Of Overgrown children and Little adults

Update
Hello…Update on where have I been ( not that too many people have asked) ---Its been such a long time , I wrote- please blame it on the maid saga. My brother in law has nicknamed me ‘PKD’ – Pyaar Ke Dushman and of course a natural corollary to that is – Asha is GONE. I have once again started a new chapter in my life. Rest of my time – had been pushing the Superwoman act too far, it finally caught up with my ‘Maslow’s Needs Hierachy- level 4, that I seemed to have reached’ – life is all maya. But no maid, Ta’s impending school admissions, Boss giving me improvement feedback everyday, sulking team members… it was bound to tell. And to cope with it all- what better way than feel completely guilty for being hopelessly inadequate & to compromise on your own needs- my need to vent, tell, preach – my blog suffered silently. But I created it, na- its got to have ALL my qualities. So it went silent, sulked but it decides to bounce back.
Here is one of my latest experiences..

Of Overgrown Children and Little adults

In this country where people pay Municipal Commissioner offices few thousand rupees to postpone date of birth dates so that they can therefore push retirement age by one WHOLE year and somehow add on to their children’s pension money ( ha- who said Indians don’t plan) , Lord and I stand guilty of making a huge parenting mistake right at the start. Avyukta made the mistake of being conceived in April ( don’t you smirk), so therefore is Dec born and therefore is eligible for school admissions only this year- he will be 4 years 3 months when he goes to school, a little older than most other children in his class. Yes- that’s another sin added to ‘My Book of Guilts- sins that I must atone for’, but we were suitably focused in knowing what’s best for our child and therefore applied to only one school. How clever is that? In hindsight, a smart – money saving action- but till 4 days before- I was ready to divorce my husband because he just didn’t care whether our child got schooling or no. Kaise baap ho? (If it was upto him, Ta would go to an only sports facility, where he would play football, basketball, hockey, tennis- the whole day long). My son thankfully, definitely shows more inclination towards academics and is truly his Mama’s boy.

Heritage School at Gurgaon is a unique one- it is the only school that I have heard of which truly practices its philosophy of ‘Each child is equal but unique’. So they have progressive learning methodology but admission is completely based on lottery. We went, all suited booted et child, got ushered into a meditation centre- after we removed our shoes outside, there were comfortable carpets laid out, where we could squat in as dignified a manner and we needed to send our child back home- coz he was not needed. I felt suitably foolish but sat down to participate in one of the most informative 2 hrs of my life. The process : the school reps educated us on the school philosophy and then asked another 3 year old to draw out lots- names of children who were through!
Highlights :
All Children learn differently- some through singing, others through reading, even others through drama. ( I have been thinking that is principle of Adult Learning)
It is not easy to sing ‘baarish aayee cham cham cham’ in front of 40 others parents, especially when you enthusiastically volunteer to do something and feel like a complete idiot pretending to hold a chaata.
The little 3 year olds are the most mature people around – ask completely relevant questions and once they get satisfactory answers turn around and start playing/ colouring/ dancing- whatever they feel like doing.
Most of the 30 + people that you see sitting around you- long way to go before they reach basic levels of maturity- for example
School rep: We believe in project based learning and no exams till class 4th, we believe children learn better when given a context. Ours is a different system, not perfect but evolving- if you believe in it- stay with us, else don’t apply

30+ year old 1 : What – no exams, don’t you think that they will never learn to cope with stress in life?
30+ year old 2 : How will they prepare for CAT / IIT admission in this scenario?
30+ year old 3 : How will they learn to write?
30+ year old 4 : Will they ever learn to read?

School Principal: Only stress I know of is in Quantum physics, CAT exams do not require writing, they test conceptual clarity, and that too the student is expected to circle the correct answers, …….and so on. (Parents , as you can imagine, thought he was a little mad, disconnected from the real world- especially when he spoke of a vision of developing future citizens who were driven by passion, logical reasoning, conviction and not just rote learning)

Most of these parents got through, paid up the fees, quickly blocked up someone else’s seat ( at the expense of people who really wanted to send their child here) and left after clarifying that they only stood to lose 45k if they wanted to withdraw admission. While I can understand that in this land of limited quality supply and a relentlessly increasing demand for meaningful education- I cant understand why we have this constant pressure & need to ‘prove oneself’.
The parents were all sitting on high alert- waiting for the next question from their peers and enthusiastically volunteering to answer it on behalf of school authorities.
Many of them were well prepared and had the next 20 years planned out in detail, on their child’s behalf. ( another one of the sins for which I may need to atone for- when asked what I want for my child , I give Miss Universe pageant answers ‘ A responsible human being, at peace, capable of making his own decisions and so on…).
I am a relieved person and my son is a happy boy- coz he is looking forward to playing with the ducks in the school pond. Hubby is so happy- Heritage has a football league. I don’t know whether this is the best school ..but I do know that life is only as good as one makes it to be.
Paul Theroux in one of his travelogues about his train journeys through Asia, starts his chapter on India with ‘ The problem with India is that there are too many Indians’ touché!! To be fair to us – this best school need, the need to predict and make the future happen…what to do- we have a long way to go before we move beyond maslow’s first 3 levels of needs..there are too many Indians