The Sunday News
THERE is a need to revisit the education curricula for the integration of psychomotor activities into the system and make education more relevant, a Cabinet Minister has said.
Speaking during a visit to the Joshua Mqabuko Nkomo Polytechnic in Gwanda Town last week, the Minister of State for Liaising on Psychomotor Activities in Education, Cde Josiah Hungwe, said psychomotor activities should be incorporated into the education system for education to be more relevant.
“The education system is too academic and focuses on examinations instead of addressing the needs of the individual student, the unemployment market and the nation. In today’s world it is the technical, vocational, entrepreneurial and life skills that the employment market values. There is therefore a need to revisit the education curricula with the objective of incorporating psychomotor activities into education and training.
“The infusion of the psychomotor activities is expected to broaden the curricula to enhance the relevance of the education by equipping school leavers, including those in non-formal and adult education, college and university graduates with knowledge and skills appropriate to the employment market as well as self-employment,” he said.
Cde Hungwe said with the absorption of psychomotor activities, the education system would be more enhanced and youths would be able to create jobs for themselves and others and benefit the nation as a whole.
“With this in mind, we must together devise strategies for making practical skills acquisition attractive to the youth if they are to become productive citizens capable not only of survival, but of competitiveness in the 21st global village.
“We are talking about a cadre who can do things for himself,” said Cde Hungwe.
He said being academically excellent alone was not enough but should be complemented by acquiring skills relevant to transforming the economy.
During the colonialists era, technical skills were meant to make individual workers of the colonial masters and did not prepare them to be their own employers.
As a result, the study of practical subjects has been stigmatised even after independence with few people showing interest in the area.
Joshua Mqabuko Nkomo Polytechnic in Gwanda Town has been one of the institutions moving in the right direction in terms of psychomotor activities.
However, the institution’s principal Dr Ngoni Moyo lamented low enrolment for technical subjects saying that most applicants preferred teachers’ training.
She said there was a need for a change of the mindset as most people were reluctant to take up technical courses.
“The psychomotor office needs to do a lot and convince people to take up these entrepreneurial courses. This year we enrolled about 200 students for the technical faculty but our ideal number is 500. We have the space,” she said.
Dr Moyo also bemoaned lack of infrastructure for the technical subjects saying there were no workshops and they were using improvised workshops for all engineering courses.
“That is our biggest challenge and we hope that with the fiscus improving we can have the infrastructure for the technical wing,” she said.
Dr Moyo said JMN Poly has acquired a farm and hoped to do some projects at a larger scale. The acquired farm is located at Matshetsheni area and is 500hectares.
The polytechnic offers psychomotor activities such as animal husbandry, fashion design, carpentry and horticulture among others.
