The Light Millennium, Charitable Global Human Advancement Organization, proudly presents the below research by Kalindi Wanigasooriya and Raneesha Jayaratne, Whyteleafe Junior Researchers (Sri Lanka), in support of the 2022 #WorldScienceDay theme’s #BasicSciencesForSustainableDevelopment, along with encouraging students toward further research-based projects.

The theme of World Science Day on 10 November 2022 is Basic Sciences for Sustainable Development. It is being celebrated within the International Year of Basic Sciences for Sustainable Development, which kicked off on 8 July 2022. Scientists, science communicators, and science enthusiasts are encouraged to prepare their events to celebrate #WorldScienceDay.

“The annual observance of the International Week of Science and Peace (each year during the week in which 11 November falls), is making an important contribution to the promotion of peace. The Week encourages greater academic exchanges on a subject of universal importance while also generating greater awareness of the relationship of science and peace among the general public. Based on observances of Science and Peace Week to date, it may be expected that participation each year will increase, contributing to greater international understanding and opportunities for co-operation in the applications of science for the promotion of peace throughout the year.” #ScienceForDevelopmentAndPeace | Source: https://www.un.org/en/observances/world-science-day/week

Whyteleafe Junior Researchers Series

“Skilled Mind ~ Skilled Child”
Asses and evaluate the soft skills among the Sri Lankan Children (Age 10-18)

by Kalindi Wanigasooriya and Raneesha Jayaratne, Whyteleafe Junior Researchers

Introduction

Soft Skills fulfill an important role in shaping an individual’s personality and should be introduced in the very early stages of childhood. In a competitive globalized world, the value of these skills is further enhanced. Soft Skills, especially life skills, help them know how to cope with daily situations as well as on more long-term choices. If children are well-equipped with Soft Skills, they will have the flexibility to manage their lives when they grow up. 

Soft skills will help a person to think in a more holistic way rather than once-sided, thus will help to arrive at more balanced decisions. Moreover, people who possess more soft skills will be able to create a better and fairer world than we live in today. On the other hand, a lack of soft skills can limit your potential, or even be the downfall of your business. By developing strong leadership, delegation, teamwork, and communication abilities, you can run projects more smoothly, deliver results that please everyone, and even positively influence your personal life by improving how you interact with others.

The soft skills that we focused on in this research are Empathy, Communication, Leadership, Time management, and Teamwork.

Explanation of the research question and objectives 

Research Question 

Our research question is to find out whether there are soft skills among Sri Lankan children between 10 – 18 using 5 main essential soft skills which are Empathy, Communication, Leadership, Time Management, and Teamwork. 

Research Objective 

Our main objective is to give an insight into the social and educational scholars to correct the situation and show the path for them to develop and correct society as a whole. Assess the soft skills among Sri Lankan children between 10 – 18. 

Theoretical Framework

Pratt. (2019) stated “A soft skill is a personal attribute that supports situational awareness and enhances an individual’s ability to get a job done. The term soft skill is often used as a synonym for people skills or emotional intelligence” 

Grisi, (2014) defines soft skills as the prerequisite hard skills to keep oneself updated and developed in fluctuating circumstances. These skills are related to man’s logic and rationality. While this may be true, hard skills permit him/ her to bear out to chase his dreams of becoming an engineer, teacher, philologist, psychologist, and anthropologist. Soft skills drive an individual independently to go beyond the limits of an individual. Daniel Goleman, with the help of a diagram, elucidates the meaning of intrapersonal and interpersonal competencies. The picture clearly states that every individual is accountable for his actions. In particular, the awareness and effects of the individual are connected. Figure 1 shows the representation of soft skills.

Ciappei, (2015) explains that most of the personal traits of an individual persuade his competencies. Soft skills like justice, bravery, courage, and tolerance are indefinitely carried from the moral aspect of life. All these significant traits eventually nurture the competencies. Moreover, the research study distinguishes soft skills as entrepreneurship skills and technological skills. Entrepreneurship skills also termed leadership skills, encircle the skills like taking risks, uninspiring and motivating co-workers, creativity, innovativeness, and management skills. Likewise, technological skills permit one to accomplish specific tasks within a timeframe.

Results

Our research was conducted through a set of questionnaires given to children between the ages of 10 – 18 years. In the questionnaire, we have mainly focused on 5 main soft skills. The questionnaires were circulated among 320 children in 16 different districts and the answers were analyzed accordingly.

•   Communication Skills

The majority of Sri Lankan Children have high communication skills. 

•     Teamwork Skill 

The majority of Sri Lankan Children have high Teamwork skills. 

•     Empathy Skill 

The majority of Sri Lankan Children have high Empathy skills. 

•     Time Management Skill 

The majority of Sri Lankan Children have high Time Management skills. 

•     Leadership Skill 

The majority of Sri Lankan Children have high Leadership skills. 

•     Practical Knowledge of Soft Skills  

The majority of Sri Lankan Children do not have the practical knowledge of Soft Skills.

Discussion 

Soft skills are something that modern children should have as they enter society. But in our research, we only included 5 soft skills. And with the results that we got from the research, we believe that most Sri Lankan children do have soft skills, but they don’t have the practical knowledge, or we can say that they do not get any chances to use or express these skills. We can change this situation by helping these children. According to our belief, we think that the parents, elders, teachers, and all the other guides can help this situation by giving them more opportunities to express soft skills in their day-to-day life. And we think that it can change by the schools as well. Since most of the 10-18 kids spend their lives in and with the school we believe that the school authorities have the power to change such things.

We believe that these changes might make and give these limited children a way to express and use soft skills in their day-to-day- life. This research is Lim Soft skills are something that a modern child should have as they enter society. 

We believe that these changes might make and give these limited children a way to express and use soft skills in their day-to-day- life. 

Finding the selected target group was another limitation and the lack of knowledge about the soft skills among the target group was another limitation when gathering data.

Conclusion 

We did our research to find out whether there are soft skills among 10-18 children in Sri Lanka. We found out that there are soft skills among the researched areas but most of them don’t have the practical knowledge or we can say that they don’t use these skills in their day-to-day life. And we concluded that the child’s parents, educators, and elders can take part to improve their child’s lack of soft skills in their lives.

In brief, we see that the kids between 10 – 18 do have soft skills. Even though the results show a positive answer, in practical situations we don’t see the same. We see their lack of opportunities and occasions where they can apply the soft skills within them. According to our findings, the following actions can be taken to let children improve in the said area.

Parents, educators, and elders first and foremost need to understand the gravity of having soft skills. They are to identify methods through which soft skills can be imparted to their children. Educators need to find every area where they can lead children to improve in soft skills like empathy within the classroom. The parents can let them enjoy nature more in their early years of childhood.

These are some solutions that can be taken to improve soft skills. Children these days are learning practical and technical science through books that are not quite practical. They learn to plant trees through books as well. While doing this research and analyzing the responses to some questions are not that practical. As we said in the above examples the education system also has been a part of this that caused children to lack practical knowledge. The children in the researched areas always refer to books these days that have made children become like robots. Parents might have noticed this as well. As answers to these problems, we think that the parents, educators, elders, and also the government should make a change to this so that future adults will not be lacking in practical knowledge.

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Whyteleafe Academy

Dedicated to the 2022 World Science Day & International Week of Science and Peace byThe Light Millennium, Charitable Global Human Advancement Organization (LMGlobal.Org; 2001, New York); associated with the United Nations Department of Global Communications (formerly, UN.DPI) since 2005. www.lmglobal.org

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