Be Virtuous and Sensible - Sharmila Vijayvargi

My Book of Positive Thoughts by Anil Kumar

Virtuous persons are those who adopt a high moral standard. Their behaviour is morally good and desirable, and their character is a bundle of virtues. Such persons are sensible, that is, they are wise and prudent. They can distinguish between the right and the wrong and always stand by and for the right.

We should do our best to be virtuous and sensible. Simplicity, humility, love, compassion, politeness and courtesy are the hallmarks of a virtuous and a sensible person. We should develop them in us. We must not allow anger, hatred, pride, boastfulness, meanness and evil thoughts to affect our virtues and sensibility. 

Our virtues and sensibility get expressed in our manners and etiquette. We are nothing but our manners and etiquette, which our conduct always exhibits wherever we go and whatever we do. For a start, we must learn to be always cheerful, polite and courteous in our behaviour. We ought to obey and respect our parents, elders and teachers and everyone around us. Little words of gestures such as 'please', 'thanks', and excuse me for making our speech courteous.

We must also avoid criticizing others for any reason. If we must disapprove of others'  unbecoming behaviour, we must choose our words carefully. Unnecessary criticism of others can seriously affect our relationships. We have no right to indulge in scandalous talk about others and spoil their name and harm their reputation. Since ours is a democratic country, people are free to have different views, opinions and beliefs. 

Therefore, we may disagree with others on all matters, but we must respect the freedom of thought and expression. We must learn to understand and appreciate the views of others, and for this, we should develop the fine art of listening to others with patients and compassion.

Finally, a word about our speech: a polite and courteous speech is an index of our mind and character. It can win us friends, respect and a good reputation and if it is the other way round, we may develop a lot of enemies around us. Therefore, always be polite, courteous and well mannered. 

Sharmila Vijayvargi

The Fabindia School

svi@fabindiaschools.in

Honesty and Respect - Innovators BHIS

"Honesty is the first chapter in the book of wisdom." -Thomas Jefferson.

I was relatively a new class teacher to Grade 6 as I had taken over the class midterm. The children were apprehensive about their new class teacher and wanted to create the best impression. They were to submit their first assignment to me, which happened to be an essay. I had told them that I would really appreciate the neat presentation of work. On the day of submission, there was one boy who had submitted the work in a brand new notebook.

Little did I know the actual reason behind it! His work was very neatly done, an absolute delight for any teacher. I showed his notebook to the class and asked them to applaud his neat work. The class obeyed, albeit after a tiny bit of hesitation. That struck me as being odd. I called this child and asked him the reason for using a new notebook. He said the previous one had no pages left for use. I asked him to get that notebook as I would love to see his earlier work, especially as he does it so well. To this, he nodded but the smile vanished from his face. 

The following day, before I could go to the class I had this boy waiting outside the staff room to meet me. The first thing he did was to handover the previous notebook to me and say, sorry. As I opened the notebook and looked at him, he rattled off the truth as to how he wanted to impress me so much with the first assignment that he had made his mother write it out for him. He was honest enough to concede that his mother had been unwilling. He chose a new notebook because his earlier handwriting would give away the truth. He confessed he had done this as his poor handwriting had never allowed him to win any appreciation in class. Now he was scared that he would lose his reputation, given his dishonest deed. I assured him that even though he was feeling low now, holding on to honesty was the best thing he could have ever done. I assured him that I will look up to him as a brave and honest child. This brought back the smile on his troubled little face. He learnt that honesty is being true to oneself. Honesty earns respect as we sail through our life and learn to accept things for what they are.

Innovators @ Billabong High International School Thane

-Bhumi Punjabi, Vaishali Phatak, Krishnakshi RaviShankor, Smita Bhobate

Honesty and Tolerance - Super 7

 All about honesty

Rajesh had been patiently waiting for his turn to bat during his CCA class. Finally, after his teammate Siddharth was bowled out, Rajesh got to enter with his bat. His face clearly portrayed his joy. Two balls later, Rajesh suddenly started to walk out, much to the surprise of his friends. When asked, he stopped and said, “I am out. I had edged the ball”. He had been caught behind by the wicket keeper but his opponents hadn’t realised that the bat had touched the ball. Their teacher who was closely monitoring the kids had noticed how happy Rajesh had been to finally get to bat. He called him aside, and asked him about it. The child, unhesitatingly stated, “I follow Sachin Tendulkar. He is my idol.” The teacher nodded with a smile. We all remember how the Little Master would leave the pitch if he had edged the ball, without even waiting for the opponent team to make an appeal.

The teacher felt elated to have such an honest child in her class and when she shared the incident with us, it immediately brought a smile on our faces. Honesty, we believe, is a mirror of one’s own self- a genuine portrayal of one’s soul. It is important that we inculcate the value of honesty right from childhood. This is one value, which if imbued, will help the child walk forever on the path of truth and righteousness. Children learn a lot by emulation; hence it is important that we lead not by words, but by examples. To be honest with others, we must first be honest with our own selves. This is not always easy. All of us face situations where it would be easier to be dishonest. But it takes a great deal of moral courage to resist such temptations. A reputation as an honest, trustworthy and reliable person is precious and rare in this world. Each of us has the opportunity to build such a reputation. True, some people may make fun of us for being honest but there will definitely be others who will appreciate it. Being honest in all things will give us a clear conscience and peace of mind.

In this regard, one of our group shared another incident. She had made it mandatory for students to finish eating their tiffins before going out to play during the lunch break. A child, who hadn’t done so, walked up to the teacher and said, “Ma’am I have finished eating. May I go out to play?” The teacher nodded and gave him the permission. However, she was surprised to see the boy return after two minutes. The child admitted that there was a part of the chapatti which he hadn’t eaten. He felt guilty for telling a lie. He apologized to his teacher, ate quickly and ran out to play. Such incidents do fill our hearts with joy and bring about a certain respect for our pupils. There was a time when one of us encountered another event which taught her that honesty and respect go hand in hand. She was distributing the answer scripts of a weekly test when a child came up and pointed out that she had been given two extra marks. She even went on to request the teacher not to appreciate her in front of the class as she felt that she has done nothing more than her duty. Such firm demonstration of integrity and dutifulness fill us with awe and respect for our students.

Super 7 @ Billabong High International School, Thane 
-Sayantani Mukherjee, Dimple Awasthi, Ritu Chitnis, Manjusha Saji, Jyoti Ramdhave, Vijaylaxmi Ramesh, Sumati Muthukumar