4.2 Becoming out of time: violating temporal normativity
4.2.3 Out of age: Delayed development
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appreciate. And the rest I will tell them I am waiting for you. So I give them time – and that way they will think to do it quickly, and their partners will motivate them to do it quickly. So then they motivate each other and we get 100% compliance. (Kalima, Ahmedabad)
The 100% compliance strategy is combined with reinforcement such that it is not only the teacher disciplining students to conform to classroom times, but students disciplining their peers in ways that both “spatially regulating bodies and intellectually regulating minds” (Saul, 2020, p.
56). Another way to counter disruption in the classroom is through choral repetition, a commonly used strategy in whole-classroom instruction (Kalyanpur, 2022),
There are some children who are sitting but their attention is not there. They are thinking something else. So when everyone repeats things together they start repeating after them.
So it is beneficial for them. Some children you must have noticed are so attentive, they are sitting and answering all questions. And then some are there, sitting in a corner, not paying attention. So when everyone speak then they feel, yes we are also in the
classroom. So to grab their attention. (Angelica, Mumbai)
Choral repetition is another example of how teachers use children to regulate and discipline each other’s behavior. Once out of sync children are identified, through their defiant and ‘unruly bodies’ (Erevelles, 2000) that do not follow classroom norms and habits that disrupt the collective temporalities of the classroom (Adam, 1995), these strategies are put in place to eliminate “temporal diversity” (Saul, 2020) to modify their undisciplined behaviors.
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Children become out of time by becoming ‘out of age.’ Children do not display appropriate age-grade-related behaviors or academic outcomes,
When you say he's a slow learner, what does it mean to be a slow learner?
Means first he has a pronunciation problem, so he doesn’t understand spellings properly.
His level is entirely say 1st grade…he’s in 4th grade. His age is appropriate, but his grasping power is not good like the other kids. So that’s why. (Zoya, Mumbai) The response above reveals the developmental bias (Saul, 2020) of “predictable stages” of development that are shared by all children of particular ages such that all children are expected to “progress in the same way” (Edling, 2022, p. 96). This gives rise to a “temporal abnormality”
(Knight, 2019) – the slow learner is identified for he is “not good like the other kids.” Goodley and Runswick-Cole (2011) describe the emphasis on normal development as the “tyranny of developmentalism” (p. 79), such that children who deviate are othered.
Teachers wrestle with the idea that each child should be able to fulfill grade-level expectations, "we want that all children learn to read. " Yet, there are children they cannot
“reach, they are not able to learn", or that "some don't focus", "some are different", or the "5%
whose attention I cannot account for." There are “implicit assumptions about a ‘right age’, a pre- existing ‘appropriate base’ upon which to build, and about ‘proper sequencing’” (Adam, 1995).
Given these pre-determined, linear, sequential conceptions of development and knowledge, children who are ‘out of age’ become problems,
They face lots of problems because there are those children and with them the teachers also face problems. Because if we teach them and then go to the next class so then they face problems and with them, the teacher does too. Because…to watch those kids they
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have to turn back on the other kids. So, there is a problem if the kids cannot do things and then they move to the next grade teachers face many problems.
Interviewer: So, what is the solution according to you?
For this problem, if teachers can give more dhyāna to the children in that grade
itself…like if the child doesn’t get it then we need to do it now. We shouldn’t move them ahead. (Aqsa, Ahmedabad)
Examining teachers’ beliefs about grade repetition in South Africa, Walton (2018a) describes support grade repetition as they believe that the mismatch between the curriculum and children’s learning trajectories rests on a deficit within the child. While Aqsa does not advocate for grade repetition, she believes that the mismatch is a problem for the teacher and the “dis-synchronous learner” (p. 55). For Aqsa, it is incumbent upon the teacher to identify these problem children lest they become a problem for another teacher. Khadija, on the other hand, places the
responsibility on the parents,
Ma’am to tell you the truth it’s very weird, I feel very bad that the child doesn’t know but we’ve promoted them. And even now those kids don’t come to class…we give them one exam and then promote them. Then we’ll tire ourselves telling the parents to send the kid to class…if not all, at least a few. But they don’t do it. Just show up for the final
exams…(Khadija, Ahmedabad)
During the pandemic, unequal and unreliable internet access meant that not all children could attend online classes. Following government guidelines, schools promoted all students to the next grade. For teachers, the pandemic heightened the mismatch between the pace of the curriculum and the pace of children in acquiring grade-appropriate learning,
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Some kids’ basics are so ganda (dirty/bad), they don’t even know ABCD. Don’t know how to write. Today I found out about a girl who did not know 1-2-3…so if I do number names up to 100 with that child, what will she understand? These people (the school) are not focusing on the basics when the children need to have their basics strong. Yes, I understand the teachers are working hard, but because of online learning, children’s basics were spoiled. The base that we have. (Sadiya, Mumbai)
The ”basics” were a challenge for teachers as schools transitioned from online to in-person learning during the pandemic. To address this, Zahra divided time over the school term to make sure all children learn how to copy directly from the board. For her, this is a basic skill the children will need to survive second grade,
There are only a few months left. So, I got them to now start writing from the board. It took them a lot of time at the start. They couldn’t do it, ‘teacher how do we write?’ Then it took time to explain to them how to write. Now the situation is that they write slowly but they write. Fast…there are some students who are able to write with me. But some are there who even after I’ve written on the board will take another 30 minutes to write.
(Zahra, Mumbai)
As some children identified as out of age, to focus on them often means that “the rest of the children get bored…they are fed up or bored.” (Bushra, Mumbai) It also means that “if I go on to teach them those things (basics) then it wastes my time. I have to focus on my portion a bit too.”
(Zahra, Mumbai)
The notion of basics refers to the ‘bare minimum’ needed to know to move from one grade to the next. Children who are out of age defy benchmark expectations. Regardless of student interest or inclination, teachers claim that the child “this is the basic, he has to understand
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this a little bit.” The lack of student interest is partly understood as the internal characteristic of the child,
there’s a girl in my class, she loves games but when it comes to studies, she does whatever…she’s not a slow learner but she’s not interested. Even us, if someone is making us watch a movie we don’t like if someone forces me to watch it so why will I?
(Angelica, Mumbai)
It is partly a consequence of how the child responds to teaching, “we’ve just given a tag slow learner, it’s all about teaching and how they look at it” and part fault of the parent, “and
sometimes the family background is a problem…parents are not cooperative. From here they just go…here and there. Sometimes it’s that they aren’t practicing well or there’s no one to pay attention to them. I have one girl like that.” (Angelica, Mumbai)
The central concern for teachers in ensuring that children do not fall out of age is the future, “if his basics aren’t clear how will he study further?” The linear, sequential curriculum requires teachers to focus on ensuring that they organize the child’s presence in a way that does not jeopardize their future, “if they don’t practice now then in 4th grade there will be even bigger math problems so how will they do it? There will be formulas. So, we must do it now.”
(Angelica, Mumbai)
The expectations of the present are also determined by teachers’ understanding of the purpose of education. Describing how she identified children for state-mandated remedial
classes, Zoya describes what she considers grade-appropriate knowledge – the ability to read and write one’s name. To her, basic literacy is the foundation of education,
First of all, I think that by 4th grade children need to know how to read. In every
language, Hindi, Marathi, English, and Urdu. I pick those who don’t know how to read
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because reading is the most basic thing. Can they learn how to answer questions is a distant thing, but if you’re not able to read then what is the aim of education? Kids need to know how to read. So first I noticed that they don’t know how to read. Some cannot even write their full name. What if they get lost? If someone cannot speak to write and tell me even that they cannot do. Then what is the meaning of education? (Zoya, Mumbai)
The idea of the basics, or bare-minimum grade-level expectations prioritizes an a priori construction of children. That is, it focuses on ‘becoming’ or future-oriented, developmental understandings of childhood. The dominance of future ‘becoming’ precludes an uncertain
‘becoming’ that allows space for diverse bodies, abilities, and learners to emerge in the classroom (Gabel, 2002; Goodley, 2007).