I feel that I am a kid all over again. No, not physically, but the kind of learning which has just started for me now! It's not about any subjects of the school years but the real process and approach of learning anything, which had started during my childhood and stopped abruptly, don't know when? Might be during my last years at school? As that was the stage when we really started thinking about future and it had no clarity, till date! Having no clarity also is bit ok but one should never loose the enthusiasm in knowing little things in the process of getting clarity. But the scary part is that this kind of unwarranted-no clarity-no enthusiasm state has actually started happening from the baby stage these days. Just imagine how vulnerable they can turn out to be if they are raised in that state? Hard to even imagine! That is what made me thinking. Being a mom, agree that every mom wants to give her best to her kids, but understanding what is best for kids in current world is so important. Having a free play, jumping, running, laughing, hands full of mud....these are the things which should be so common and so simple things that we can get from life. But these are the things that have become costly and unreachable and yes it's unbelievable too! Yes it was unbelievable for me when I could find very very few alternative schools out of thousands of educational institutions the city has to offer. And it is unbelievable that it's hard to make people believe that this is what a kid needs first and foremost when compared to anything else. Our kids are not machines, giving them the freedom to play in the early years of childhood is the simplest best thing that we can offer them, this is the best we can do. What is the use of a person in a competitive group when he ceases to think, innovate, cannot handle pressure? If the kids are getting turned out to be like factory products because of overloading them with unnecessary information at unnecessary time, then that is what they will become, a noncompetitive person. It is not enough if you just join them in any school but it is also required to see to it that they learn the right things at the right time, which is nothing but their own pace. It does not mean that they can eat, sleep and laze around! Let them develop a sense of competition to themselves, that they should be willing to learn something new everyday, have a sense of responsibility for the tasks they take up, show some care for others and nature. Do little by little, but it has to be a process. It should not start when there is an exam the next day or should not stop when the exams get over! We are not living for school exams but it should be like another step towards improvement. All that thought and said, I feel like my responsibility has just increased many folds as a parent and still trying to get my kid's social media interaction to zero. On a lighter note, I already feel like it's a herculean task in managing things with my 3 year old. And I am trying to learn things with him all over again at 10 times his age, but glad too that it looks like happening finally :) I already feel like a more sensible and responsible person:) I just hope he gets the best childhood so that his/my future years are more brighter and clearer!
A recent experience of directing a drama with children opened up new perspectives to the mother and teacher in me. As I was pondering about the art of acting as someone in a story, it dawned upon me that children are born actors. Look around to see how natural it is for a young child to imitate others all the time, so well without any inhibition or filter. A child naturally lives in the other to understand what it means to be the other - it is profound learning, and hard work that they are doing. It is only later, through the years of growing up, we gain the ability to look at others as someone else from the self. Hence we grow the ability to empathise, that we can transform ourselves to feel what it means to be in others shoes and come back to the self - much like playing a role in a drama. As we grow, we invite many roles into our lives (father, mother, brother, son, aunt etc.) and juggle between acting in different roles. We act so well that we actually live in that role and
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Truly we can learn a lot through experience and thus it is Experiential Learning.
Learning from kids and learning for kids are the two most blessed things parents can get as opportunity....Happy learning.