Role of Education in Growth and Development of a Child

Education is the potential instrument of a person’s mental and moral make-up. The history of civilization bears testimony to the facts that man a wild animal, has built a glorious heritage of culture, art, science, philosophy and religion.

Heredity and environment are the two most important factors of growth and development. Heredity endows each individual with capacities, attitudes, and interests and it is for education to provide scope for their expansion and expression through favorable environment.

A happy co-ordination between the twin factors leads individuals to the highest level of growth and development. In the areas of human values, it is not capacity or ability that counts, but achievements of success and efficiency by education and training are important. Capacity without training is blind and may not work up to expectations.

The most important thing for the teacher is to try to study children and to know what their native traits are. All children are born with a number of bodily and intellectual tools. Of course they differ in degrees. It is not their possession that matters. Rather, the right or wrong use of tools is clearly the responsibility of education.

Happily selected environment has worked miracles with many hopeless delinquents, criminals and sinners. Tests have revealed that a large number of delinquent children are normal. And their fall was due to harmful influences of education.

A change of environment has regenerated many of them and enabled them to develop into honest and self-supporting citizens. And finally, the teacher must see that he himself is a very vital part of child’s environment.

In teaching various subjects to the child, his mental maturation is to be taken into consideration for chalking out education programmes. And mental maturation depends upon the physical growth and development. Since the rate of growth of boys and girls differ, the same educational programme for both boys as well as girls will not prove fruitful.

So, various individual differences as regards physical and intellectual growth and development must be taken into consideration. Also, a too-fat child or a too thin child, a very small or a very big child will have a feeling of inadequateness. Teachers and parents must take care of these physical deviates. Mentally deficient children also must be taken care of in the teaching-learning situations.

Keeping in mind the challenging characteristics of growth and development of adolescents, the educational activities should be carefully organized. Development of sex plays a very important and significant role in the life of an individual. So a sort of sex- education should be given to the child as well as to an adolescent.

Sex education aims at the development of healthy attitude among boys and girls with a view to leading a good social life. Some teachers blame children for lowering the standard of the class and abuse them saying, “Mangoes cannot grow out of cotton seeds.”

No doubt, heredity sets limits. Certainly, mangoes cannot grow out of cotton seeds. Only, the quality mangoes can be improved by a careful regulation of the environment, such that mangoes can be better mangoes and one can make cotton grow into productive plants and yield a larger harvest. So, the appropriate education requires that inherited inclinations^ capacities and interests of every child should be studied early and all facilities should be provided in his environment to develop all that is best in him as an individual.