Quality and Love - Reah Sikand

Love and Quality are two great values or feelings that a child must have. Children understand the language of love better than any adult. When a child feels secure and loves, he performs much better in class and grows up to be a lovely human being. All living things need love and care. I had a child in class 3 who would score fewer marks in English, I would often hear teachers getting upset with her. I decided to help her out in her free time. I was patient and loving towards her. I was surprised to know that she had done much better in English papers that year. When a child is scared of their teacher or parent, they get uncomfortable to ask questions and do not perform their best. On the other hand, when an adult is loving, kids feel more comfortable communicating with them. Love is something every individual craves for.

Quality in the class depends on the potential of each child. Every kid has its own capabilities, and the last thing we adults should do is compare the kids to each other. In my class, I ask the kids to help each other in their studies. This makes their bond and friendship stronger.

With age, I have realised the importance of quality over quantity. Like I tell the kids, when you do something, give it your hundred per cent or don’t do it. Sometimes when I enter class, the kids are not in the mood to study and o respect that, and we have a fun class or watch some interesting videos on the screen.

We as teachers teach the kids various things, but the kids are the best teachers for us as well.

If a child does a shoddy job with her classwork, I will sit with that kid alone and try and understand the reason for it, maybe I did not teach the topic well, and she found it difficult to do her homework, and I will sit with the kid and teach her the topic one on one where she can freely tell me what her doubts are.

In a situation where boys and girls are together, there is bound to be a romantic relationship, which is normal. We need to normalise such situations. I would talk to the student and tell them it’s absolutely fine, but certain limits should not be crossed; otherwise, that could lead to many problems for the kid. 

- Reah Sikand, The Doon Girls' School, Dehradun

Thoughtfulness and Understanding - Reah Sikand

Thoughtfulness and understanding are two values that go hand in hand. Thoughtfulness means to be considerate towards others. Children start interacting with others at a young age. Thus, this value should be instilled in them from a young age. Kids should understand the meaning of thoughtfulness as this makes them caring individuals.

My grandmother always taught me that we must put ourselves in the other person's place before we judge them or react to their actions. This made me realise that circumstances make people behave in a certain way. Everyone needs love and care.

One day I entered the class and started teaching the kids, and a few of the kids came to me after class and asked me if I was doing okay since they noticed I wasn’t myself in class that day. I was surprised to realise that the kids had noticed I was sad.

We need to treat kids like adults and communicate with them. We need to tell them to help others and care about others. Kids learn this quality very quickly because they are pure souls. When children visit NGOs, they become more sensitive towards others. Thus, schools must encourage their kids to do social work.

Understanding is to feel an emotion another person is feeling. We must understand individuals, and we must learn to empathise with others. We tend to become selfish and only think about ourselves, but if we only think about ourselves, no one will think about us as well.

If there is open communication between children and adults, these values will be easy to understand for kids. Being a good human being is very important for a better world, and for that, teaching kids moral values are the most important thing. When adults are happy and calm, and peaceful, kids will automatically develop this attitude.

- Reah Sikand
The Doon Girls' School, Dehradun

Happiness and Tolerance - Rectifier BHIS

As Jeanette Winterson says, “The key to happiness is the tolerance of those who do not do as you do.”

Nina was a teacher at a school three blocks away from her home. After her husband Jim passed away, she needed something to keep her emotionally stable and teaching underprivileged kids brought a lot of joy for her. She fondly called her kids, Star Kids.

Pic by Saee Joshi

She always showed up early to her class & eagerly waited for them. In her small class of 10 students, there was a boy named Alex. He was a child of divorced parents and would often get in trouble with other students and act out his aggressive tendencies. “He would mess up the class vibe and environment”, some teachers would say. Nina knew he’s asking for love in the most unloving way. But she was always worried her class wouldn’t win the best class because her class would always be in a mess post the lunch break (usually when Alex would get into a fight and mess up the class).

Pic by Saee Joshi

One day, Nina hurriedly came up to the class and told them that their school was expecting some very important visitors & they would make some notes, inspect a little. This was the first time that the kids saw their teacher worried. She was worried that her class looked shabby, she had been trying to get some stains off that wall, her table looked messy, the chairs, the board. She had so little time to do anything! She would usually talk to Jim at a time like this when she was anxious & he would have just the right thing to say and make her feel calm. She instructed the kids that she would be back in some time and gave them a chapter to read aloud turn by turn.

Rajshri Mohite

She left hurriedly downstairs as she was a part of the welcoming committee too. Soon the visitors began going to each class, talking to the students and teachers respectively. When the turn for Nina’s class came, she was anxious more than ever. She knew her class didn’t look as good. But when she opened the door to her class, she was in utter shock n disbelief!

Rajshri Mohite

The class looked spic and span, books neatly arranged in the order one would need them to be, the shelf didn’t have cobwebs, her desk looked spotless and the chairs arranged neatly. To her utter surprise, the kids were on duty. One kid was standing near the books, one near the board, one at the door to welcome the guests and some kids had made a beautiful welcome card for the visitors. Leading on behalf of the children was Alex! He went on to give a small tour of their class to the visitors eagerly.

Nina’s happiness knew no bounds! She later realized that all of them had worked together on an idea put forth by Alex harmoniously. She knew it wasn’t easy for anyone but they tolerated each other’s ideas and worked with whatever they could do best in so little time. She knew she had done something right when she decided to become an Educator. She could never be more proud as an educator of her Star Kids than she was that day.

Rectifier @ Billabong High International School, Thane

- Pallavi Harkare, Kalpana Dodia, Rajshri Mohite, Prerna Khanna, Priyanka Iyer, Mahalaxmi Iyer

Keep Kids Busy At Home

Since many kids are/will be home from school, sharing an awesome list of ideas from a parent who homeschools. (Rcvd as a WhatsApp fwd)



Online resources:
- BrainPop
- Curiosity Stream
- Tynker
- Outschool
- Udemy
- iReady
- Beast Academy (Math)
- Khan Academy
- Creative Bug
- Discovery Education

YouTube Channels:
- Crash Course Kids
- Science Channel
- SciShow Kids
- National Geographic Kids
- Free School
- Geography Focus
- TheBrainScoop
- SciShow
- Kids Learning Tube
- Geek Girl Diaries
- Mike Likes Science
- Science Max
- SoulPancake

Lots of board games, library books (and Kindle), tinkering/upcycling with household junk, etc.
Some resources to help with kids at home:

*Scholastic has created a free learn-from-home site with 20+ days of learning and activities.

https://classroommagazines.scholastic.com/…/learnathome.html

*Pretend to travel the world..Go on a virtual tour of these 12 famous museums.

https://www.travelandleisure.com/…/museums-with-virtual-tou…

*This is the awesome free curriculum that we use. Everything from preschool activities to 12th grade is here!

https://allinonehomeschool.com/

*List of thinking games by grade: https://allinonehomeschool.com/thinking/

More awesome free learning websites that we like to use

https://www.starfall.com/h/

https://www.abcya.com/

https://www.funbrain.com/

https://www.splashlearn.com/

https://www.storylineonline.net/

https://pbskids.org/

https://www.highlightskids.com/

https://kids.nationalgeographic.com/

https://www.coolmath4kids.com/

http://www.mathgametime.com/

https://www.uniteforliteracy.com/

http://www.literactive.com/Home/index.asp

http://www.sciencekids.co.nz/

https://www.switchzoo.com/

https://www.seussville.com/

https://www.turtlediary.com/

https://www.e-learningforkids.org/

Please feel free to share this with anyone who you think may benefit from this.

- Courtesy Ravi Santlani Scoonews