Beveridge’s Five Giant Social Evils
According to Beveridge Report, also known as the Report of the Inter-Departmental Committee on Social Insurance and Allied Services of 1942, there were five giant social evils that were affecting the British society and which needed to be addressed urgently. This report identified these giant social evils as squalor, ignorance, basic wants such as food, idleness, and diseases (Durand, Belacel & LaPlante, 2013).
This report proposed a lot of reforms that have been taken by this society and massive changes have been seen. When this report came up, there was a concerted effort by the government and society members to address them. Although these five evils have been addressed, they are still relevant in this society because a section of the society is affected by them in one way or the other.
This society is still affected by squalor, an issue that was identified in the report of 1942. Some members of the society still live in very dirty ghettos of this city, and in such areas, the level of immorality and indecency are very high. Ignorance as one of the five giant social evils has reduced significantly over the years, but it is still an issue that needs to be addressed. A smaller section of this society is still categorized as ignorant.
Basic wants such as food, clothing, and quality healthcare is still an issue, especially among the poor members of the society. Idleness is taking a new shape in this society, and it is probably the main social evil that the country is faced with today.
Diseases such as cancer and HIV/AIDS are still affecting members of this society. Both the rich and the poor are affected by various diseases that affect their productivity. While the poor suffer from simple treatable diseases because of lack of finance, the rich suffer from lifestyle diseases such diabetes and obesity. This research will focus on idleness and obesity as the two most relevant of the five social evils in this society.
Idleness is one of the main social evils that are affecting this society today. According to Chung and Mason (2012), idleness is taking a whole new approach that may not be very easy for the government to address. This scholar says that the social media has brought a new form of idleness that may not be easy to address.
Most of the British citizens have Facebook accounts they use to chat with friends. From the adolescents to the middle-aged citizens of this country, Facebook is the best social sites they can use to meet friends. This is bringing in a new form of idleness where people spend most of their time chatting instead of doing something meaningful. Instead of studying, the adolescents spend much of their time on Facebook, jeopardizing their academic performance.
It may not be possible to address this issue because of ease access to the internet that these adolescents are exposed to in this society both in school and at home (Lefrançois, 2012). The working class are also affected by this menace. Once they get into their offices, they get into Facebook and spend most of their time socializing with friends across the world.
They fail to complete their tasks in time even though they report to their jobs in time. This is a new form of idleness because these people spend their entire life doing nothing but chatting with friends. This is a social evil that must be addressed in today’s society in order to achieve the desired development.
Diseases are another social evil still affect members of this society today. Government has made impressive steps towards improving healthcare provision in the society. However, many British nationals still suffer from various diseases that hinder them from participating actively in various developmental projects.
The rich suffer from lifestyle diseases such as high blood pressure, diabetes and obesity. The poor are seriously affected by social diseases such as HIV/AIDs. These two categories of diseases have been affecting members of the United Kingdom’s society, and the government has been trying to fight them but with little success.
As Hyde (2014) notes, government expenditure on these diseases has been on the rise over the tears, and unless this issue is addressed adequately, it will still remain one of the giant social evils in this society. Frauenheim (2013) says that it is the responsibility of the government and all the society members to find a way of dealing with these two social evils in order to foster development.
What society requires from education
Education has remained highly cherished in this society as it has been viewed by the society as the foundation upon which young people develop their future. According to He, Zhang & Vittal (2013), education is one of the learning processes that aim at imparting knowledge and positive behaviour on learners.
Education contributes towards the societal development in various ways. Generally, education plays a greater role in developing various values, skills, and knowledge that the society needs in its normal development. Therefore, curriculum planners should ensure that education contents provide the best knowledge and skills that will positively reflect the societal values (Grabher & Ibert, 2014). Education is one of the ways that has been used in the past and is currently used in order to create a civilized society (Forrester, 2000).
Education promotes individual cultural, social, physical, and economic aspects of life. In addition, education also produces individuals who are creative and innovative. Therefore, education should be made in such a way that all individuals are catered for including the poor in the society (Bartlett & Burton, 2003). This may include involving learners in extra curriculum activities and classroom learning.
Teaching should be expanded towards promotion and growth of individuals’ moral, cultural, and social acceptable norms. In addition, it is also important that individuals’ thinking and learning skills be highly considered (Coffey, 2001).
The qualification and curriculum authority should promote learners’ personal and reflective thinking development in order to produce creative and independent learners. Teachers should also promote the application of life skills including information and communication technology skills that are very important in the society today (Trowler, 2003). This research will focus on only one main expectation that the society requires from education, especially those aged 5-11 years.
One of the most important things that the society expects from education is the need to teach foreign languages among young learners aged 5-11 years. The world is getting increasingly globalized and there is need to know different languages in order to enhance interaction. According to Horton and Tritch (2014), the need to have a common language in the world has been forced educationists to come up with curriculums which allow learners to be taught different languages.
Children aged 5-11 years are best positioned to understand these foreign languages because they have a higher ability to master them. As explained in the cognitive theory, human being has a better memory at tender ages (Maskooki & Maskooki, 2012). In order to understand foreign languages, memory plays an important role, especially in understanding the semantics.
The cognitive theory emphasizes on the fact that the process of learning largely depends on an individual’s ability recognize, recall, reflect, analyze, understand, and evaluate. In learning of foreign language, a child aged 5-11 has a higher capacity than adults. Isaksson (2014) says that when a child is exposed to a foreign language at an early age, it would have a better ability to understand the language than when he is exposed to it at an advanced age.
In this society, English is the common language used in teaching institutions. It is unfortunate that most of the learners complete their education without learning any foreign language (Tomlinson, 2001). This is not what the society expects from schools, especially in the current world where communication remains the most important tool in integrating with other societies across the globe.
Learning of foreign language is currently becoming popular in most schools in this country because of the expectations and pressure from the society. It is now clear that foreign languages offer learning ability to seek higher education or employment opportunities from various parts of the world.
According to McKenzie (2001), the society requires that those who go through educational system should be able to understand the dynamism of the world, and be able to interact with other people from various places. They also expect that education will offer civilization to the learners and make them people who can fit in various contexts of the environment. However, this may not be the case if a learner is not exposed to other major languages around the world.
It is a fact that English language is one of the most commonly spoken languages in the world. However, it may not be enough to restrict one’s ability to speak to only this language. Knowing other languages may be important in helping individuals be able to interact with other people from different societies.
The society expects that education system should be tuned to offer learners a wider choice of language. Manring (2014) notes that the current curriculum in this country appreciates that young learners aged below 11 years may not have the ability to understand complex scientific concepts. However, they have a higher ability to understand different languages. It would therefore, be very important to make them understand various languages at this tender age.
Social and Emotional Aspects of Learning
Understanding social and emotional aspects of learning is important in understanding the approach that should be taken by educationists in the learning process. According to Social theory of learning, individuals usually learn through observations. Mitchell and Hall (2014) say that through social interactions, individuals can directly observe behaviour and characters of others (Cronan & Douglas, 2013).
Through imitating good characters by these individuals, learning is attained. Therefore, the theory advocates for promotion of learning through social interactions. Moreover, in order to promote individual differences, individuals’ emotional states should be considered mainly because different learners come from different cultural backgrounds and have difference problems (Hajli, Bugshan, Lin, & Featherman, 2013).
Furthermore, understanding of emotional aspects of learning can easily help in solving conflicts, hence promoting learning and allowing individuals to solve their problems easily. This may be defined by the social environment that a learner is exposed to, especially for learners who are below 21 years. These learners are heavily influenced by the social environment in which they stay.
Peer pressure is always strong at this stage because of the need for recognition. Learners within the age of 11-21 would always want to be seen as heroes, or at least be accepted by members of their peers. This may affect a learner positively or negatively (Green, Bean & Peterson, 2013).
Learners who are exposed to a positively competitive environment will always develop positive attitude towards learning. This is so because the social environment encourages learning. However, those who are exposed to social environment where learning is viewed as a second option that should be avoided if possible, education may no longer be their priority.
Emotional aspect of learning looks at the life problems such as anger management and anxiety. On the other hand, social learning usually fosters respect between individuals, hence leading to enhanced cooperation in learning process. Emotional aspect also promotes self-awareness and management of learners’ feelings (Bouchamma & Michaud, 2014). Students and learners usually have different emotional and social needs hence the uniqueness of other individuals should be put in place.
Due to this parents and other school stakeholders should be involved in the process of promoting emotional and social learning. This will result into positive outcomes, as parents fully understand their children (Ball, 1990).
Some learners are known to fail in particular subjects because of the emotional attachment they have towards the subject or the teacher. It may not be easy to detach the feeling one has towards a teacher from the subject he or she teaches. Mele and Schepers (2013) note that one a learner develops negative emotional feelings towards a teacher; chances are always high that the student will hate the subject.
The negative attitude towards the teacher would be transferred to the subject. Such a learner would find it very difficult to understand the concept of such a subject because he or she will lack the willingness to understand what is being taught. On the other hand, learners who develop positive attitude towards the teachers would probably excel in the subject they teach. This means that it is very important for the teachers and other responsible stakeholders, to nature the emotional aspect of the learners (Torri & Martinez, 2014).
This would help in ensuring that learners remain constantly motivated in their academic works. For social learning to take place well, teachers should also encourage teamwork and motivate individual learners. Various opportunities that allow students to develop their social skills should also be provided.
Favourable learning environments should also be provided. Lastly, students with physical and emotional problems should be encouraged to promote their learning both in classroom and outside classroom setting. Provision of social and emotional skills will always result into positive and better performance hence should be encouraged (Durand, Belacel & LaPlante, 2013).
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