'THE world' vs 'MY world'

I saw a very interesting presentation by Devdutt Pattnaik in TED (East vs west - The Myths that mystify). He spoke on the basic cultural difference between East and west and as a result the difference in the business structure between these paradigms.

One point that really set me thinking was the way he connected the story of Ganesha and Karthikeya going around the world to get the divine fruit. while Karthikeya set out in his peacock to go around the Earth for 3 times, Ganesha just went around his parents thrice and got the divine fruit. :)

karthikeya went around 'THE WORLD' but Ganesh went around 'HIS WORLD' !!! Think!
and this is what I would call as making a 'WORLD of difference' :) Thanks to Devdutt

While most of the parents are more concerned about alighning the child to THE World, they hardly dive into the 'MY World' of a child and get to know his dreams, aspirations, values, etc, etc.

I came across the mission statement of a 'so called' good school, it read something like- ' To prepare students to fit into the society...'

lets zoom into the word 'fitting'. is fitting the students into the society the goal of a school. Then are we not completely ignoring the 'My world'of the child and only 'Moulding' them to FIT into 'THE WORLD'!

Lot of educationists also proudly claim that they 'MOULD' the children. I can only remember a potter moulding a pot! Imagine the state of the child whom every teacher is trying to 'mould' according to 'THE World' of the teacher / parent.

'Do like this. Don't do like that!'
'DO MBA. That is the 'in' thing now.'

Look around people who made a mark in the history. They are the ones who d
ared to live by 'Their World' and not 'THE world'. While the world belived that EARTH was flat one person stood by 'HIS world'. It took almost centuries to really understand his world.

While the whole world was going towards violence, one person stood by 'HIS WORLD of non-violence' and proved to the world the power of non-violence.

There are many ways to interpret the concept of 'MY world and THE world'. lets think about it.

Lets start listening to the child's world. Lets start understanding the child's world. lets start nurturing the child's world.

Lets 'LET THE CHILD BLOSSOM'

GIVE ME AN OTHER CHANCE...

What a thrilling FIFA quarter finals yesterday. the BIG guys - Brazil dropping out and the last African team missing its chance for glory.

When I saw Gyan missing the last chance of penalty he had the song that hit me was -
"Give me some sun shine.. Give me some rays...
Give me an other chance I wanna grow up once again"

Na..na..na..na...

GIVE ME AN OTHER CHANCE....

Imagine the emotions that Gyan would have faced when he missed that easy opportunity! They could have easily gone to the semis and made history! The next chance they are going to get is only after 4 years! And by the time a see of change could happen!

Does this ring a bell when we connect it to education?

It definitely rings a bell for me.. But let me leave it to you to share your thoughts.

Schools that L‘EARN’!

No. I am not going to talk about whether schools are over exploiting with fees or I am also not going to talk about education becoming business. I feel educational institutions becoming more commercial is fine. But, in the process what schools need to keep in mind is what I would like to discuss here about.
First let us list some advantages of educational institutions becoming commercial. I have come across many such schools who charge fees substantially. Some positives things that I observed in this trend is that –

1. Schools are equipping themselves with more infrastructure and sophisticated learning environments
2. Schools are slowly moving beyond booking knowledge to at least positioning themselves as catering to the holistic development of a child
3. In the competition, each school is also trying to position itself as one step ahead of the other so called 'best' schools

So I am seeing development and growth because of education becoming commercial. I am not going into the negatives now. Let us keep that aside as of now.
While it is a healthy climate to see growth, what is worrying is when schools empower themselves for the sake of earning and not learning, when schools better themselves for attracting parents but not for benefitting students.
'Air conditioned classrooms.'
'Air conditioned library'
'Smart boards in every class'
It is very important for a school to equip themselves with latest technologies. But at the same time Air condition is a luxury over empowering teachers on various new methodologies of teaching! 'Project based learning' has been a buzz word in the west almost for the past 2 decades. But How many of our school heads would have tried and implemented it. How many of the schools are open to learn new things in teaching or open to bringing in a student centric approach or creating a culture of thinking in classrooms! While majority of the schools have budget allocated for books, sports equipments, teaching aids, technology, etc. it is saddening to note that not many have a budget allocated for empowering their teachers. And even if they have, it is very minimum and suffices just to put a record in the books that they are empowering teachers.
We stop learning when we feel we are full. So what would be the state of a school whose head feels he is full / his school is the best / he knows everything. The learning stops and they are no longer available for learning new things.
In the last week times of India there was a half page article on 'Innovations in education' and it stated that in a decade the world is going to face a huge crisis. The number of degree holders would be much more than the job demands. India has a greater chance but at the same time Indians face a big problem. We lack 'employability skills'. Empathy, working in teams, being a team player, motivation-all these fall under the employability skill. I have seen MBA graduates who can't speak English properly! So there are lot of youngsters out there who think they would get a job if they have a degree!
The process has to start from school. The teaching has to extend beyond textbooks to different levels of Blooms. Unfortunately, though Blooms taxonomy is taught in B.Ed. schools the application is just in examination level and teachers don't remember it beyond that.
'It is good to earn. But don't stop to learn.'
I end this blog with this punch dialogue. J
LET THE CHILD BLOSSOM


Leave your comments below.

The ‘Expected Answer Seeking’ Syndrome

Q1 - "You all enjoyed the previous blog right?"
Q2 - "So what are your comments on my previous blog?"


Q1 - "Is there a difference between the above two questions?"
Q2 - "What do you think about the above two questions?"

Now, are we able to see the difference between the Q1 questions and the Q2 questions? The answer that I am expecting from you is "YES". This is exactly what we are going to talk about – The expected answer seeking syndrome. J And the largest community that is suffering from this syndrome is the teaching community. And they religiously pass on this syndrome to generations after generations. Please don't mistake me that I am being very pessimistic about the teacher community. Are you getting me wrong? NO…? YES…? NO…? This is when we really get confused and the syndrome works out really well.

Tell me if you have not been put in such a situation, where you are been asked a question. You answer and the tone of the teacher would tell you that the answer that you gave was not the expected answer and if you are intelligent enough, you would take the clue and change your answer without even understanding the reason!

Tell me if you have not experienced a situation where you want to tell something but you KNOW somehow that the person who is asking the question will not be pleased by your answer and you just give out the answer that would please the questioner!

This syndrome is the greatest enemy of creativity. If I am suffering from this syndrome I rarely appreciate unique and creative answers. I would even say I don't understand what it means to be creativity or I would not be able to appreciate seeking unique answers. It is just not there in my dictionary.

Rewind a bit to the school days and recollect such incidents. A question in a 3^rd standard annual exam – "_______ adds beauty to face?" Without the context of a lesson you could answer smile, hair, makeup or whatever you want. But in the context of the lesson 'Teeth' the expected answer is – teeth. While the teacher was teaching this topic I remember a child got up and asked "Ma'am, a child is not having teeth but still it is so beautiful right?"

What a brilliant observation and question. But the question was lost in the syndrome. The teacher just smiled and asked the students to underline the word teeth in the sentence – Teeth adds beauty to the face.

Coming late – How many teachers would have got irritated even if we had genuine reasons? "Look at his audacity. Why can't you just say sorry?' So the expected answer is just sorry and the teacher would be satisfied with that.

Imagine the situation where a principal has a doubt that a particular teacher has not been teaching well and he wants to prove that her students know nothing. When the objective is to prove that the students are stupid the questions will be framed in a way that the students will be seen to be stupid. It is as simple as that. And even among them if some student is trying to make a mark he would not even be appreciated and even more tougher questions will be thrown.

The only solution for this problem is…

I am sorry. I don't know. J Please leave your comments on what you think on this topic.


"You enjoyed the blog right?" J
J
J

On a mission…

Mission teaching and mission parenting:


It is tiring, it is challenging, it is fettering, it is fretting. But what can make this mission a mission of joy, discovery and success is the mantra ‘Let the child Blossom’

It is a powerful statement that I have borrowed from EZ Vidya’s mission statement. The more I think about it, the more revelations I get.

Before judging, before instructing, before advising, before thrusting, before answering, before questioning just ask one simple question – ‘Am I letting the child blossom?’

One day my boss asked me “What do you think is the key word in the mission statement – Let the child blossom?’

I thought for some time and said ‘child’, somebody said ‘blossom’. She said according to her it is the verb ‘LET’. Think about it.

As I started observing I really understood how important that verb is.

A child sees a horse for the first time and says ‘Hey such a big DOG.’

Immediately we would laugh at the child, think he is dumb and say ‘It is not a dog. It is a horse!’

If we relook at this same situation with the mission statement in mind, then few questions that would pop up is –

‘Why is he saying it is a dog?’

‘If I am just going to let out that it is a horse what thought process would happen in the child’s mind?’

‘How can I make him understand that it is different from dog?’

These questions could possibly lead us to an other approach. We would rather ask the child to say why he said it is a dog and ask the child to state the difference between a dog and the animal that is in front and construct a thought process and finally tell out the new lingo ‘Horse’.

This way a child starts observing more.

With this mission –

A teacher would not just teach but facilitate

A parent would not just advise but add wise

A boss would not thrust but would allow

We would not Tell but we would ‘LET’



I am now going to stop telling and let you think more about it and share your thoughts. Join the mission ‘Let the child blossom’

Unwind

What comes to your mind when you think of -

'India'

'School'

'Government'

'Religion'

'Men'

'Women'

'Teachers'

'USA'

'Mathematics'



This fluency exercise is a great tool to capture the 'perception' of people. We see only what we want to see and perception plays a vital role in the mind to make us see what we want to see. List down your perception on the topics that are listed above and Analise how these perceptions were formed!



A powerful statement that I learnt in CHYK* was 'Man is limited by his beliefs.' What a statement! WE form certain perceptions, beliefs and assumptions and we are limited by them! Lot of us even fail to recognize this truth and continue to be limited by them.


Once a person forms a strong perception or belief it is really difficult look at things the other way. How difficult would be to convince about democracy to a communist or the vise verso! Its that difficult.

Imagine how difficult then is to influence the education scenario! How many stockholder's perceptions we need to influence...! Parent... Teacher....Principal...Decision maker....

Few of the many strong perceptions that are really challenging to break is -
'Text book is my curriculum' (In fact many a teachers and principals may not even be aware of what is a curriculum... Many wouldn't even be aware of a NCF

'I need to mould my children. I have to impart knowledge.' (This very assumption stems from the perception that children don't know anything. I will have to 'teach' them. )

'I have taught for 20 years. I 'know' how to teach.' (A very strong perception that blocks a teacher from learning and implementing new techniques and appreciate new concepts. )

'My child has to score good marks to be successful.' (A very powerful assumption, the side effect of which all of us are aware of. The other hidden assumption in this is that we think we will be happy if we are successful and 'success' itself varies according to each ones perception!')

These are just a few. There are many more such perceptions that act as strong force in education reformation.

As we gather more and more experiences perceptions, beliefs, assumptions are formed without even our knowledge. It is very important we INWIND, REWIND and UNWIND from time to time.

Leave your comments on this. Share some of the perceptions that you think are influencing the change in education.













*CHYK is the Global youth wing of Chinmaya Mission