{"id":1114,"date":"2019-09-23T19:21:00","date_gmt":"2019-09-23T19:21:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/oscillationss.blogspot.com\/?p=1114"},"modified":"2019-09-23T19:21:00","modified_gmt":"2019-09-23T19:21:00","slug":"why-we-have-finalized-homeschool-for-our-son","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/oscillations.in\/?p=1114","title":{"rendered":"Why we have finalized Homeschool for our son?"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n<\/p>\n
\nSometimes back, I was talking to
\nan Educator friend (who thinks Educator word is a better representative of his role
\nthan teacher) and our discussions turned towards the memorization problem of
\nour education. When I asked him whether he understood the gravity of the crisis
\nI realized that he did not even understand the concept of memorization. He was
\ntaking this in literal sense when the issue is relative (IQ vs Memory).<\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nSo I gave him the example of my
\nson-my 7 years old son who has almost 200 car toys and remarkably he remembers the
\nsource of each and every car. Sometimes he comes to me with a car and tells the source like that car I had bought for him when he was crying after he got
\nhis vaccination. And almost every child has this type of memory because they
\nhave fewer things to take care off and they are busy and wander in their own
\nfantasy world. So is there any need to check and test their memory? They are
\nalready demonstrating that they are good in remembering things so is there any
\nneed to waste their precious time in proving that they have good memory. In
\nfact best way to enhance their memory is to expose them to newer phenomenon
\nroutinely especially the things they like and prefer.<\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nBut in our schools, most of the
\nstudy and time is oriented towards making them remember things and then more
\ntime is wasted in testing the same (exams\/tests) when it serves no purpose and
\nthere will be minimal reward in their future life for the use of memory. What
\nis the purpose in asking a 1st <\/sup>\/2nd<\/sup> standard child to
\nmemorize a story and then taking exam\/test of the same? By taking exam we are
\ntesting the memory only (which is not required at all at first) but there is no
\ntest to see whether he can apply the understandings\/learning of the story in life
\nor situations.<\/span><\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nWe humans build opinions when we
\nsee and comprehend things relative to us like when a child sees how bad he
\nfeels when his friend does not share the chocolate with him and this lays the
\nfoundation of opinion about sharing things with others. We can\u2019t understand
\nthat which does not have its existence relative to us. Like can we make a child
\nunderstand what is love? Why people die for love? No, we can\u2019t because a child with
\nhis present physical and emotional development stage can\u2019t comprehend this
\njust like we can\u2019t comprehend what our Sages\/Gurus\/Rishis mean when they urge
\nus to rise beyond our present consciousness level to higher spiritual level to
\nexperience the vastness and greatness of life. We can\u2019t comprehend when they
\nsay there is no death\u2026when they die for the virtue.<\/div>\n
\nSo the consciousness and wisdom
\nof a child is developed when he is exposed to the different phenomenon of the
\nworld. He makes his inferences about the phenomenon based on his present state of consciousness.<\/p>\n

So we can direct our efforts in channelizing and exposing
\nthem to the phenomenon which is relevant to them like love story movies are
\nworthless for them, English grammar is useless for them (they learn languages
\non their own with much more efficiency), General knowledge books are useless
\nfor them (I have seen questions about MS Dhoni in GK Book for 1st standard!!).
\nBut cartoons like Doraemon are much more helpful (even better than schools) as
\na child can relate to it as he lives the same type of life\u2026his dreams are same.
\nMy son that day asked me about the time machine which Doraemon has and asked me
\nwhether he could meet his grandfather with the help of that machine by going back
\nin time. I was surprised that he could understand the linear flow of time
\n(although we are not sure about the linearity).<\/p><\/div>\n

\n<\/div>\n
\nEvery child understands and uses
\nmathematics in his life but with things with which he is associated. You
\ngive them 5 cookies and takes away 1 and they can tell how many are left very
\neasily as compared to the effort when we ask them to solve this one paper
\n(5-1=?). Now, these numerical alphabets are foreign objects for them which they
\ndo not use in their daily life. Also, our mind thinks and understands
\nphenomenon in pictures (we may not realize this but whatever I am writing here
\nwe are seeing a picture for every word\/emotion in our mind running like a
\nmovie) so their mind can comprehend 5 cookies lined up on a paper but then
\ncannot comprehend that \u201c5\u201d represents the count of anything numbered 5. For
\nthem it is a picture only but we still try to teach them math in this way only.
\nI have seen the use of five things along with 5 but I feel whether we need to
\nteach and force mathematics on them in this boring way or in a way which they
\nuse in their daily life.<\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nIQ is about
\napplication of Data\/Knowledge<\/span><\/u><\/b><\/div>\n
\n
<\/span><\/u><\/b><\/div>\n
\nAt present, in our schools
\nchildren (7-8 years) are being forced to sit for 7 hours studying GK, Grammar, and
\nEVS which are useless for them. When I put my son to a Nagpur school they have
\nasked us to bought books on some 7-8 subjects. But CBSE rules provides for only
\n3 subjects: Hindi, English and Maths but there were extra subjects like GK,
\nEVS, Science, and English Grammar and all these are strictly prohibited by
\ncourt, NCERT and CBSE. Even the honorable Madras High court Judge was shocked
\nand surprised to note that Grammar and Computer science have been studied in
\nclass 1. To teach these useless subjects children are being forced to sit for 7
\nhours in schools. I raised the issue with the management of the school and to my
\nsurprise they replied that the curriculum and time is just like other schools in
\nthe Nagpur and it is the benchmark. But I told them that the benchmark is
\ndecided by CBSE\/NCERT not by schools. For this they had no answer.<\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nI immediately realized that they don’t have the IQ to understand the uselessness of forcing these books on
\nsmall children. I have seen these schools shouting \u201cIQ-IQ\u201d all the time in
\ntheir promotions but after my interactions with so many of them I have realized
\nthat they do not understand this at all. I asked about this to so many
\neducators I have met and their fully confident answer was that it is about the
\nintelligence. But how and why-they do not have any clue at all.<\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nOnce I gave one example on this
\nto some of my friends. I am detailing the same here. I am an investor and pick
\nstocks after detailed study about the business. I was having one stock- Praj
\nindustries ltd which is one of the most innovative company in India and their
\nmain business is to set up plants to produce Ethanol from Molasses\/sugarcane
\nwhich is called 1st<\/sup> generation Bio fuel. Then they were focusing on
\nproducing 2G bio fuel from the bio wastes like Wood chips, rice husk etc. So
\none day I was sitting with some of my friend and we were discussing this issue
\nand then one of my friend said that 2G bio fuel may not be possible as there is
\nno technology to extract or synthesize fuel from grass, wood etc. <\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nAt that time I had done the study
\nof Enzyme industry for finding a stock related to enzymes. I had also completed
\nthe study of Dairy industry. So at once something flashed in my mind and I told
\nmy friend that this activity of extracting energy from wood, grass is already
\nbeing done. My shocked friends asked where. I told them about the cow. A cow
\nuses special set of enzymes to convert the tough and complex matter like
\ncellulose into energy so we can also extract these enzymes from them and use
\nthe same for 2G fuel. It is just like we extract rennet from the stomach of
\ncalves for making cheese. We later checked and found that research for 2G bio
\nfuel is indeed based on enzymes from cow stomach.<\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nSo study about the enzymes and
\ntheir role in our life is just DATA but when we use them for the solution of
\nthe problems then it is about IQ. Intelligence is the use of the data. <\/span>I always
\nsay that Data is God and advise all to absorb as much data as they can. But
\ndata for me is not about the Birth place of Lord Buddha. I refer data about the
\nname of a player, awardee, birth place, book writer etc. as \u201cSpatial Data\u201d and
\nmost of the time it is useless in the context of our life. But what Lord Buddha
\npreached, his experience about the life and world is something which can\u2019t even
\nbe valued. Because just the words of a person like Lord Buddha can transform
\nthe life of anyone just like he did for \u201cAngulimal\u201d. So the data about what our
\nworld is and how it behaves the way it behaves is most important for our life
\nand I call this as \u201cEssential Data\u201d and the data which we can gather by
\ncomprehending the teachings of persons like Lord Buddha, Mahavir, Krishna etc. is \u201cTransformational Data”.<\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nSo when we have the data about
\nhow the phenomenon of the world behave then we can use that data for our use or
\nfor solving or for betterment of our life whether it is about electricity or
\nmedicines. <\/span>Human first understood what electricity is and how it behaves and
\nthen with this data they had been able to produce the electricity on their own.
\nThis is IQ. IQ is more related to the use of knowledge rather than superficial
\nknowledge. Use of knowledge requires deep understanding of the concept and
\nfactors affecting the behavior and outcomes which is very different from \u201csurface
\nscratching\u201d teaching methods of our schools.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\nOur Brain has this amazing
\ncapability to create new insights, extract innovative ideas from the unknown in
\na flash but it happens when we have the data for processing in our mind, when
\nour mind is filled with the essential data\u2026data about how phenomenon works here
\nin this world and most of the times our brain appears to create these insights
\non its own\u2026in auto mode.<\/span><\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nAnd the sad part is that our
\nschools focus on imparting data only (that too \u201cspatial data\u201d) and very little
\neffort is put on devising study material and method to promote and enhance the
\nuse of data by children for finding solutions of the problems. With our current
\nlow standards of imparting study in schools, most of the times they end at
\nteaching \u201cEssential data\u201d as \u201cSpatial Data\u201d just like when they ask students to
\nmemorize the formula for calculating the area of a circle (\u03c0<\/span>r2<\/sup>)
\nand the derivation is never explained to them. <\/span><\/div>\n
\n
<\/span><\/div>\n
\nAnd if we can try to
\nlook beyond the apparent then we can see that the primary function of current education
\nsystem is not to enhance the skills of students but to certify what they
\nhave-memory, intelligence etc. At present, a student is brilliant because he is
\nbrilliant on its own and there is no contribution from the school. Our schools just
\ncan\u2019t enhance the intelligence of a poor child. There is no method and efforts
\nto develop intelligence. So in essence, our schools are just certifying which student is brilliant,dumb or average.They are a testing platform
\nonly and there is no value addition from schools in the intellectual development of an average student.<\/span> We all can remember how our
\npoor school friend from 5th<\/sup> standard was poor even in 10th<\/sup>
\nstandards. I have seen people performing well in studies once they are out of
\nschool because after schools they were able to utilize their time much better
\non their problem areas but still the loss of most creative and productive
\nperiod of childhood can never be replaced. <\/span><\/div>\n
\n
<\/span><\/div>\n
\nOur current education
\nsystem can never create revolutionary innovators. Sometimes, Indian education
\nsystem appears good due to individual brilliance stories but system itself
\ndoesn\u2019t contribute much to create and develop brilliant brains. The contribution
\nof our schools in creating and nurturing the brilliance is insignificant. These
\nindividuals could have written their destiny even in sheer darkness. <\/span><\/div>\n
\n
<\/span><\/div>\n
\nFor the current sorry
\nstate of our education system is due to many reasons but surprisingly one of
\nthe reasons is- NCERT, the failure of NCERT in developing the qualitative aspects
\nof education and content. There is big hue and cry every year about compulsory
\nsourcing of NCERT textbooks by CBSE schools and it appears that only mandate of
\nNCERT is to produce cheap textbooks. However books publication was never the
\nmandate of NCERT. NCERT was set up in 1961 to assist and advise the Central and
\nState governments on policies and programmes for qualitative improvement in
\nschool education. Its main focus areas were research related to school
\neducation and the publication of \u201cmodel\u201d textbooks. As we can see the mandate
\nwas \u201cto publish Model books\u201d. It was never of \u201cMass publication of books\u201d as it
\nis thought of.<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
\n
<\/span><\/div>\n
\nHowever the government
\nis using the tax payers’ money to subsidize the paper cost which is used by the
\nNCERT books and therefore being made cheaper. The government is subsidizing it
\nto the end students by using the tax payers\u2019 money. So, as we can see taxpayers
\nare paying for the cheap books and it is not that they are producing it
\ncheaply.<\/span> That\u2019s why I sometimes feel that it is better for NCERT to stick to
\nits original mandate of research in improving the quality of school education
\nrather than wasting time on publishing millions of books and wasting time on
\nsupply chain.<\/span><\/div>\n
\n
<\/span><\/div>\n
\nExcessive
\nUseless study material and study time<\/span><\/u><\/b><\/span><\/u><\/b><\/div>\n
\n
<\/span><\/u><\/b><\/div>\n
\nWhen I was looking for a suitable school for my son in
\nNagpur I was shocked to see that all the schools were forcing excessive useless
\nstudy material and excessive school timings on small children. How can a small
\nchild of 7 years afford to spend 7-8 hours in a controlled tiring environment in
\na school daily and then after that hope to enjoy their golden childhood. I have
\nseen parents sending their children to tuition even when they already wasted
\n7-8 hours already in school. This is injustice and torture beyond imagination.<\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nDue to long school hours a child
\nis not being able to take food properly plus food always gets stale\/cold during
\nthese long hours. After the poor child comes back home after putting 7-8 hours
\nhe is always very tired. This affects his playtime and sleeping pattern very
\nbadly as they are supposed to get up at 7 am which is not good for children as
\ntheir body clock and sleep\/rest pattern is different. Most of the children I
\nhave seen take school as some type of jail which they have to endure somehow
\nand this is not good at all for the long term intellectual growth of a child.It is surprising that in spite of
\nthe regular intervention by high court still the schools are being allowed to
\nplay with the rules and the lives of small children.<\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nThis forcing of extra subjects by
\nthe school is the main cause of extended hours (or torture not study). Because
\neven if we take 45 minutes for 3 subjects as prescribed by NCERT\/CBSE the total
\nstudy time will be 135 minutes plus 15 minutes assembly and another 1 hour for
\nplay and food break will make it approx. 250 minutes (4 hours) but now they are
\nput to endure school for 7 long hours and this becomes 8-9 hours due to
\ntravelling times in larger cities.<\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nA child learns and absorbs the
\nworld best when he is a free spirit without any stress or pressure. Class rooms
\nare not the best way for this as a child learns by visuals and real life
\nphenomenon not through empty words. So the need is to give them proper
\nenvironment, free time in real life for the observation and visualization not
\ntrapped in the class rooms like prisoners. <\/span><\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nWe still have in our education system
\nthe wrong notion of \u201cPopulation syndrome\u201d where we perceived more people as
\ngood (for earning more income) but ended up being a highly populated country devoid of even most basic
\namenities. The same mentality we are following for child education thinking
\n\u201cmore is better\u201d while it is common sense that burden of books kills
\ncreativity, ingenuity, Natural flow of thinking and natural talent. Numerous
\nstudies have shown that the education standard is one of the true indicator
\n(Other is health) of economic development in a country and it is sorry to see
\nthat India is lacking both.<\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nSo our schools need to throw away
\nthe herd like mentalities and try to bring in innovative models for imparting
\nknowledge\u2026schools should play the role of more of a medium (Channel) through
\nwhich the students absorb the knowledge than a heavy burden which only forces
\nstudents to struggle for walking straight on a tight rope with heavy burden on
\ntheir heads.<\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nPISA moment
\nfor India<\/span><\/u><\/b><\/div>\n
\n
<\/span><\/u><\/b><\/div>\n
\nA young man has the
\nresponsibility for his own action and life but a child is the responsibility of
\nthe parents, school and society and we try to fulfill this responsibility by
\nputting them for long painful hours in school.<\/span> In fact, this \u201cMore is good \u201c
\nmentality has polluted our education system so much that India occupied 73th
\nplace among of 74 countries participating in PISA (Program for International
\nStudent Assessment) test (the last one in which India participated). <\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nPISA survey is conducted by the Organization for Economic
\nCooperation and Development (OECD) to test education systems by comparing the test
\nperformance of 15-year-old pupils. Indian education planners were shocked at
\nthe poor standing and cited reasons like language problems of Indian students
\nwhich was not even a face hiding excuse since many other non-English speaking
\nnations like China emerged as winners. Besides, there is not much role of a
\nlanguage in Mathematics.<\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nStudents from Singapore, Japan,
\nTaiwan, Vietnam, and China (Hong Kong, Macao, Beijing, Shanghai, Guangdong, and
\nJiangsu province) were among the top performers. Over 540,000 students, from 70
\ncountries, participated in the tests. The two-hour test not only evaluates the
\ncognitive skills of students in science, math, and reading, but also assesses
\ntheir ability to solve problems in new and unfamiliar conditions (as I have
\nexplained earlier the IQ). The approach of PISA \u201creflects the fact that modern
\neconomies reward individuals not for what they know, but for what they can do
\nwith what they know.\u201d All this implies creativity, free and natural thinking
\nprocess, long rooted culture of understanding the problem and concept not just
\nmemorization and we know that our education system fails big time in
\ninculcating and motivating these traits. Due to embarrassment India did not
\nparticipated in the 2012 and 2015 survey. At present India is thinking of participating in 2020 PISA test and i think this apprehension is a tight slap on the face of our so called great educators who are basking in self glorification.<\/span><\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nSuccess of
\ninnovative education system of Finland-An eye opener for India<\/span><\/u><\/b><\/div>\n
\n
<\/span><\/u><\/b><\/div>\n
\nCountries like Denmark and Finland
\nhave with their focus on creativity, innovation and continuous restructuring
\ncreated an environment where children take schools a place of enjoyment and
\nlearning not as some type of Jail and this has resulted in the children of
\nthese countries achieving big in their life and these are some of the happiest
\ncountries in the world. Recently, the success of Finland in raising their
\neducation standards has made even the likes of USA to follow their approach.
\nFinnish students have been turning in some of the highest test scores in the
\nworld. In PISA tests, Finland has ranked at or near the top in all three
\ncompetencies on every survey since 2000. Earlier world over, the education system
\nof USA, Germany and France was considered the best but the success of Finland
\nin PISA tests continuously shocked the entire globe.<\/span><\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nThe likes of China, Taiwan has
\ndone well but even in these countries children are being made to sit for long
\nhours in schools. These countries are now finding that their children are
\nunhealthy and devoid of energy due to excessive brain drain and long school
\nhours. However Finland has achieved the success in education in much better and
\nhealthiest way. Finland has achieved this remarkable progress just in a span of
\n10 years.<\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nIn Finland they do the
\nopposite-children are assigned minimum homework (half an hour only) and most of
\nthe school time is used for creative play outdoors. There are no regular
\nexams\/tests<\/span> for evaluating the students in fact they have one test after the
\nend of high school taken at the age of 16 which may be equal to our
\nmatriculation test. Unlike our great indian Educators they were first to
\nrealize that tests\/exams make students and teachers to focus on the narrow
\nsyllabus and focus is just to pass the exam so this leaves minimum scope for
\nlearning, creativity and enjoyment. <\/span>In Finland, there are no lists of top performing
\nschools, students and teachers.<\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nMy son asks me how power plant
\nproduce electricity, how AC cools the room, how lemon grows on the tree in our
\napartment\u2026..so just like every child he has a lot of question about \u201chow the
\nphenomenon works\u201d but we want them to spend their time in watching aimlessly at
\nclass room blackboard for hours and absorb the common study content which tries
\nto fit all the children with varying choices and passions into same box.<\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nOur schools take all the children
\nas a commodity and there is no focus on individualization.<\/span> This fact when I
\nbrought in front of management of my son\u2019s school they were looking at me
\naimlessly and I understood that they were incapable of understanding this. But in
\nFinland teachers create their own tests to assess every child. A master’s
\ndegree is required to enter the profession, and teacher training programs are
\namong the most selective professional schools in the country while in India
\nmost of the people choose teaching when they do not get employment elsewhere<\/span> or
\nwhen they himself were average students (But indeed there are some brilliant
\nteachers because exception is general). I have seen some of the dumbest (academically)
\npersons working as school teachers and even head of school.<\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nThe main idea behind the
\neducation system in Finland is to provide same education to every child
\nregardless of financial, family or geographical background and the aim was not
\nto make children Job ready but on social equality.<\/span> So there are no private
\nschools and children are given healthy meals, psychological counseling, and
\nindividualized student guidance. <\/span>But
\nmost startling achievement is that the difference in the top preforming and low
\npreforming students is lowest in Finland and similarly no other country has so
\nlittle variation in results across schools. So as I was pointing out earlier
\nthat our schools have no value addition in the intelligence of students but
\nFinland has proved that they can do it.
\n<\/span><\/span>So Finland has proved that it is possible to achieve excellence by
\nfocusing not on competition, but on cooperation, and not on choice, but on
\nequity. <\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nIn Finland, schooling starts at the age of 7. I have seen Indian parents sending their kids to school at the age of 2-3
\nyears which pains me. We sent our son to Pre-nursery school at the age of
\n4 that too for 2-3 times a week for some 2-3 hours just to play but no study. We
\nsent him to school when he was 6. In Finland Science classes have only 16
\nstudents so that all can focus on practical experiments in detail. School
\ntimings are only for about 4 hours (which I want to see in India also and I
\nfailed to make our so called educators understand). Their school starts around 10 am as they also understand that early school timings inflict severe damage to the health of children.<\/p>\n

The national curriculum is
\nonly broad guidelines and so teachers are required to use their creativity and
\ninnovation to devise the learning methods for each and every child
\nindividually. That\u2019s the reason that some of the brilliant academic minds
\nchoose teaching as a profession in Finland and they are respected and enjoy the
\nstatus just as doctors and lawyers. <\/span>Finland publishes highest books every year
\nand Finnish people are avid readers. Helsinki the capital of Finland was
\ndeclared the city with the most honest people.<\/div>\n

\n<\/div>\n
\nThe focus on Finland on improving
\nthe quality of their education has begun to show results as in 2017 Finnish
\nstartups received highest venture capital by GDP share in Europe. They have
\nmost innovative startups like Solar Foods has developed a product named \u201csolein\u201d,
\nwhich is an edible protein produced without any current agricultural systems
\nand its environmental impact is ten to one hundred times lower than soy or
\nmeat. Another startup Sulapac has developed an award winning material from wood
\nchips and natural binders to replace plastic. Then another startup Spinnova
\ntransforms cellulose into textile-ready fiber without dissolving processes or
\nharmful chemicals, using 99% less water than the cotton value chain. Spinnova
\nwon Fast Company\u2019s World Changing Ideas Award. These are just few of the
\nstartups they are creating. Our Nokia is also a Finnish company.<\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nMost important thing, Finland is
\na country which has forest products as major exports so one would think that
\nthey must have destroyed all of their forests like we are destroying. Now the
\nfact, 74% of the area of Finland is covered by forests just like Bhutan which
\nhave in their constitution to have minimum 60% forests. In Europe, Finland is a
\n“forest giant”, there being over sixteen times more forest per capita
\nthan in European countries on average.
\n<\/span>The amount of timber in their forests would make a 10-metre wide and
\n5-metre high wall around the globe. Finland has ensured this by growing more
\ntrees than they are cutting every time. This wisdom and care is possible because
\nof the high education standards unlike India where we consider The Ganga river
\nas holiest and our Mother but still pollutes it like gutter so can we say that
\nour education system has made us more civilized, aware, full of wisdom and
\ncompassion? The answer we all know without even any need to study anything.<\/div>\n
\nYou all can check more
\ninteresting details about the success of Finland education system by googling
\nit.<\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nFinally a
\nHomeschool for our Son <\/span><\/u><\/b>
\n
<\/span><\/u><\/b><\/div>\n
\nThere were many big and expensive
\nschools in Nagpur but they were also suffering from the same disease-no
\nunderstanding of education and children. So we were helpless and chose a school
\nwhich looks like having some sanity. But their only sanity was that they never
\nforced us to send our child to school daily as we started sending our child
\nschool every alternate day in order to give him time to recover and rest.<\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nOur only hope was that may be he
\nwould be able to like the school which he did to some extent but the main issue
\nwas the excessive school timings and unnecessary study of GK, Grammar and EVS
\nwhich was total wastage of time for a 1st<\/sup> standard student. We
\nrealized that he was always very tired in the evening, lack of energy,
\ndisorientation, irritation, frequent stomach problem and Nausea. This I have
\nseen with almost every child. <\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nSo we decided that all this
\ntorture is not good for our child and I met\/wrote to the school principle many
\ntimes and explained the situation and the fact that they are breaking the rules
\nof CBSE\/Court\/NCERT by forcing these extra books and extra school hours. But
\nthey were limited by their wisdom (and IQ level). This is not the story of that
\nparticular school\u2026.everywhere is the same situation\u2026all over India. I asked
\nthem what is the purpose of teaching these small kids the English grammar? What
\nis the usefulness of teaching them about the vowels and consonants? I even
\nchallenged them that even their teachers do not understand the concept behind
\nVowels. <\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nWe do job for 8 hours a day and
\ntime for us moves very fast. As we can see that years are passing like months
\nonce we cross 30-35. But time for a child moves very slow\u2026extremely slow. We
\nall can remember our life at school and college and those 10 years (until graduation)
\nseems like 50 years to us if we compare the current speed of movement of our
\ntime. There are some strange theories which say that this perception of time
\n(moving fast or slow) has its roots linked with the ratio of time interval to
\nthe total life span we have been alive. Like for a 10 year old young boy, one
\nyear is a long period of time since one year is 10% of his total life so far.
\nBut for a 50 year old this one year is just 2% of his total life. So no doubt
\nwe can see here that 10% is more than 2% I explained this to the principal that
\n7 hour for a child are equal to some 20 hours of ours and this is what Einstein\u2019s
\ntheory of relativity is all about and as a teacher they can better understand
\nthis but they could never as they suffered from intellectual myopia. <\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nOnce the school principal told my wife that we needed to up the ante for our son as he was lagging behind in
\nstudies. But these great educators could not see that first of all they failed to do
\nsomething when they were fully aware of the problems our son was facing. They
\nwere breaking the rules of court\/CBSE and could never muster the courage to
\nanswer any of my emails about these issues because in essence they lacked the intellect to
\ncomprehend these intricacies of human mind and growth. They could not gather the courage to accept that all these unnecessary books, long school timings are just a ploy to fetch higher school feel from parents..who will pay them such hefty fees if not for these long hours and number of books. They are doing this injustice to small children and ruining their golden period of learning with all sorts of garbage. How? Because their customers-the parents are not aware of anything…they are dead illiterate when the issue is to choose quality over quantity.<\/span><\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nOur son loves drawing and draws
\nthe shapes with great accuracy and drawing is just like writing alphabets or
\nwords because these alphabets are nothing more than drawing shapes\u2026as one can
\nsee \u201cO\u201d is a circle\u2026\u201dA\u201d is a triangle. So we promoted our son to drawing and he
\ncould learn writing alphabets very easily without much effort on our part. Our son
\nis very fond of things like Trains, Air conditioners, cranes, road rollers etc.
\nand he likes writing the names of various AC\u2019s like Onida, Samsung, Panasonic
\nand he memorize these words without much effort when he was 6. So I tried
\nexplaining this to the school that \u201cA\u201d for Apple is not the only way to teach. \u201cS\u201d
\nfor Samsung conveys the same idea\u2026for him \u201cS\u201d means Samsung or Shatabadi
\nexpress. The purpose of \u201cA\u201d for Apple is not to teach him about the Apple but
\nto make a child aware of the Sign (A) and related things because apple is not
\nthe only word to start with \u201cA\u201d\u2026there is Ant\u2026there are thousands. So no teacher
\ncan say that \u201cS\u201d only means Sun or Strawberry. <\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nI still see parents putting their
\nchildren to pre-school etc. at the age of 2-3. Actually early schools were
\ndiscovered when both husband and wife used to work in the early dawn of industrialization
\nand these pre-schools were required to take care of children. But there is no
\nsuch situation now. Even when mother is a housewife and is well educated they still send their child
\nto school at very tender age of 2-3 years and there is great risk to their
\nmental health because 8 out of 10 children feel like in foreign territory and
\nremain fearful. They yearn for home and mother continuously and this dis-orientation of mind is very dangerous.<\/p>\n

These days we see so many children
\nsuffering from eye disease and they have to use spectacles. Now doctors have
\nrealized and confirmed that this is due to reduced exposure to sun light and
\nfocus of the children on near sight objects and they use their eyes to see far
\nsight objects very less. This happens as they spend most of their times indoors
\nin schools, then indoors at home and tuition and then TV and mobile phones. So
\nthis makes their eyes to suppress the growth of eye ball resulting into Myopia.
\nThey have listed sun light as the best remedy and prevention for this. This has
\ntaken the form of epidemic in countries like China where they have put
\nexcessive pressure for academic performance. Even in China the problem is
\nsevere in cities not in villages where the focus on education is still far
\nless.<\/p><\/div>\n

\n<\/div>\n
\nSo left with no other option, we
\nthought and finally decided to teach our son at home. There are some innovative
\nalternate schools in India and some intelligent fellows are trying to teach
\nstudents in a better engaged and joyful way where learning is a play but we
\ncould not find any such school in Nagpur otherwise that could be an option. So these
\ndays our son is living a happy and relaxed life. I am a chartered accountant
\nand my wife is a merit holder in Masters in geography and I feel our son could
\nnot find better teachers. These days so many parents are becoming aware of the
\nuselessness of our school education system and Homeschooling is fast catching the
\nimagination of many parents in India. In fact, this is the highest growing
\neducation system in USA.<\/span>
\n
<\/span>
\nEven Government recognizes the value of homeschooling in india and recently Maharashtra Government launched Open SSC Board for homeschool students under which homeschool children can give exams for 5th std at the age of 10, for 8th Std at the age of 13 and for 10th Std at the age of 15. And if by the grace of God we could find any school imparting engaged and torture free learning then we’ll put our son into that school…so the search is still on.<\/span>
\n
<\/span>
\n
\nNot to Bring school at home while Home-schooling<\/span><\/u><\/b><\/p>\n
\n
\n
<\/span><\/u><\/b><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\nAs our son is very fond of
\nCranes, Trains, Power plants, cars etc. so we bought as many toys for him as much
\nwe can and he has large collection of toys on which he uses his creativity to
\nmake structures and build stories and narrate those to us. These days he is a
\nfree and relaxed soul and taking his interests in various activities like martial
\narts etc. For building his interest i have built my own gym at home so that he
\ncan see me doing gym and can relate himself. Most of his study time now is focused
\non “how” of this universe like how the things he likes works like he
\nasked about goods train and we explained the same to him in detail-like we need
\ntransportation for carrying food, coal, cement etc…giving him the example of
\nChips (which he loves) which are produced in Gujarat but delivered to Nagpur in
\nTrucks and now he explains the meaning of \u201cDistribution\u201d to others. He goes to
\nsee a nearby power plant almost 2-3 times in a week where he stands for half an
\nhour watching and asking questions on its working. For us this is his schooling\u2026much
\nnear to reality and involved. <\/p>\n
\nSo while home schooling we have
\ntried not to bring “school at home”. So we are not following just the
\nregular textbooks for his study because as i have explained earlier most of the
\ntimes they are just one dimensional. So we are exposing him to all sorts of
\nphenomenon of the world so that he gets the exposure to various things of
\nlife\/world and we are just watching him from the edge to see what can be his
\nmotivation for his future course of action in life. That motivation can be
\nscience, space, medicine, sports, art, construction etc. So we try to expose
\nhim to variety of Data in a relaxed and enjoyable manner. Like, he loves his
\nmother the most and one day he told me that he was very worried that one day
\nhis mother would also get old. So seeing his interest, I tried to explain him
\nthe role of DNA\/Genes in controlling and directing our bodies and told him that
\nhe could make his mother forever young if he could learn how to control the
\ngenes responsible for old age. He got really interested and I showed him the
\ndiagrams of DNA and how such vast amounts of data is stored in every cell of
\nour body. Actually, if we can see at this age he can\u2019t understand all these to
\nthe core but here the focus is to check and develop his interests. When we love
\nsomething\u2026have passion for something then learning becomes a play not a burden.<\/span><\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nI have a small Gym at home and he
\nsees me doing gym and he also loves physical activities the most whether it is
\nrunning, cycling, wall climbing etc. but now after seeing me in the gym he
\nlikes doing push-ups and barbell curls. He can standstill between two doors on
\nthe sheer strength of his arms. So, we explained him the role of nutrition in
\nthe growth of our bodies and now he understands the role of Protein (in muscle
\nbuilding), carbs, fat and Vitamins in our bodies. He understands the danger of
\nhydrogenated vegetable oils used in processed foods like chips etc. and he has
\nleft taking cold drinks, Frooti, most of the junk foods. He uses these only occasionally
\nnow. For developing his reading skills, we encourage him to use real life
\nexamples like reading the ingredients of the Chips bag. He can read, spell and
\nwrite long and complex words like Palmolien, hydrogenated vegetable oils. For
\nlanguage & reading, we encourage him to imagine\/create his own stories and while
\nhe narrates his stories we type the same for him. So he tells stories about how
\nhe and Doraeman save a child in a train accident. Then we make him read the
\nstory and as he has created it so he reads and understands words very easily.<\/span>
\n
<\/span>
\n<\/p>\n
\n<\/a><\/div>\n

But here the biggest difference if one can see is-He loves and enjoys reading and studying this way\u2026for him this is not stress of education but a fun activity\u2026and this is the only and best way to learn things and this joyful learning is the thing which keeps us motivated and full of life and energy even when we are old. Learning is not a phase but a vision. But no school in India understand this way of teaching as for them children are commodity and they impose only one learning method on everyone.<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\nAs one can see here there is no
\nlimit on learning. He can learn what he loves\/likes or wants to know. and it
\nis not confined to the borders defined by books and this really surprise me
\nsometimes why most of the parents can’t see the narrow range of school books. Our
\nson just like other children wants to know how it rains, how trains operate, wants
\nto play as long as he wants\u2026but our schools forces them to not to ask anything
\nbeyond books and instead of playing watching real world they should sit in a
\nnarrow dark classroom watching and listening in which he is not interested at
\nall.<\/p>\n

School- a Partner in understanding and choosing the way of Life<\/span><\/u><\/b><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n<\/div>\n
\nI have always believed that we
\nare here as part of our journey and this is not our first life. Because if we
\ncan see then we can realize that we are born with some of the behavior aspects
\nof our persona like bravery, kindness, fear, will power\u2026we were like this since
\nour birth and we do not seem to done something in this life to acquire these
\nattributes. We and our siblings are part of the same family\u2026raised in the same environment\u2026but
\nyet we are all very different by nature, have different views, aspirations\u2026why?
\nBecause we are all just continuing our journey from where we have left the same
\nin our last attempt. Some children learn the music at very early age, some
\nunderstands complex studies, some demonstrates amazing memory\u2026these are all
\nsigns that we are starting the journey from where we have left last time in our
\nlast life.<\/p>\n

So the most important thing in raising the children is to understand
\ntheir path, their inclinations, their aspirations and creativeness through
\nwhich they will express themselves to this world. To understand their path we
\nneed to observe them with open mind and not to impose our useless notions onto
\nthem. Parents do not know how many brilliant artists, scientists, musicians
\nthey have killed. Creativity is the biggest worship of this life and its only
\npurpose\u2026creativity enable us to transcend the realm of mind and comprehend and
\nabsorb the real essence of this life which fulfill our purpose of being here
\nand prepares for the next much higher layer of life.<\/p><\/div>\n

\n<\/div>\n
\nNo child likes the school. The happy
\nfaces we see in schools do not enjoy the learning they were getting from school
\nand they are happy because of other reasons like friends or play time. Also
\nmost of them after being forced into this daily accept this as part of their
\nlife but this also ensures the end of learning and purpose of life. Parents
\nthink that sad children in school are natural because they were like them in
\ntheir childhood also but if they have any wisdom then they can very easily see
\nthat even their life was centered around job and career and they never enjoyed
\nand relish what is real life\u2026the flowers were never blossomed\u2026they could never
\nsing the song for which they have come to this world\u2026and one day they will left
\nunmanifested, unexpressed, unpronounced and unsatisfied. But they think that
\neating tasty food, gossiping, watching movies, having a car and house is the
\nonly aim of life and they feel that only this much fulfillment is possible in this
\nlife and our world (Tier-3 level). They can never understand what it feels like
\nto create something\u2026anything\u2026music, a song, a story, an idea, a scientific
\ndiscovery, spiritualism, occult\u2026there is so much beyond our obvious world and
\nso much to achieve and feel the bliss of having this beautiful time here until
\nour death.<\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nDeath is inevitable yet all our
\nefforts in our life are centered towards our survival only\u2026very few have the
\nstrength to live out and put efforts for their dreams. Our sages like
\nVivekananda try hard to make us believe that what we are valuing as life is
\njust worthless. They cry but we even go to them to get blessings to fulfill our
\nworldly desires. I have heard many such stories where an enlightened person has
\nsaid that his biggest sorrow is his incapability to make other people believe
\nthat our life has much superior purpose and structure. Once one of my friend
\nremarked that it is due to death that life and all our efforts\/hard work looks
\nnonsense and foolish as at the end there is only this painful death. But i told
\nhim that may be we are taking and seeing it this way because reality may be
\nthat the ultimate aim of our life\/efforts is just to get READY for this most
\nimportant EVENT we call DEATH because there appears nothing much worth of this
\nlife…it appears and is low grade. So maybe we should think of welcoming this
\nDeath with hope rather than despair. May be Death is the only ultimate \u201cTest\u201d of
\nour life but most of us passes the school test and due to passing this useless
\ntest we fail miserably in the ultimate Death test.<\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sometimes back, I was talking to an Educator friend (who thinks Educator word is a better representative of his role than teacher) and our discussions turned towards the memorization problem of our education. When I asked him whether he understood the gravity of the crisis I realized that he did not even understand the concept of memorization. He was taking this in literal sense when the issue is relative (IQ vs Memory). So I gave him the example of my son-my 7 years old son who has almost 200 car toys and remarkably he remembers the source of each and…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1114","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/oscillations.in\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1114","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/oscillations.in\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/oscillations.in\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oscillations.in\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oscillations.in\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1114"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/oscillations.in\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1114\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/oscillations.in\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1114"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oscillations.in\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1114"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oscillations.in\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1114"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}