Education for Life ?
What is the purpose/significance of education
and life? This question was asked by Krishnamurti and has been an ancient one.
As T. S. Eliot said to know what we want in education we must know what we want
in general. Is education just to earn a living, life to enjoy and/or is there
something more. To earn a livelihood and live decently in this world implies
that education must equip with skills and knowledge. To ask the question is
there something more and possibly find an answer to it, an openness is necessary
which implies that education must keep alive the spirit of questioning and
learning. Can both be done simultaneously? Is that whole education?
I came across K’s teachings quite by chance in
1992 and in the very first instance it struck a chord being logical, sensible
and simple. K’s question ‘what are you doing with your life?’ and his saying
‘the benediction is where you are’ inspired me to initiate a school that would
offer the kind of holistic education proposed by K. This education needs a
matching curriculum and pedagogy. The education must be able to cultivate the
art of seeing, listening, questioning, and learning along with equipping with
skills and knowledge. This had to be started from scratch by an ordinary man
in the midst of a concrete jungle where children are carelessly dumped into the
ruthless rat race, goaded and cheered to achieve at all costs. It was again
quite by chance that I came across the Waldorf curriculum and pedagogy.
Immediately I saw that what K pointed to and what was happening in the Waldorf
classroom were essentially the same. It makes possible to provide the kind of
education proposed by K in such a constrained situation.
Child development and growth is a natural
phenomenon. Knowledge of the phenomenon and the process enables one to provide
a right kind of education in a right way. Intelligence is not of time but the
brain( mind-body organism) is of time. Education (0-21 yrs) may be viewed as a
finishing process of the organism. As K said the brain is the only instrument we
have. It needs to mature and be sensitized to the necessary physical and
psychological states to be able to realize its capacity for Intelligence.
Aaverbhav was initiated in 2002 and being an
alternative school is still struggling to establish itself. As for the present
building in which it is located it is only a small result of my family’s
committed effort to make available a decent learning environment. Due to the
few number of children the gap between increasing cost of sustenance and income
is widening. If more discerning parents send their children to the school it
can pull out of the precarious situation. It needs like-minded people who can
give (not sacrifice) to strengthen the endeavor to bring about good human beings
and a sane world. Founded by me, Aaverbhav, with an open approach, takes
anything spirited, simple and sensible in an attempt to provide a humanizing
education. It may blossom or wither in the bud.
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