One of my friends recently told me about some programmes that have been started by these IIT-JEE coaching centres. One of them, I remember was a programme for Class 9 students. Holy smoke, a JEE training programme at Class 9? What the blazes? It was then that I remembered that a phenomenon like this is nothing new. Even when I tried to enter a JEE training programme in Class 11 (which I lost interest in, since I had shifted to commerce), I remember seeing the prospectus (yes, they had a prospectus) which boldly proclaimed a "Foundation Course for young IIT aspirants of Class 9 and 10".
What is this world coming to? A JEE training course for people who'll not attend an IIT lecture for at least half a decade. We have nursery schools conducting interviews for admission. I remember reading articles about how in the US, they have special kindergarten programmes that "ensures" a child gets into Harvard. And closer home, the number of students committing suicide because they couldn't get into an IIT are steadily rising. I remember when a girl committed suicide a couple of years back even though she got 91% because her parents were expecting her to get above 95.
I really don't know how to express myself over this matter. Have people today gone mad? What in the name of heaven is wrong with 91%? What sort of pressure was put on that girl to force her to such an extreme step inspite of getting such good marks?
Many parents today expect too much of their children and that's a fact. I've met parents who enroll their children in about twenty dozen personality development camps when they're barely six or seven years old so that the children, in their own words "don't miss out on anything". I'm no child psychologist but I can tell you that within one year, they would have forgotten most of what they learned in these camps. When I remember my own lazy childhood (not more than one major activity per vacation and lots of sleeping and pottering around), I thank god that I have a family that understands. In fact, my mother today grumbles about how I was idiotic enough to miss out on the real pleasures of childhood like playing cricket on the streets, stealing fruit from the neighbour's garden and loafing around on rooftops. I wonder how many career-focussed parents today would agree with her.
And schools are no better. I'm absolutely disgusted with the way schools advertise themselves these days (99% pass rate! 99% pass rate! 15 state toppers! 15 state toppers! Pick me! Pick me!). And in order to make sure they don't disappoint parents, they pile immense loads of work upon their students. They cut out sports and extra-curricular activities since parents think they're expendable. Learning is no longer about understanding and appreciating the subject. It's about how exactly you should frame your answers in exams. They then hold hour-long sessions where they programme their machines to write answers to exam questions in a 'proper' manner instead of trying to make sure if the student actually gets what is being taught. History is not about the mad story of humanity, it's a list of dates to be mugged up. Physics is no longer about the fascinating world we live in but a bunch of formulae to be memorized. Schools are not centres of learning, they're factories of success.
Oh I know, people are going to say that the scene today is very different from what it used to be during my childhood (I'm an aging, senile 18 year old) and demands much more. Children have to be prepared for that. That is why, they claim, that by putting pressure on children at an early age, we toughen them up (like leather) to face adversity later. I agree that the scenario today is much more pressurizing but that is precisely why I feel you must leave children alone. By ensuring that their childhood is free from pressures and turmoil of adolescence and adulthood, you allow them to retain that one small bit of sanity that'll prevent them from turning into mere success-generating machines and live a little. What's more important than money and fame? A bit of life.
Bruce Lee Mani, one of the members of the band Thermal and a Quarter once commented in an interview that children today have lost that sense of wonder that he used to have as a kid. I couldn't agree more. Why else do you think more and more people today care less about the world they live in? It's because they are never taught to notice how smooth a riverside pebble is, how magnificently a lotus opens it's petals and how cool a monsoon breeze can be. And that, my friends, is how you appreciate life.
What is this world coming to? A JEE training course for people who'll not attend an IIT lecture for at least half a decade. We have nursery schools conducting interviews for admission. I remember reading articles about how in the US, they have special kindergarten programmes that "ensures" a child gets into Harvard. And closer home, the number of students committing suicide because they couldn't get into an IIT are steadily rising. I remember when a girl committed suicide a couple of years back even though she got 91% because her parents were expecting her to get above 95.
I really don't know how to express myself over this matter. Have people today gone mad? What in the name of heaven is wrong with 91%? What sort of pressure was put on that girl to force her to such an extreme step inspite of getting such good marks?
Many parents today expect too much of their children and that's a fact. I've met parents who enroll their children in about twenty dozen personality development camps when they're barely six or seven years old so that the children, in their own words "don't miss out on anything". I'm no child psychologist but I can tell you that within one year, they would have forgotten most of what they learned in these camps. When I remember my own lazy childhood (not more than one major activity per vacation and lots of sleeping and pottering around), I thank god that I have a family that understands. In fact, my mother today grumbles about how I was idiotic enough to miss out on the real pleasures of childhood like playing cricket on the streets, stealing fruit from the neighbour's garden and loafing around on rooftops. I wonder how many career-focussed parents today would agree with her.
And schools are no better. I'm absolutely disgusted with the way schools advertise themselves these days (99% pass rate! 99% pass rate! 15 state toppers! 15 state toppers! Pick me! Pick me!). And in order to make sure they don't disappoint parents, they pile immense loads of work upon their students. They cut out sports and extra-curricular activities since parents think they're expendable. Learning is no longer about understanding and appreciating the subject. It's about how exactly you should frame your answers in exams. They then hold hour-long sessions where they programme their machines to write answers to exam questions in a 'proper' manner instead of trying to make sure if the student actually gets what is being taught. History is not about the mad story of humanity, it's a list of dates to be mugged up. Physics is no longer about the fascinating world we live in but a bunch of formulae to be memorized. Schools are not centres of learning, they're factories of success.
Oh I know, people are going to say that the scene today is very different from what it used to be during my childhood (I'm an aging, senile 18 year old) and demands much more. Children have to be prepared for that. That is why, they claim, that by putting pressure on children at an early age, we toughen them up (like leather) to face adversity later. I agree that the scenario today is much more pressurizing but that is precisely why I feel you must leave children alone. By ensuring that their childhood is free from pressures and turmoil of adolescence and adulthood, you allow them to retain that one small bit of sanity that'll prevent them from turning into mere success-generating machines and live a little. What's more important than money and fame? A bit of life.
Bruce Lee Mani, one of the members of the band Thermal and a Quarter once commented in an interview that children today have lost that sense of wonder that he used to have as a kid. I couldn't agree more. Why else do you think more and more people today care less about the world they live in? It's because they are never taught to notice how smooth a riverside pebble is, how magnificently a lotus opens it's petals and how cool a monsoon breeze can be. And that, my friends, is how you appreciate life.
3 comments:
I can feel the pain. I was recently reading book by Stephen Hawkins abt maths, and saw a beautiful explanation of the Pythogras theorm.
its left me wondering, why did not I have time to think about? why is our system so crammed that we cann't think or wonder
That's true! I felt the same way so many times...victims of the system :)
Good words.
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