The following interview was conducted in Cordoba, Argentina, on June 17, 2009
The original version is found at http://www.lavoz.com.ar/nota.asp?nota_id=529268
The Voice of the Interior was published in the newspaper on Sunday, June 28, 2009
Here comes the edited version.
“The traditional school is collapsing”
"I don't blame any teacher or system, because the change was faster than the ability to handle the issue."
The new generation of restless children that fill schools around the world needs a school in the antipodes of the traditional. Or, what is the same, an institution that does not confuse shifting boys with hyperactive or attention deficit, that motivates students, that does not bore them or disperse them. A vital, "biointegral" school that bases teaching techniques on emotions without neglecting the intellect. Broadly speaking, that is the approach of Noemí Paymal, a French anthropologist who has worked for years in Latin America.
The specialist in alternative education and director of the Pedagogical Research Center 3000 La Paz, in Bolivia, says that there are very simple and effective tools to deal with the children of the "third millennium." Talk about a holistic pedagogy that understands and addresses the needs of today's children and youth.
Paymal spoke last week in Córdoba, in two talks organized by Ciplan (Education, Science and Culture).
-Teachers often say they have no tools to include hyperactive children. What can they do?
-Research shows that 80 percent of children have now changed their way of learning, their emotional level, their emotional interest; Your right hemisphere is faster, you can do several things at once, you are self-taught and you have multiple interests. There are many tools from the physical, the intuitive, the emotional, the multicultural, the ecological, the ethical.
There are many pedagogical tools today, which aim to develop various areas of the human being, from the physical to the intuitive, the emotional, the multicultural, the ecological, the ethical ...
Before it was aimed only at the intellectual, the cognitive. And we already know that it doesn't work.
- Some example?
- For example, we can start with recovering all levels of body development. The child has to move every 20 minutes in elementary school and if he is younger he has to do it all the time. Telling them not to move is like asking the plant not to grow or the sun to stop; It is its nature and knowledge must be anchored with movement.
For example, anchor knowledge with movement.
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Photos of Brain Gym, or kinesiological education
- Is it valid for all children?
- 80 percent of children now are like that. They are not hyperactive but they need to move, they have multiple interests. They need to play almost all the time until the age of 10. Today's child is not linear, it is holistic, he sees everything at once. If the right hemisphere is not used, it atrophies and then an intellectual society like ours is reached, which is not balanced.
Today's child is not linear, it is holistic, he sees everything at once.
- Are these characteristics the same throughout the world?
img- It is the same in the 15 countries we have investigated. As anthropologists we are considering a change of humanity as a whole, the change is very fast. It has happened in 40 years, which is nothing in relation to the evolution of humanity.
- How have schools adapted to this vertiginous change?
-They have not adapted. I don't blame any teacher or system because it was faster than the ability to handle the matter. Before the changes were slow, there were slight differences between generations. Now they are so fast that the boy passed the dad and the teachers. At this speed you have to recognize it and attend it.
- What causes the lack of adaptation?
-That children have a bad time, hence the high rates of teenage suicide and child depression in the world. The teacher also has a bad time because he has no tools, because in his time it was not. And parents have a bad time. Well, the whole society suffers.
- What pedagogical tools can be used?
Cognitive tools, and also emotional, biointelligent or bioludic tools, the "intuitive" and the tools that work in the mind-heart connection.
- Of course we will continue teaching with cognitive tools, but playful and challenging. The child will do his process until he finds the solution. A good teacher should not give the solution, he has to wait for the child to find it. Another tool is the emotional one. You always have to work on self-esteem, recognize your feelings and those of the other. This prevents the problems of violence. There are biointelligent or bioludic tools with which all aspects of the human being are worked. You don't have to focus so much on the intellectual and the notes don't matter. There are also sensitive and intuitive tools, with which the child can play games to feel the energy. Children are very sensitive although they are restless and stubborn, which is usually a facade to protect themselves from a high sensitivity. In the research we did, 80 percent of those children have hyperesthesia, an overactivation of all physical senses. If one screams, he feels it louder. His eyesight is sharper. Biointelligent tools work by themselves (knitting, cooking, orchard). There are also tools that work on the mind-heart connection where personal strength is strengthened.
Mature and sensitive children
-Why do you think today's kids are the way they are?
-The logic speaks of more stimulating media in the media, of the bombardment of information from birth. They come technologically more advanced, but also emotionally very mature, with an early perception and a sensitivity that we had not thought. We believed that when the computer arrived they would have an individualistic vision, but they are born with a suprasensitivity, a high perception, which gives us a lot of encouragement. Children are a manifestation of this massive change. And because it is massive, the school is collapsing.
They come technologically more advanced, but also emotionally very mature, with an early perception and a sensitivity that we had not thought.
- How much potential is wasted when there is no stimulus needed?
- More than half (to say some figure). The emotional coefficient is more important than the intellectual. If a child is not taken care of in his affective part, he retains only 20 percent of the class data. It is almost not worth teaching.
- Is alternative education applied in small groups?
- Ideally, have groups of eight to eleven children and two adults. If you can't, the teacher can divide the class into several groups, make islands with the tables and work in groups. I would like to see parents helping in turn, to offer assistants. You have to think that it is a challenge that must be solved now. Find tools in which the child can channel his tremendous energy and creativity.
- Such a system is very difficult to implement massively. Is there any other alternative?
- Yes, for example, do extracurricular activities. It is enough that once a week, the child or the young person has a place "emotionally safe" where they can do their personal process, recover their self-esteem, "connect". Or give anti-stress techniques to teachers and parents, because if they are well, children will be fine in class.
- What are the results from the academic?
-The child treated at all levels of development will have knowledge but, in addition, will be balanced as a citizen, as a human being.
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Noemi Paymal says that the school confuses children of the third millennium with hyperactives.
Photos
1. Pedagooogia 3000 files
2. Brain Gym, www.africanpuppet.com,
3. Voice of the Interior newspaper
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