Acquiring education is one of the biggest necessities of our current time. Competition has grown too high in this field, forcing students to try their best in getting high marks through adopting different methods of learning. Students are getting more cautious about the marks they receive rather than fully understanding what they have learned in class. Deep and surface learning are basically two learning methods adopted by students. Often ‘Surface learning' is also called ‘Passive learning', and ‘Deep learning' as ‘Active learning.' It is not an attribute of an individual; it is just an approach to learning by students. Most students have turned themselves more to the passive learning instead of deep learning, which pays better results. Passive learning maybe a quicker method to learn, but it makes it easier to forget what you've learned as well, like they say, “Easy come, easy go.” Statistics indicate that students following passive approach toward learning end up remembering only around 10% of what they were taught. Deep learning however, enables students to learn even more than what they are taught in classrooms, as their focus is more on the information itself. In deep learning, students relate their newly acquired knowledge to old knowledge, which produces an urge to earn even more knowledge. Deep learning makes learning a process of ‘reasoning' which actually helps improve its quality. “I don't think there is any thing wrong with passive studying,” says Ahmed Abdullah, a 16 year old student, “in fact, I end up with the time to do many other stuff in addition to studying.” Noor Ul-Ain, 18, said “I will not say a passive study is good but I will not even say that it is bad either; after all, I am getting good marks.” Passive studying might be popular among students but educationists are not comfortable with the the widespread and popularity of this approach. Mrs. Tanvir Tariq, Principal of Hala International School said that active learners have more sound insights in almost every field of life as compared to passive learners. Getting students' interested in what they are being taught is the first step in converting them into active learners, according to Mrs. Tariq, who believes that teachers bear as much responsibility as students in making that change. “There should be a more practical approach toward teaching methods. projectors, quiz type activities, computers and interaction between teachers and students, all that should be utilized in order to make life long, active learners out of students,” Says Mrs. Tariq. Mrs. Tariq expressed her concerns regarding overfilled note books that are considered the standard of good studying, something that ought to be discouraged. Parent's expectations from their children are also worth mentioning. Many children often feel pressure on themselves while studying due to the high expectations of their parents, fear of failure is always behind their approach toward studies. Or even the greed of reward. There is great need of understanding the capabilities of a child by parents, as their confidence in him/her may help him/her to excel more than his abilities. There are many ways in which students can be encouraged to adopt a deep approach to learning. Such methods depend on establishing learning outcomes, through a variety of different teaching techniques, such as student participation and teacher led activities, and also through appropriate assessment. There should be more emphasis on learning through reasoning and active engagement between teachers and students to promote deep learning. The outcome of deep learning is thus an ability to absorb the subject's matter, instead of memorizing it, which will increase students' competence. __
