Rhymes & poems led to coaching

KAMAL BARUAH

There exists a tension with every parent when it comes to coaching centric education that spread its tentacles into the digital world as well. The grueling school-plus-tuition epidemic education system caused effect of their prolonged period of lost childhood and stress induced by this rush for a ceaseless tuition race. With a shrinking job market, parents faced dilemma where to send their wards for better school or coaching to build a career and also parents’ unreasonable ambitions forced students to go beyond their interest in study. Most of the parents want their children to begin as early as possible in the hope that it will give them an edge.

In higher studies, private tuition or coaching centers have evolved into a lucrative business. From IAS coaching to NEET, IIT-JEE, CUET, CLAT, CAT etc., all they’re in the race for a limited number of seats as students saw lakhs of aspirants competing competitive examination across the country. Students even go for coaching to get admission for a reputed coaching institute. In the TV series ‘Kota Factory’, the show follows students’ struggles, dreams and relationship for an uphill task that is very daunting from the outset and continues to be challenging. Over a million students are studying overseas for pursuing higher study. Shockingly many students chose to study medicine abroad at low cost.

There was a time, when tuition classes in groups or private tutoring were temporary solutions but now coaching centers dominated by giant brands like Byju’s, Allen and Resonance come into the picture. No doubt coaching centers are a great place for some to relax in cozy environments while learning. For students, tuition is their life as time is actually spent studying until they complete class 12. This year NEET-UG exam has sparked national outrage recently. NTA’s inability to conduct examination exposed after repeated postponements of CUET, UGC-Net, and NEET-PG. However it affects students in a number of ways.

The joys of raising a child in big metros is now challenging, when it was unheard of for a parent to even book a seat at pre-school for admission of their new born babies, along with the time of issuing Aadhaar. Recalling a past time, this writer also had some fond memories, when his daughter went to Kindergarten in a reputed convent school. There was a long queue in the midnight hours for admission forms as they are limited to a few numbers – so parents stood there in the night. I was visibly shocked by the activities of sending children for tuition to prepare for admission at the very first year of formal education. After such appalling situation, I had no option but to send our daughter for a short refresher course as there was no time left for interview. Hopefully she could able to understand Basic English after a month of tuition.

It was all about identifying colours, numbers and shapes to evaluate those parameters for understanding child’s developmental milestones for the school or if there are any cases of special needs education. That followed by nursery questions and activities. I once felt despair as the interviewer cautioned me severely saying “oh she speaks only Hindi”. Our daughter had no early childhood education like play group or Nursery etc. and was brought up from the Hindi-belt areas. The principal probably realized that a language has no barrier to overcome in learning. As the years passed by so quickly, transitions are the key to academic learning. Students learn more in active learning at classrooms than through traditional lectures. Students often highlight thoughts about schools and their teachers with parents every day.

The other day when I asked our daughter to pen down her thoughts about classroom experience of school days, she could only remember the time enjoying with friends and class teacher while in the kindergarten. There were many situations; however, one of the most memorable was participating in rhymes and poems while dancing together. Barny ma’am was the only teacher at St. Mary’s convent where she taught girls in their early years to build a foundation for lifelong learning. Past pupils still loved going their school during Christmas albeit all those highly materialistic coaching in later study. Rhymes and poems are calling them while all the girls from Kindergarten would dance to the beat, shaking their legs and stamping feet, waving arms and nodding head but now it’s time to go to school for another dance during holidays.

(Email: kamal.baruah@yahoo.com)