What would one do, oh what will one do, if a beautiful event, that doesn’t happen or come-by often times (because it is such a rare exhilarating thing) – just happens to happen near one’s very doorsteps?
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eclipse, brain damage
April 22, 2016
a zoology lesson
April 5, 2016
When I grow up, I want to be a little boy.
— Joseph Heller, Something Happened (1974)
It is quite possible that in that family: Read the rest of this entry »
a real school for adolescents: a ‘context framework’
March 30, 2016
For the past few months or so, my spouse & I have been working with a ‘small’ school, to help it setup/structure a robust & meaningful adolescent programme for its learners – rooted in our Indic traditions and grafting in the best of what the Orient and the Occident have to offer, in a Montessori background as we understand it. Read the rest of this entry »
susan engel: playing to learn
March 25, 2016
I love this. :-)
Ma’am Engel, you say so many things, so very eloquently! I really hope, my fellow education-racketeers would listen to folks like you. Hope we all would soon internalize the fundamental fact that, efforts at ‘reductionist education’ based on mere assessment tests & measurable outcomes are really harmful to the children and to the society-at-large in the long run, yes.
bumbling ball in a box and humbling math…
March 24, 2016
Let us say we want to measure the volume of a sphere, fitting snugly in to (or ‘bounded by’) a cube. Read the rest of this entry »
maria montessori said so…
March 23, 2016
There was this series of 12 lectures, that was delivered by Ma’am Montessori in the year 1948 – and broadcast from the All India Radio Station, Chennai. Read the rest of this entry »
mallasandram megalith site – visit plan, notes
February 23, 2016
Once in a while, I organize trips to interesting historic / geographical / sciencey kinda of places, for young learners, in association with small schools. This blog-post is one example of what gets organized around these visits – and is posted in the hope that, based on this data, any adult can take a group of kids on a field-trip of pure and tiring joy! (please do read the postscript too! and of course, this post is also only some 1900 words loooong!)
… come, walk with me in the mud*… Read the rest of this entry »
october sky, the shining, matewan and um, the shawshank redemption
December 29, 2015
Yesterday, a short 10 day break for the Erdkinder (Montessoriese term for adolescents) began – and we thought, may be they could see a couple of films (not merely high brow, not cryptic Arthouse, nor very mainstream, but reasonable flicks) that they can reflect on and get back to the School post their holidays.
The first was ‘The Shawshank Redemption’ – not exactly great, but a reasonable film (story of that pulp ‘horror’ fiction writer – Stephen King) directed by Frank Darabont; however, I would consider the rendition more melodramatic than what the storyline warrants, and I would tell you why. Read the rest of this entry »
the spirit of christmas
December 25, 2015
As usual, the day before the ‘actual’ Christmas, it was celebrated with much gusto at the School – on 24th December itself.
‘circular ruins’ vs ‘taare zameen par’ & ‘tinkle’
December 1, 2015
Circa 1972/73, as a little boy, I read a Tamil translation of this mind blowingly beautiful short story of Jorge Luis Borges (JLB) – one of the finest littérateurs that inhabited the earth, an Argentinian – a remarkable essayist and a fine poet too.
This translated ‘circular ruins’ was Vattach-chidhaivugal (=வட்டச் சிதைவுகள் – made available on the web by that fellow-curmudgeon Vimalaadiththa Maamallan, hat tip to him) – artfully and faithfully done-up by a remarkable Srilankan Tamil – Dharumu Aroop Sivaramu (AKA Pramil Banuchenran, Bramil … …) – who, in my opinion, is/was one of the finest littérateurs too. I remember to have been completely bowled over by the translated story and recollect that I tried to hunt for more of JLB’s outputs – not with much success though, as my world then was limited to whatever that was available in the local government lending libraries. Read the rest of this entry »
macaulay’s progeny, education macht frei, of course!
October 2, 2015
Even after more than some 180 bloody years, the Macaulay’s legacy happily and sordidly lives on in India – what with the mushrooming ‘English Medium’ schools all over our Indusland and ‘Cambridge / Oxford / Berkeley / MIT / etc affilicted Royal Concorde[1] Internotional Public Residential type ‘school’ entities, promising the clueless parents of ultimate deliverance of their hapless and rather sad & stymied children…
Yeah! HotAir -welcomes – you – on – board – flight – 911 – to – touts’ universities -where else -but-in-USA – please – fasten – your – seatbelts, we-are-ready- to-take-off – what? -don’t – you – know – we – have – two – swimming – pools – and – provide – horse – riding – training – also – conduct – meditation yoga – classes – suit coat blazer ties caps shoes must – we ‘accent-neutralize’ your children’s – speech – so – they – sound – like -yankees – when – they – visit – the – localmalls – in – hordes – and – wear -polo – caps – with – their – bills – turned – sidewards – yeah – they – FightJEE too! So we all can then, happily die ever after! Yippee!!
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doubteronomy and numbers
September 13, 2015
This is a reflective piece written (some 5/6 years back or so, for me) on ‘doubt’ by my dear friend, a fine educational philosopher and Ms Guide – K. Rama – a respected colleague of mine and a fantastic Montessori teacher. Of course, this is not a hyperbole.
Let me say that, fantastic teachers are generally very hard to find and then – when you add the mighty Montessori twist to it, oh well…
Elementary age children – really, really love her, for the magic that she manages to weave in the impressionable minds of the children – in the process, enthralling the gawking adults like yours truly too…Of course, my kids benefited immensely from all this magic.
I really miss her & the Montessori Magic these days. *sniff*
ave adolescens, morituri te salutamus!
August 8, 2015
The adolescents require so, oh SOOO much external structure in their lives.
At another level, they also resist that, rightly so. So, these seemingly contradictory pulls make dealing with them, that much more challenging and endlessly tiring.
As a wag said, an adolescent is a teenager who acts like a baby when you don’t treat him (or her) like an adult. Truly and verily. Read the rest of this entry »
kinder, über alles
March 16, 2015
… Joseph Haydn’s jingoistic composition extolling the virtues of deutcheland and his emperor notwithstanding, I like (and love) my dear Haydn’s oratorios immensely – the seasons and the creation.
Yes. Children above all. Yeah!
home & school – a complete partnership
September 13, 2014
Very many years ago, we had a meeting (the participants were mainly teachers, parents and teacher-parents) at our earlier (Bangalore) school and the following is a set of notes / discussion pointers that we used to kindle thoughts, seed discussions and to thrash out various vexatious issues and stuff…
The whole context for the meeting was circumscribed by the idea that – parents and schools are NOT on the opposite sides of the child, pulling the poor child literally apart; that these two stakeholders are on the SAME side as that of the child, helping and assisting it to realize its potential to the fullest extent possible.
Off: http://www.bristol.k12.ct.us/uploaded/Mountain_View/Docs/global-curriculum.gif (thanks: bristol public schools – mountain view)
Anyway, I thought it would perhaps be a good idea, to share the quick notes (from our archives) — that we made for ourselves, when we went for this meeting/discussions — with the readers of this weblog.
Of course, by no means, any claim is made about this listing being reasonably complete or even being logical; we would like to revisit this – so, feel free to comment on it.
It is reproduced hereunder verbatim – it is kind of dated, sketchy and in a ‘telex kind , of incomplete language,’ but probably would be useful, as long as there are decent schools and responsible parents… Oh, the hope. Read the rest of this entry »
‘education’ – big picture vs details
September 11, 2014
…Or, a bird’s eye view VS earthworm’s view, if you will; this post is part of the infamous ‘education’ series at this blogsite. This is an unfairly long essay – so, feel free to runaway, NOW! :-)
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In my earlier avatars I have been part of the surreal corporate world, and I have met with quite a few folks there, who proudly uttered pearls of wisdom such as, they are the “big picture people, ya know” – accompanied by a swagger and those irritating & condescending ‘air quotation’ marks made with their index fingers.
Invariably, they were bosses and/or pretenders. They never interested me. I never respected them. It is their loss, ahem! ;-) I continue to meet such vainglorious people off and on (yes, it takes one to know one). I tell myself that we do require diversity, don’t we? Honestly, we require diversity in every field – some species die, some survive, some mutate, some become mutant monsters, some are well meaning, some are not, some are for positive actions, some others are for mere reactions…
… In any case, any kind of diversity results in that, much-required colourfulness, in an otherwise staid world. Like in the corporate world, how I would have loved to have something else instead of the drab grey, dull coloured shirts and trousers and drabber black suits and cleanshaven faces and powerpoint slidesets…
‘education’ – this, i believe…
August 16, 2014
And so it was.
A few weeks back, yours truly got a chance to ‘formally’ discuss with a group of young, impressionable & wannabe teachers – from many countries including mine and backgrounds – but mostly from South and Meso Americas – about my (current & random) views on this beastess called education – and as I had made the following rough notes for another occasion, I chose to make use of the same and ranted (the text below was given as a handout to them post the talk, because they wanted to get the real drift of the discussions, poor things).
So, I held forth, pontificating ad nauseam – based on my experience and approaches, bestowing my infinite wisdom on these hapless folks. Yes, before you rush headlong to trash me, I know – it is not that I am great teacher or even a reasonable teacher, mind you; and, you must remember that old saw about the ’empty vessels…’, yeah?
However, I also do believe in dialogue – and soon there was this multilogue – not exactly a balanced flow – but pandemonious rapids of information and opinions flowing in from all directions. The discussion was to have been for one hour, but it went on for 3 hours (thanks to the enthusiasm of the youth) over three cups of steaming black coffee.
Anyway… It is always so damn nice to see dedicated and work-ethic infected youth. Them with their dreams and aspirations to make the world a better place. Their wide-eyed wonder and spirited enthu for life, the hope. Their leftist leanings and Che Guevara Tee-shirts. Their takes on Western and Indic philosophies, the yoga of learning. Their ideas of literature (especially the illiterature of the likes of Arundhati Roys) and how bad the ‘education’ scene is, back in their own nations… Their sense of youthful humour, chiseled bodies… It is so damn nice to listen to clueful, knowledgeable and articulate youth full of positive energy – with their brains in full-crunch / alert mode.
I wish them and the future, all the very best that the mothership earth has to offer. (and wish the same to sanctimonious me too!)
popular astrology for children – 101 (hic)
June 18, 2014
Move over, you ‘world famous astrologers’ such as Besan Daroowallah, go start making besan laddoos, or even start brewing liquor… But, stop making those terrible, horrible, no-good, very bad horrorscopes please!
Try to earn a honest day’s wages, surely it is not that very difficult…
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I pretend to ‘do’ mainly science with our ‘earth children’ – but I also drift off in various directions, to do history, geography, angrezi (hic), math and stuff. Heck, I even pretend to be a choir conductor. Don’t get me wrong, there are quite a few other adults (who actually are more able & capable than yours truly) in the picture too, so there is no need to ring the alarm bells… The truth is that, they are all busy working, whereas I am busy posting blog entries! Read the rest of this entry »
education: a taxonomy towards understanding the beastess!
December 21, 2013
You see, every once in a while, some guys (peace be upon them, poor things) become unfortunate enough to take part in my random training sessions – wherein I pretend to bestow my infinite wisdom on an otherwise normal and happy bunch of people; there was one such workshop that I conducted a couple of weeks back, in which a few of us discussed the various angles / prisms (or axes, if you will) through which one can see the myriad facets of that phantasmagorical beastess (yes, education is a female!) called education; this note was circulated to seed some discussions and here it is, as some food for your thoughts, that is, if you are the type which likes to think…
But then, this is a rather looooong document, that has taken very many years of practical experience, observation and a sort of reasonable scholarship to get assembled – and so some patience is advised. If you do not have the patience, you please stop right here. And, go away. Seriously.
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In this document, we would look at the common ways of stereotyping education in terms of what sociologists call their sociological categories, Ideal Types.
“An ideal type is formed from characteristics and elements of the given phenomena, but it is not meant to correspond to all of the characteristics of any one particular case. It is not meant to refer to perfect things, moral ideals nor to statistical averages but rather to stress certain elements common to most cases of the given phenomena.” (The methodology of the social sciences’ – Max Weber – a very fine text; some details below)
The methodology of social sciences / Max Weber / 1949 / The Free Press, Glencoe, Illinois; this is one of the books that I keep getting back to, when I have some fundamental doubts about categorizations – sociological and much else! Strongly recommended for anyone who wants to seriously study societal dynamics and dialectics…
Simply put, the world of ideal types merely allows one to stereotype, simplify and attempt to slot – and then to grapple with things – such as white and black, so that we can easily pretend to understand things.
But you see, the world is NEVER defined in terms of black and white. It has myriad hues – it is a true celebration of gray areas.
Salutations to thee, the Goddess of the Great Gray!
othisaivu.in 