Hungry to learn across the world

That's the title of a BBC article telling the story of 16 year old Babar Ali - the world's youngest headteacher. Every day, he teaches hundreds of students in the village of Murshidabad in West Bengal.
Babar is a student himself. Every morning, before school, he has to help with household chores. Then he catches an auto-rickshaw to travel part of the way to school. He walks the last mile or so.
Babar's school is free, but his family have to pay for a uniform, books and transport - which all adds up to £25 a year. This is £25 too much for a lot of families.
After Babar finishes his school day, he comes back to his small village, and teaches what he has learned to 800 children who are too poor to afford the school fees. Babar is not alone. Ten teachers have joined him - students like himself - to teach what they know to other children.
This is an awesome story. Children who are hungry for knowledge feeding what they know to those who are even more deprived than they are.
But the title of the article is misleading. Children across the world are not hungry to learn. Time and again I've heard teachers comment that their biggest problem is in motivating students to want to learn.
Seeing as motivation is one of the key factors in effective learning, this is a worrying problem. So what is it about the kids in our schools? Why aren't they hungry for knowledge? Is it because they live 24/7/365 in the middle of an information feast, and they're gorged to the point of indifference?
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