Band 8 IELTS Essay Sample | Some people say that in all levels of education, from primary schools to universities, too much time is spent on learning facts and not enough on learning practical skill

Some people say that in all levels of education, from primary schools to universities, too much time is spent on learning facts and not enough on learning practical skill. Do you agree or disagree?

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Band 8 IELTS essay sample

There is no doubt that practical exposure is as important as theoretical knowledge. A number of people think that much time is devoted to teaching the facts instead of focusing on hands-on experience in all phases of learning, whether it is school or college. I completely agree with the statement and in this essay I will support my view with valid arguments and examples.

Most of the institutes follow conventional method of teaching which includes reading, learning and writing. By this method, children can only recall concepts for a limited amount of time and when it is time to apply that knowledge at work they have forgotten it. Consequently, many students who have degrees in physics or electronics cannot even change bulbs. Likewise, many MBAs cannot fill out a tax form. All of these point to the shortcomings of a system of learning that focuses only on theory.

Another example of this is that the current curriculum does not have an equal number of theory and practical classes. To illustrate, while I had one lecture each day on the theoretical aspects of computers), there was only 1 laboratory session in the whole week. Due to this improper division, I could not practice everything being taught and hence lacked proper understanding of the concepts. If we had equal proportion of theory and practical classes, I would have gained better skills and confidence. A recent study by the educational department of New Delhi has shown that youngsters who were shown experiments were able to memorize and retain the information for a longer period of time then the ones who read it.

To conclude, I agree with the argument that much time is being spent on cramming instead of experimental learning because of the current structure of teaching. Unfortunately, this overemphasis on theory prevents / stops students from acquiring real world skills.

Band 7.5 IELTS essay sample

Enriching students with knowledge is an essential part of learning and development in schools and universities. Whether or not the educational system spends enough time on teaching practical skills is a controversial issue. Many claim that the primary focus of education is memorizing facts but this approach leads to insufficient exposure to practical skills and in turn results in limited job prospects for students. This essay considers this to be a valid claim.

To begin with, in primary and secondary schools many subjects such as history, geography or languages are taught. How historic events help us learn from them is lost in memorizing the timelines or sequences. Memorizing facts such as regional cropping patters, climates and soil does not teach the skill of farming. Languages should teach children the art of communication rather than grammatic perfection. As students reach / enter university, they achieve specialization in a specific subject through good grades. For example, most of the students spend years in memorizing the laws which are readily available for reference. The time for writing an argument and presenting them to court is only twenty percent of the syllabus. Consequently, a lawyer who begins practice often lacks the confidence to present themselves before the court. It is paradoxical that the unemployment rate increases when vacancies are available in the job market.

When students have very prestigious degrees but lack the exposure to show the skills needed to fulfill the requirement of the job position, unemployment rate increases. One classic example of that is Google data analytics course. Google claims that this one-year self-driven course is a substitute for 4-year degree course in terms of education and offers more hands-on experience than a degree program. More than two hundred companies have openly accepted this and prefer to hire candidates who have completed the Google analytics course. One of the main purposes of education is employment, this review from employer accords with limited exposure to skills.

To sum-up, I agree with the argument that education system at every stage is based on memorizing and reproducing facts rather than gaining skills essential to survive and thrive in the job market.

Essay sample 2 | Band 7 IELTS essay sample

Education is crucial for the development of individuals as well as nations. However, some people feel that our education system does not give enough practical exposure to students. I fully disagree with this statement because our new education policy gives high priority to the development of practical skills in all domains.

In the early education system, high priority was given to theory, but now educational institutions have adopted the method of learning by doing and teachers are responsible for helping students complete tasks which are related to both theory and practical. The evaluation systems in the education sector are divided into continuous and comprehensive assessment where continuous assessment is fully based on the practical skills of the students. This is applicable not only in the technical subjects but also in the arts subjects.

Universities are initiating many programmes to promote the practical knowledge and skills of students like “Industry Academia Collaborations” to promote the apprenticeship, observation visits and employment of qualified students. These initiatives will support our students to bridge the gap between the theory and practice. Our educational policies are based on skill development which gives emphasis on enhancing the employability skills of the students in various spheres of education system.

From the aforementioned information we can conclude that practical knowledge and skills are the key component in the curriculum from primary schools to universities and that helps our educational institutions to equip our students with practical skills based on theory.