Skip to main content

Children - no more childlike?



The above is a real picture of the condition of school education in India.  A front page report in the Delhi edition of The Hindu (13 Nov 2013) carries the photo from a teacher training institute in Dharwad.  The institute (DIET) which trains primary school teachers has only one student, and 6 teachers.  The previous batch had just two students.

The Times of India carries another report on the same day: 'Need Parenting Help? Call a Coach.'  More and more parents are turning to experts for advice on how to deal with their children!

Why have children become such a problem that parents need expert advice
and teachers seem to be terrified of them - so terrified that teacher training institutes are running the danger of shutting down?


Labels:

Comments

  1. jahidNovember 13, 2013 at 5:14 PM

    Kalyug hai Sir, ghor Kalyug :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalNovember 13, 2013 at 5:56 PM

      Jahid, I would like to see Kalyug from a secular, scientific view and use the concept of entropy: nature tends from order to disorder. The more evil is allowed to creep in, the quicker will entropy be. We allowed too many undesirable things to children... Now they think getting elders shut up in jail is their right!

      Delete
  2. AnonymousNovember 13, 2013 at 5:48 PM

    This is really a Sad State of Affairs...Until and Unless Childrens knows the importance of Education,How can our Country Prosper...

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalNovember 13, 2013 at 5:59 PM

      Children are like clay, Harsha. It is up to the adults in their life to mould that clay. But adults like teachers have been rendered helpless by various systems.

      Delete
  3. JeevanNovember 14, 2013 at 1:34 PM

    Oh my God! This is terrible. A noble profession on it's way out?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalNovember 14, 2013 at 6:36 PM

      Teaching is too old a profession to become extinct! But at what level will it survive? Who will be the people that carry it forward? These are questions worth asking.

      Delete
  4. drchinmoyhazarikaNovember 14, 2013 at 7:54 PM

    Traditional "moulding" does not work as it did before. The "moulding" need not be onto children alone, the "moulders" may need to be moulded too. Hence, it becomes such that the would-be teachers know what to mould the children into.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalNovember 14, 2013 at 10:39 PM

      "Moulding" is not perhaps the right imagery, Chinmoy. It's a very old concept that I borrowed for convenience's sake. Pruning would be a better imagery. The gardener should know when to prune, how to prune and which parts to be cut off.

      The idealism apart, would you ever be willing to be a teacher? :)

      Delete
    2. drchinmoyhazarikaNovember 18, 2013 at 10:57 PM

      I already am :)

      Delete
  5. UnknownNovember 15, 2013 at 5:48 PM

    This is quite depressing.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalNovember 15, 2013 at 6:05 PM

      The actual situation in classrooms and school campuses is even more depressing, Pankti. Unfortunately I can only write in analogies and riddles. My next post will be on the same theme but written against the background of Golding's novel, 'The Lord of the Flies'.

      Delete
    2. UnknownNovember 15, 2013 at 6:20 PM

      I look forward to it.

      Delete
  6. Jeena R. PapaadiNovember 15, 2013 at 10:31 PM

    I thought youngsters were not interested in the teaching profession because of the unattractive remuneration compared to the other (popular) professions.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalNovember 16, 2013 at 6:53 AM

      It's a complex situation, Jeena, as complex as most social problems are. The remuneration is just one dimension.

      Delete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Adventures of Toto as a comic strip

  'The Adventures of Toto' is an amusing story by Ruskin Bond. It is prescribed as a lesson in CBSE's English course for class 9. Maggie asked her students to do a project on some of the lessons and Femi George's work is what I would like to present here. Femi converted the story into a beautiful comic strip. Her work will speak for itself and let me present it below.  Femi George Student of Carmel Public School, Vazhakulam, Kerala Similar post: The Little Girl
47 comments
Read more

Whose Rama?

Book Review Title: Whose Rama? [Malayalam] Author: T S Syamkumar Publisher: D C Books, Kerala Pages: 352 Rama may be an incarnation of God Vishnu, but is he as noble a man [ Maryada Purushottam ] as he is projected to be by certain sections of Hindus? This is the theme of Dr Syamkumar’s book, written in Malayalam. There is no English translation available yet. Rama is a creation of the Brahmins, asserts the author of this book. The Ramayana upholds the unjust caste system created by Brahmins for their own wellbeing. Everyone else exists for the sake of the Brahmin wellbeing. If the Kshatriyas are given the role of rulers, it is only because the Brahmins need such men to fight and die for them. Valmiki’s Rama too upheld that unjust system merely because that was his Kshatriya-dharma, allotted by the Brahmins. One of the many evils that Valmiki’s Rama perpetrates heartlessly is the killing of Shambuka, a boy who belonged to a low caste but chose to become an ascetic. The...
8 comments
Read more

The Little Girl

The Little Girl is a short story by Katherine Mansfield given in the class 9 English course of NCERT. Maggie gave an assignment to her students based on the story and one of her students, Athena Baby Sabu, presented a brilliant job. She converted the story into a delightful comic strip. Mansfield tells the story of Kezia who is the eponymous little girl. Kezia is scared of her father who wields a lot of control on the entire family. She is punished severely for an unwitting mistake which makes her even more scared of her father. Her grandmother is fond of her and is her emotional succour. The grandmother is away from home one day with Kezia's mother who is hospitalised. Kezia gets her usual nightmare and is terrified. There is no one at home to console her except her father from whom she does not expect any consolation. But the father rises to the occasion and lets the little girl sleep beside him that night. She rests her head on her father's chest and can feel his heart...
19 comments
Read more

In this Wonderland

I didn’t write anything in the last few days. Nor did I feel any urge to write. I don’t know if this lack of interest to write is what’s called writer’s block. Or is it simple disenchantment with whatever is happening around me? We’re living in a time that offers much, too much, to writers. The whole world looks like a complex plot for a gigantic epic. The line between truth and fiction has disappeared. Mass murders have become no-news. Animals get more compassion than fellow human beings. Even their excreta are venerated! Folk tales are presented as scientific truths while scientific truths are sacrificed on the altar of political expediency. When the young generation in Nepal set fire to their Parliament and Supreme Court buildings, they were making an unmistakable statement: that they are sick of their political leaders and their systems. Is there any country whose leaders don’t sicken their citizens? I’m just wondering. Maybe, there are good leaders still left in a few coun...
10 comments
Read more

Virginity is not in the hymen

The subtitle of Thomas Hardy’s novel Tess of the D’Urbervilles is A Pure Woman though Tess had lost her virginity before her marriage and later she commits a murder too.  Tess is seduced by Alec and gives birth to a child which dies.  Later, while working as a dairymaid she falls in love with Angel Clare, a clergyman’s son.  On their wedding night she confesses to him the seduction by Alec, and Angel hypocritically abandons her.  Angel is no virgin himself; he has had an affair with an older woman in London.  Moreover, Tess had no intention of deceiving him.  In fact, she had written a letter to him explaining her condition.  The letter was, however, lying hidden beneath the carpet in Angel’s room.  Later Alec manages to seduce Tess once again persuading her to think that Angel would never accept her.  Angel, however, returns repenting of his harshness.  Tess is maddened by Alec’s second betrayal of her and she kills him....
55 comments
Read more