ADOLESCENTS & YOUTH: ENRICHING THEIR LIFE SKILLS
"Education is not preparation for life.
Education is life itself... progressive
and experiential"
John Dewey
The word 'education' means different
things to different people. It could mean
upgrading one's skills in the context of
performance, strengthening oneself
with various qualities, enabling oneself
for better decision making and handling
conflicts and investing authority
through empowering oneself.
So "Education is a creation of
choices, making people aware about
those choices and enabling them to
make use of those choices."
As education systems expand to
empower youth, every nation, society
and community has to work towards
promoting a well being atmosphere.
When adolescents acquire knowledge,
attitudes, values and life skills, they
benefit in a variety of ways. Life skills
help adolescents to make informed
decisions, solve problems, think critically
and creatively, communicate
effectively, build healthy relationships,
empathize with others and cope with
and manage their lives in a healthy and
productive manner. Such knowledge
and skills can lead to behaviours that
prevent disease and injury, foster
healthy relationships and enable young
people to play leadership roles.
Moreover, the knowledge and life
skills education imparted to young ones
are likely to be passed on to their own
children, thus influencing future generations.
We therefore need to effectively
address a wide spectrum of issues
related to adolescence and youth in a
rapidly changing world.
Why is there a need for Life Skills
Enrichment?
The host of factors that promote
high risk behaviours such as alcoholism,
drug abuse aggression, irresponsible
sexual behaviours are boredom,
rebellion, disorientation, peer
pressure and curiosity. The psychological
push factors such as the inability to
tackle emotional pain, conflicts, frustrations
and anxieties about the future are
often the driving force for high risk
behaviour.
Life skills training is an efficacious
tool for empowering the youth to act
responsibly, take initiative and take
control.
It is based on the assumption that
when young people are able to rise
Continued on page 32
Dr. Jitendra Nagpal
Chairperson, National Gandhi Museum, New Delhi
His Words
I could not be leading a religious life
unless I identified myself with the
whole of mankind, and that I could not
do unless I took part in politics. The
whole gamut of man's activities today
constitutes an indivisible whole. You
cannot divide social, economic, political
and purely religious work into
watertight compartments. I do not
know any religion apart from human
activity. It provides a moral basis to all
other activities which they would otherwise
lack, reducing life to a maze of
'sound and fury signifying nothing'.
(Harijan, 24.12.1938)
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Probity in Public Life
One of the most disturbing features
of contemporary Indian life is widespread
corruption. Every day we read
and hear of some new story. Gandhi
laid the utmost importance to honesty
in public life and imposed strict standards
on himself and all his followers.
According to him a public servant
should never accept gifts from the public.
In his Autobiography, he relates the
story of how on his departure from
South Africa, he was presented with
gifts which included gold, silver and
even diamond ornaments. There was
one gold necklace for Kasturba who
wished to keep it , not for herself , but
to be given to her daughter-in-law in the
future. Gandhi refused. He created a
trust and left all the precious gifts to be
used for the service of the community.
Every paisa he collected for public
funds such as the Tilak Swaraj Fund, or
the Harijan Sevak Sangh was scrupulously
accounted for. He trained the
men who worked for him so that in the
early days of Independence corruption
was rare. Gandhi did not care for
money. His needs were so few. He simplified
his life, ate the simplest food,
wore a loin cloth and lived in a mud hut.
Gandhi placed great emphasis on
character building. “The first thing we
have to do is to improve our national
character. No revolution is possible till
we build our national character”, he
said. He continually emphasized the
importance of ethical values in our public
life and practiced what he preached.
Poverty Reduction
Gandhi held that poverty dehumanizes
human beings, undermines their
sense of dignity and self respect,
wastes their potential and deprives
their lives of all meaning and purpose.
It is one of the worst forms of violence
that human beings can commit against
other human beings. The first duty of
the state and society is to provide the
basic human needs to all its citizens.
“I will give you a talisman. Whenever
you are in doubt, or when the self
becomes too much with you, apply the
following test. Recall the face of the
poorest and weakest man you may
have seen, and ask yourself if the step
you contemplate is going to be of any
use to him. Will he gain anything by it?
Will it restore him to a control over his
own life and destiny? In other words, will
it lead to Swaraj for the hungry and spiritually
starving millions? Then you will
find your doubts and your self melt
away.” His mission in life he said “was to
wipe every tear from every eye.”
After returning from South Africa,
Gandhi spent a year travelling across
India to study the condition of the poor
and underprivileged. He identified himself
with the poor and took the vow of
voluntary poverty.
Gandhi’s belief in tolerance, pluralism,
an open society shaped our
national movement. His idea of resolution
of conflicts by peaceful means, of
removing poverty, of honesty in public
life are all relevant in today’s world.
MAHATMA GANDHI: LIFE...
Continued from page 1
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above emotional impasses arising from
daily conflicts, entangled relationships
and peer pressure, they are less likely
to resort to anti social or high risk
behaviours and grow up to be Aware,
Responsible and empowered individuals
and harmonized citizens of a developing
nation.
Alvin Toffler in "The Third Wave"
stated, "The illiterates of 21st century
will not be those who can not read and
write but those who cannot learn,
unlearn and relearn".
Definitions of Life Skills - the beginning
of wisdom
What are life skills? Several definitions
are compiled here from UNICEF
and WHO to provide a wide-ranging
perspective of the concept. Life skills
have been defined by the World Health
Organization (WHO) as "the abilities for
adaptive and positive behaviour that
enable individuals to deal effectively
with the demands and challenges of
everyday life".
UNICEF defines life skills-based
education as basically being a behaviour
change or behaviour development
approach designed to address a balance
of three areas: knowledge, attitude
and skills. The UNICEF definition
is based on research evidence that
shifts in risk behaviour are unlikely if
knowledge, attitudinal and skills based
competence is not addressed.
Life skills are essentially those abilities
that help promote mental well
being and competence in young people
as they face the realities of life.
Life Skills can be utilized in many
areas, issues, topics or subjects such
as in prevention of drug abuse, sexual
violence, teenage pregnancy,
HIV/AIDS/ STD prevention, suicide
prevention, etc. UNICEF extends its
use further into consumer education,
environmental education, peace education
or education for development,
livelihood and income generation,
among others. In short, it empowers
young people to take positive action to
protect themselves and to promote
health and positive social relationships.
Components of Life Skills
WHO categorizes a core set of life skills
into the following three components:
a) Thinking skills - include selfawareness,
social awareness, goal
setting, problem solving and decision-making.
To be able to think critically,
information should be provided
in order to make informed decisions
and choices. The skills to think
critically can also be developed if
the teenagers are given the opportunity
to look at different perspectives
of an issue, the pros and the cons of
making one decision over the other
and making them realize the negative
consequences of making hasty,
unplanned decisions.
b) Social skills - include appreciating/
validating others, working
with others and
understanding their
roles, building positive
relationships with
friends and family, listening
and communicating
effectively, taking
responsibility and coping
with stress. Social skills enable
the adolescents to be accepted in
society and to accept social norms,
which provide foundation for adult
social behaviour.
c) Negotiation skills - It means not
only negotiating with others but
with oneself as well. For effectively
negotiating with others, one needs
to know what one wants in life, is
firm on one's values and beliefs
and can therefore say "no" to
harmful behaviour and risky temptations.
A cascade strategy for disseminating
the training is used in many countries.
This is to say that people who take part
in training sessions then go on to train
others using the same, or a similar,
training schedule. This model is advocated
in so far as trained trainers can
go on to train other teacher trainers,
and so increase the availability of training
resources. Teachers/ life skills educators
should go through training sessions
with a trained trainer. Care has to
be taken however, to maintain the quality
of the training at all levels.
Described in this way, skills that can
be said to be life skills are innumerable,
and the nature and definition of life
skills are likely to differ across cultures
and settings. However, analysis of the
life skills field suggests that there is a
core set of skills that are at the heart of
skills-based initiatives for the promotion
of the health and well-being of adolescents
& youth.
These are listed below:
Decision-Making helps us to deal constructively
with decisions about our
lives. This can have consequences for
health. It can teach people how to
actively make decisions about their
actions in relation to healthy assessment
of different options, and what
effects these different decisions are
likely to have.
Problem Solving enables us to deal
constructively with problems in our
lives. Significant problems that
are left unresolved can cause
mental stress and give rise to
accompanying physical strain.
Creative Thinking contributes
to both decision making
and problem solving by
enabling us to explore the available
alternatives and various consequences
of our actions or non-action. It
helps us to look beyond our direct
experience, and even if no problem is
identified, or no decision is to be made,
creative thinking can help us to
respond adaptively and with flexibility
to the situations of our daily lives.
Critical Thinking is an ability to analyze
information and experiences in an
objective manner. Critical thinking can
contribute to health by helping us to
recognize and assess the factors that
influence attitudes and behaviour, such
as values, peer pressure, and the
media.
Effective Communication means that
we are able to express ourselves, both
verbally and non-verbally, in a way that
is appropriate to our cultures and situations.
This means being able to
express opinions and desires, but also
needs and fears. And it may mean
being able to ask for advice and help in
a time of need.
Interpersonal Relationship skills help
us to relate in positive ways with the
people we interact with. This may mean
being able to make and keep friendly
relationships, which can be of great
importance to our mental and social
well being. It may mean keeping good
relations with family members, which
are an important source of social support.
It may also mean being able to
end relationships constructively.
Self-Awareness includes our recognition
of ourselves, of our character, of
our strengths and weaknesses, desires
and dislikes. Developing self-awareness
can help us to recognize when we
are stressed or feel under pressure. It
is also often a prerequisite to effective
communication and interpersonal relations,
as well as for developing empathy
for others.
Empathy is the ability to understand
what life is like for another person,
even in a situation that we may not be
familiar with. Empathy can help us to
accept others, who may be very different
from ourselves this can improve
social interactions, especially, in situations
of ethnic or cultural diversity.
Empathy can also help to encourage
nurturing behaviour towards people in
need of care and assistance, or tolerance,
as is the case with AIDS sufferers,
or people with mental disorders,
who may be stigmatized and ostracized
by the very people they depend upon
for support.
Coping with Stress is about recognizing
the sources of stress in our lives,
recognizing how this affects us, and
acting in ways that help to control our
levels of stress. This may mean that we
take action to reduce the sources of
stress, for example, by making
changes to our physical environment or
lifestyle. Or it may mean learning how
to relax, so that tensions created by
unavoidable stress do not give rise to
health problems.
Life Skills
z Enable adolescents & Youth to
behave in healthy ways.
z Adolescents & youth are actively
involved in a dynamic teaching and
learning process.
z Methods used include working in
small groups and pairs, brainstorming,
role play, games and debates
and youth leadership camp.
(The author is noted psychiatrist
and life skill expert. He can be
reached at email: jnagpal10@gmail.com)
