Honesty & Respect - Indu Mehta

What are the most common instances of dishonest behaviour shown by students in the class?

Dishonest behaviour can vary among students, here are the most common instances of dishonest behaviour shown by students in class:

• One of the most common forms of dishonest behaviour is cheating during tests or exams. This can involve copying answers from another student's paper. 
• Sometimes students submit work that someone else wrote, whether they paid for it or not. They present work or ideas as their own without giving proper credit. This can include copying and pasting text from websites, books, or other sources. They submit someone else's work as their own.
• Some students engage in dishonest behaviour by fabricating data or information in assignments or research projects. This can involve making up experimental results, falsifying survey responses, or manipulating data to support desired outcomes.
• Students lie intentionally providing false information or misleading others. In an academic setting, this can involve lying to teachers or administrators about reasons for missed assignments, falsely claiming to have completed work, or providing misleading information to gain advantages.

It's important to note that these behaviours are not representative of all students and many students exhibit honesty and integrity in their academics.

2. How far is it true that you must show respect to earn respect in the classroom?

The statement "You must show respect to earn respect in the classroom" is generally true. Respect is a two-way street, and students who demonstrate respectful behaviour towards their teachers and peers are more likely to receive respect in return.

In my class, there was a student who consistently interrupted the teacher during lectures, talked back in a disrespectful manner, and disregarded classroom rules. Their behaviour showed a lack of respect towards the teacher and disrupted the learning environment for others.

On the other hand, there was another student who actively listened to the teacher, participated in class discussions, and treated both the teacher and fellow students with respect. The second student’s behaviour demonstrated a respectful attitude and contributed positively to the classroom environment.

In this scenario, it was likely that all the teachers and other students developed a more positive perception of the second student and her respectful conduct. All started listening to her opinions, assisting when needed, and engaging in respectful interactions. Conversely, the first student’s disrespectful behaviour led to strained relationships, lack of support, and potential disciplinary actions.

By showing respect to others, students can foster mutual respect and cooperation in the classroom. It creates a conducive environment for learning, encourages positive interactions, and helps build strong relationships between teachers and students as well as among peers.

Indu Mehta @KNPS Phagwara

Man versus Wild

While watching a documentary recently on the one subject that I do watch with passion, that is wildlife, I was struck with a very essential difference between human beings and animals. As the proud human race we insist on showing off our superiority and finesse by correcting the behavior of others and constantly reminding them, to not behave like animals. This documentary was focused on predators in the wild with particular emphasis on the cheetah. The film began with a hair-raising shot of the cheetah going for a kill of a gazelle and missing his target by barely a few centimeters. I wasn’t sure whether to feel relieved for the gazelle or sorry for the cheetah that was about to go hungry. A little of both maybe!

In spite of being the fastest animal on land the cheetah missed his kill, here is why.  The cheetah gains his maximum speed in just a few seconds and is not able to hold that speed for over a minute as his body heats up to an extent that he can breakdown. Which means that he has to plan his hunt extremely carefully as chances of success are very often, quite low. If unsuccessful he could go for days without food and if successful he will still have to try and protect his prize from other predators and scavengers that are in the jungle. Quite often, his kill is snatched away by other more powerful animals making the entire exercise futile.

The comparison between humans and animals lies in this that an animal like the cheetah that has great speed and limited strength in terms of protecting his own interests has a much stronger sense of security as compared to us. He has the confidence in his own ability that will sooner or later lead him to a successful kill. In all honesty this is a matter of life and death for him and yet he is unafraid. Now coming to the far superior race of human beings. We display an immense lack of any security in ourselves on a very daily and sometimes even trivial basis. The biggest example of that is our need to constantly hoard. The need to amass and collect for years and years regardless of what our true consumption is. Whereas with the cheetah or any other predator there is no guarantee of the next meal or whether or not they will live to see another day and yet there is a clear absence of any hoarding behavior. I actually used to know a lady who thought she would run out of ice apart from other things and went and bought an oversized deep freezer for her tiny and over stuffed house so that she could store ice that would last an entire year!

Evolution that has supposedly turned us into very advanced beings has also made us highly insecure. The knowledge that should have given us the strength to say whatever comes our way we have the ability to handle it has actually made us more afraid. The more we learn, the more we look at other learned people and think of how little we know. The more wealth we amass, the more we envy the fortune of others. Now I don’t mean to imply that hunger and thirst are not good. These are qualities that keep us going and help us strive towards excellence. But somehow, somewhere we have surpassed our basic instincts and gone beyond to the primal sin of gluttony. Nothing satisfies us and nothing is enough. We need to constantly hoard and put away for the future, even if it means inconveniencing today just to ensure we have something as childish as ice for a year. Living for the moment has degenerated to a very popular phrase, which is to be only given to others as advise and never really followed by us.

At this point I am forced to look beyond the so called educated hoarders and look at a day labourer. He looks to earn in a day what he is capable of consuming in that day. The minute he reaches his daily requirement, he stops work and returns home to either family or friends. He is larger hearted and more giving than some of the richest hoarders I know. When he sleeps at night, it is with an empty pocket, a clear conscience and a sense of security and confidence in himself and his tomorrow. In a very basic and animalistic way, he is closer to the cheetah in all his glory and sense of pride than the richest and most powerful men that can afford to employ him daily. Maybe the real animal is no longer living in the jungle.

About the author: Neha Parmar is a wildlife photographer and a conservationist with some tolerable talent for writing. If you liked, connected or have a contrary perspective with anything that you read please feel to share your feedback.

To see more work by Neha Parmar
https://www.facebook.com/NehaParmarPhotography.
Disclaimer: This article remains copyright of the author and is her individual perspective. If you wish to give any feedback please get in touch with the author

The only way to live is to “live”

Have you ever felt tired of being told always what is good for you and what is not ? The only way to find out what you like or don’t like is by experiencing it. A lady that had once come to teach us a Vedanta course was dictating to us a list of things to do and not to do. Things like eating vegetarian food, not drinking, not smoking, the kind of people one should speak to etc etc. So I stood up and I told her that I wanted to try all the things on her list to decide what it was that I wanted to follow or not for myself. For very obvious reasons I was politely asked to leave that class and not return. This was many years ago and with all due respect to the genuineness of her intentions I still have the same stand.

Life is made up of experiences. Those can be good or bad, exciting or boring and simply joyous or too painful. But if I were to say no to an experience how would I know what emotion or feeling I could have felt. Not all is meant to be good and not all is meant to be bad but the only way for me to be able to differentiate between what is good for me and what is bad is by experiencing it. Now I’m not saying that one should take a knife and try and slice off portions of their body in order to feel what it’s like. That would be a terrible extreme. But what I do feel is that it is important to allow different experiences into our lives. Particularly those that come shrouded in fear and dread because a life full of fear and apprehensions is a dreary thing. The only way to overcome our fears is by experiencing them. Once you have been drenched in rain you’re just not afraid of getting wet any longer isn’t it?

Lets call it The Yes Way! Anything that you think you cannot do, try it. Every time you feel like saying no to something just stop and rethink and if you think it lies within your moral and ethical realm then give it a go. Afraid of public speaking? Get up and speak in front of an audience not just once but again and again till you become shameless. Be prepared for not being heard, be prepared for all sorts of trouble and expect that anything that can go wrong will go wrong. When you accept this, you are a step closer to overcoming that fear. Once you’re prepared for the worst it probably won't happen. Whatever will be, will be better than the worst and will only take you higher. Somebody had said to me once that if you always have a backup plan you most probably would not need it. The best thing about facing your fears is that you come out with the realisation that there never was anything to be afraid of. Fearless is the only way to be. Else life isn't worth living. The strangest truth is that every thing that I have been afraid of will happen to me and with me HAS happened. And when I look back at those I can’t help but feel what a waste it was to have been afraid.

I was always very afraid of elephant charges in the forest. To be honest I never really feared a tiger but whenever I came across an elephant in close vicinity I would palpitate with fear that I was going to be sent crashing through the forest. I was so afraid that I would just freeze and not be able to shoot anymore. Then there was this one trip a few years back into the forest when the heat was driving everybody, along with the animals, insane. From the minute I entered the forest my gypsy was charged at by one elephant herd after the other at the count of almost six charges a day. Somewhere after the third attack I realized that all I had to do was be calm and not let fear dictate my reaction. That was it! I just have not been afraid ever since then and I managed to get some of my best elephant photographs during that particular trip and that also while being chased.

It’s all about changing your perspective. When I am trying to teach photography to students I always tell them to see the same thing from a different perspective. If it’s a tree then try lying down and looking up at it or getting on top of an even higher platform to see the top of it. The idea is to break the monotony of our usual method of observation and evaluation and then react.   

What truly matters is how much respect people can have for themselves with the ability to look in the mirror and feel pride in oneself, and for that, the first step is to overcome all our fears. I read a quote somewhere recently that said, “Climb a mountain not so the world can see you but so that you can see the world” and I thought to myself that was the best way to live and find much happiness.

About the author: Neha Parmar is a wildlife photographer and a conservationist with some tolerable talent for writing. If you liked, connected or have a contrary perspective with anything that you read please feel to share your feedback. 

To see more work by Neha Parmar  https://www.facebook.com/NehaParmarPhotography. 

Disclaimer: This article remains copyright of the author and is her individual perspective. If you wish to give any feedback please get in touch with the author.