – it seems we are on the peak of ignorance in this regard.

Activity-based learning is valuable and lucrative as introduced in Singapore. Singapore model of schooling is among top three of the world. Such a model can maintain the joy and interest of children and compel them to think creatively.



Government must bring reforms in the education sector, otherwise not more than a feeble hope we should keep. Parents must assess their children and keep engaging with them in healthy activities so that they grow freely without any psychological pressure and stress.