Freedom & Peace - Innovators BHIS

     Peace cannot be kept by force, it can only be achieved by understanding. - Albert Einstein

 In a class of forty students, Jia always stood out from the rest as she was far ahead of her classmates in regards to academics. She would always keep herself immersed in books as if she had no other friends. She was excellent in her performances in all the subjects. She had hoards of knowledge on any topic as she was a voracious reader. Only one thing made her shrink into her cocoon and that was if she was asked to speak or give vent to her thoughts. She would shy away from that within seconds….never wanting to speak up! This shying away into her shell worried her class teacher a lot. The teacher would always think about ways to make her express herself, most of the time wondering why such an exceptionally intelligent child would be cocooned in her shell! She decided to take one to one interactive session with her class so that she could make Jia speak up. As decided, she informed the class that they would have an interactive session on a particular day and that they should be ready to speak on something that they haven’t spoken to anyone else about.

In the allotted class, the teacher was there on time as she had an agenda on her mind. Finally, it was Jia’s turn. This shy teenager somehow walked up to the teacher’s desk and sat on the chair with her head lowered. As the teacher gently asked her to speak on what she wanted to share, there were tears rolling down her cheeks…she very discreetly shared that her parents were never at peace with each other. After repeated nasty fights at home, they had finally decided to part ways She was extremely perplexed as to who she would be with….she wanted to be with both! The teacher comforted her as much as she could and explained that adults had the freedom to make their choices in life. Jia, while wiping away her tears, owned up to her teacher that she was feeling a lot relieved by being able to speak her heart out. She thanked her teacher. She suddenly felt that she was freed from the clutches of her sorrows and dilemmas. This day of opening her heart out to her teacher and her feeling of freedom from her brought her inexplicable peace! She slowly started mingling freely with her classmates and felt happy, free and at peace as would any other girl of her age.

Innovators @ Billabong High International School, Thane

-Vaishali Phatak, Smita Bobhate, Bhumi Punjabi, Krishnakshi RaviShankor.

Nikita Galphate: Is your child ready to face the world?

Although not an avid reader the title of the book was enough to motivate me to read it through. We all want to be the best parents we can be for our children, but there is often conflicting advice on how to raise a kid who is confident, kind and ready to face the world.

Being a parent to two wonderful kids I found this book ‘Is your child ready to face the World’ an enriching read and a good source of providing an insight on preparing our children to face the world. Dr. Anupam Sibal very subtly takes us through his parenting experiences leading towards developing effective communication skills and inculcating various life values in our children. In this fast paced world the challenges of communicating with our children is also beautifully dealt in the book.

I am happy that as parents, me and my husband are already practicing the given communication strategy with our kids. Being democratic parents it many a times gives me a thought that, are we following the right parenting  practice? but after reading the book I reassured myself that  there couldn’t be a better way. Giving your child the freedom they want with an invisible cross line always gets in your favour. I relate a lot with the value imbibing ways mentioned in the books as kids won’t really take it unless they see you practicing it.

Ultimately no one other than parents can be the best role models for their kids. The book is a must read for parents, educators and facilitators working with children as the experiences shared in the book can be of a great help in dealing with various situations with the children. his book has indeed provided me with an enriching experience and an insight on the importance of building values in my children.

Nikita Galphate
The Honest Icon
The Iconic School