Children need to be released from the confines of conventionalism, says Oliver Lyngdoh
“MOMMA, WHY is A always for apple?” the little girl asked. The mother looked at her with wide eyes, tugged at her kid’s hand and dragged her away. I sat there looking at the sight which led me to thinking- Are we really that limited in thoughts and our teachings?
A for ant, A for atom, A for anthropology… The English language is limitless. Yet we stick with A for Apple. Sure they (people who are bound to a single frame of mind) will say: “But it’s the easiest to teach a kid that.”
Granted, but why limit ourselves to this? Why limit the brain of a child which has so much potential to only understand so little? And I say this because the same goes on throughout our educational life, which then moves into the way we live in society, the way we work and the way we think.
We are conditioned and shaped by society to its own whims and fancy not allowing the individual to think on his own. Roger Waters rightly said it in his song “Another Brick in the Wall” when he declared that “We don’t need no education!” If education is shaping us to be mindless idiots who can’t think beyond the four walls of a classroom, then why the need for education? One wonders, I wonder, but then how can we wonder when we can’t think on our own.
Our children carry heavy school bags amidst the rain, sun and cold. Add to that different books for a particular subject; English poetry, Prose and Grammar for example. Half-yearly and finals to judge how much they have “understood” but ranked on the “ability to muck-up” and “vomit”. The more you have text-book answers, i.e., the more you can muck up everything to write in exams, the more marks you score. Well that’s the point isn’t it? In a country where percentages and marks play a role in everything, that is all that is needed. What’s with understanding and logical reasoning? You would only be following the footsteps of others before you and walk the same path that has been carved out year after year. When then is originality required? A is always for Apple.
And professional studies? It has always been the same since I can remember. The top creamy layer go for science then segregate to medical or engineering, the middle layer go for commerce and end up in financial institutions and the second last for Arts not because of their ability to articulate or because of their creativity; but because they “failed” to produce the required marks to get into the so called “TOP FIELDS”.
Ah! But the plight doesn’t end there. Since society is driven by money and power, students go for these so called top fields because of the same. But then again few of these really have the passion for medical or the engineering field. Since the same fields seem to offer a lot in the guise of job prospects, we are swoon by them. But in reality few really care why DNA is the building block of life or why “Hello World” is at the start of every programming language example. We were guided and shaped by a society that thinks in terms of a profit.
Yet again we have no originality. We think just in terms of what our so called advance civilization wants us to.
Even after learning our lessons during our so called degree days in whatever field we took and didn’t like, we still are govern by a society that frowns on change and introspection, that is govern by power and riches, so we take other “safe-routes” like following the other set of norms that others before us have followed: A PG program in management, a master’s program in the same field and the likes, because most of us are scared to take the road not travelled by others. We are again robbed of our individuality! We are forced by a society to give up on our dreams, because getting placed and earning big bucks working for a multi-national company is the only thing that will keep us happy. But what if it doesn’t? We fail to ask ourselves this question and even if we do, our self-consciousness which in a fact isn’t our own voice anymore, but a voice shaped by media, society and our so called education system tells us otherwise .
Our individuality is lost not only in the so called education system of India, but in our daily lives. We are social animals, we are influenced by others easily, but what we fail to see is that this influence is slowly shaping the way we think, the way we talk and the way we make decisions. The society frowns when an ideal student makes an intentional choice to join a course which can boost his creativity and articulate his ideas instead of the norm medical and engineering.
The most ironic thing about our education system is that having taught us the true meaning of Robert Frost’s “The Road Not Taken”, we are forced to follow the same trodden paths that many have followed. Mind you this is not intentional. We do so because we are condition to.
What do you think of creativity and artistry? Most of us when asked, will answer in the positive, but we fail to notice in ourselves that we don’t appreciate or compliment it. A comic strip I recently read showed that when an artist or a creative person is complimented instead of discouraged, it can lead to innovative new thoughts and ideas by that person concerned. However, if the same was discouraged, that person would be disheartened besides losing self-confidence.
Let’s give an example: Your child who is supposed to be studying or finishing his homework is instead drawing doodles and writing short stories. What would your reaction be?
Your first reaction would definitely be anger which would lead to scolding the child. What you don’t realise is by doing so you break the child’s creativity and you have already conform to the society that you are leaving in and involuntary asking your child to do the same.
And again I ask: where are individuality and creativity? Everything is lost in this so called world of modernism.
And yes “modernism”; a society where if an ‘individual’ doesn’t have the new or the latest model of any brand for any commodity or product, that individual ceases to exist which then leads to self-demotivation and yes of course our very dear friend – Depression.
Studies have shown that most graduate and post graduate students are depressed and stressed out or have some form of emotional problem. This is usually because of too much workload and life and student balance isn’t ideal. Add to this the pressure from peers and society to do and follow the set norms.
A person can’t be happy because he or she doesn’t have a significant other. Society portrays this in many forms especially in media and networking where a person is always depicted as lonely if he or she is single. What is the truth in that? Sure man is social, but who said that man should have a woman to be happy and vice versa? He or she can be perfectly happy by themself!
Extrapolating the same to everything in general – one doesn’t necessarily require an engineering degree then followed by an MTech, and an MBA to be happy. One doesn’t need to be a doctor or a lawyer to be rich, powerful and happy. These are all false and baseless things. Since if you follow this norm you would only be entering the same society that carved you bringing into your world its problems and its rules. Because again, A is only for Apple.
Happiness is a person’s perception. A small child without the influence of the world can find happiness in playing with an empty box.
Richness depends on values. People who are able to get at least a litre of drinking water a day are satisfied and consider themselves the richest of the rich.
Power is just an illusion. A kid in a Superman Costume is the most powerful being in the neighbourhood according to him.
So I ask you, when did we lose all this? When did we start accepting forced happiness? When did we let society think for us? When did we let our individuality be taken away?
As I end this write up, I say to you this, I also am one who has fallen to the world’s trap. However I call on you to stop what you are doing, think for a while and ask yourself- Are you really doing what you want? Or is it just a forced notion on yourself that you have accepted?
Because as Bill Watterson’s Calvin would say: “As you can see, I have memorized this utterly useless piece of information long enough to pass a test question. I now intend to forget it forever. You’ve taught me nothing except how to cynically manipulate the system. Congratulations.”
Are you manipulating or being manipulated?