Liberal Narrative in Pakistan about India, and its Effect on Universities Students’ Perception towards Terrorism

The key objective of this paper is to find the relationship between the liberal narratives in Pakistan on relationship with India and its effects on universities students’ perception of terrorism. There is a consensus among some prominent scholars that right wing political parties, security establishment and big media houses are producing a kind of national security narrative based on the troika; India as security threat to Pakistan, Islam as rallying cry for national cohesion, and support from great powers to finance ambitious security dominated foreign policy about the neighboring countries that does not help in counter-terrorism at home. This paper has adopted quantitative research method. It is a descriptive study and data was collected from four major public sector universities through survey questionnaires. The liberal narrative on India is weaker in Punjab on all issues. The findings of liberal narratives on India reject the claims of existing literature that there is a positive relationship between liberal narrative about India in Pakistan and counter-terrorism measures in FATA. Three variables researched in case study of Afghanistan reject the existing literature that there is a positive relationship between liberal narrative and counter-terrorism measures.

Exploring Concept Mapping As an Approach to Science Teaching in Lower Secondary School in Pakistan

In this dissertation, the use of an alternative teaching approach to the teaching of science, called "Concept mapping", has been explored. This approach was compared with the traditional teaching approach which emphasizes memorization and reproduction of factual information about scientific concepts. The study was conducted in three stages: Pre-intervention stage (Observation of how science teaching is currently done), Intervention stage (introducing the concept mapping approach) and post-intervention stage (examining the effects of the introduction of the concept mapping approach). Data was collected mainly through the students' test papers, concept maps, group discussions among students, classroom observation of students' activities, clinical interviews with students, students' journals and teachers' feedback. Data analysis was done by comparing the data collected at the pre-intervention stage with those collected after the intervention (after introducing the concept Mapping approach). The findings showed that when students were taught through the traditional approach, they mostly memorized the information without understanding it and without connecting it to their previous knowledge and experiences. After the intervention, however, students showed a deeper understanding of scientific concepts and they felt comfortable in learning in a non-threatening atmosphere in the classroom. Apart from the higher academic achievement of students, students also learnt social skills such as listening to one another and respecting each other's ideas, working quietly in groups and taking turns to speak during discussions. The teachers were also found to be positive about the concept mapping approach and they expressed their desire to learn more about the approach and to try it out in their own classes