What to teach/That is the question!

 One of the topics I teach students is the concept of advertising. Of course, as per the demands of the course, the syllabus, the exam-centricity of the current academic praxis, the marks-ist focus of most all students, it has to be merely the basic, introductory stuff such a cursory glance at the grid, at storyboarding, for instance. 

Apparently, it is very creative. I have given them, for instance,  an assignment wherein the students actually design an ad. The medium could be the print medium or the audio or the audio-visual. In other words, it could be an ad for a newspaper/a mag or for a community radio/ some "RJ" types or for the TV and/or the internet.

Ideally, I would have liked it a lot if the students had actually created the ads as a pair or as a group activity. The print ones, i could have put on the wall magazine; the audio and audio-visual ones on the college site, for example. Right now, i can only tell the students that this could be a step towards creating a portfolio, given such realities as limited available time, the multiple tests, and hence their lack of interest/enthusiasm, and so on 

In my opinion, that is what is the real problem, the half-hearted measures. In another commerce college, for instance, given the autonomy, I had included in the syllabus interesting vocabulary development possibilities, genuine and necessary probabilities of students preparing project reports, LOR's, statements of purpose/sop's about self, and other such stuff they would require in their future careers. The moment I lost any say in the syllabus design, without even listening to my argument regarding such issues,  an irrelevant nineteenth century text was introduced.

Actually, an attempt should be made to prepare students who are ready to face a challenge at the international level. Instead we have absolutely irrelevant texts. There is hardly any attempt to relate the linguistic ability in a focussed way to their growth as professionals and as human beings.  Indeed, a case of 'what to teach/that is the question'!

Pratima@"Education is the passport to the future. For tomorrow belongs to those who prepare for it today," says Malcolm X.