Pandemic Schoolers
How’s it going for the kids with schooling during the pandemic?
Its been more than a year already since we started living with this pandemic. I live in Bangalore, India. One of the hard-hit cities in the nation against this stingy virus (Maybe you can add more cranky adjectives for covid). It is more than a year as well since I went to my office building. Like many people living in Bangalore, I don’t miss the office. I am so thankful to have avoided the busy traffic. I was thinking that must be a majority opinion.
But, Then I came across this kid at the basketball court inside my apartment complex. I was casually riding on my skateboard, He joined me in his little scooter and asked me If I am interested to trade the skateboard for his scooter for some time. I could not say no but then I remembered about a skateboarding fraternity in my hometown that teaches kids with a “No School, No Skateboarding” policy. To see this kid playing outside during school hours was not something I wanted to encourage. So asked I asked him how’s his school going, He was more curious to learn how to ride a skateboard from me. I made a deal with him that, If he explains to me how his school life going in the pandemic, I will teach him to ride the skateboard for some time and he fell for it. I was genuinely curious to know how the kids see the changed pandemic schooling system and how are they managing it.
I had a small 10 minutes chat with him, After that as promised, I helped him a bit with the skateboard to have some fun.
From my short conversation with him, I learned how different the feeling of school is for Pandemic Schoolers and some shocking factors. intrigued by my conversations with that kid, I had some interactions with one of my friends who is also a teacher at high school, another friend whose mom is a teacher at primary school. There seem to 2 big problems in making and we need to stop it.
We know the virtual education system has its flaws and everyone is getting used to it. lack of physical presence of facilitators isn’t working in favour to inspire the students, virtual learning comes with more temptations of distraction, getting the self-discipline worked out from the students took some time. Now after almost a year of pandemic learning, things seemed to be up and running in the right direction. or is it?
Big Classmates — Firstly the issue of parents joining online classes or I would say the parents shadow the online classes to evaluate various aspects like quality of the teacher, performance of their kids etc. I believe this doesn’t ensure a healthy environment for all the parties involved in the education system to express themselves freely. Having someone watching your back all the time isn’t so nice to concentrate and perform. Imagine how pressurised your son/daughter must be feeling, They are supposed to be feeling curious and creative there. If you, As a parent doing that. You need to stop doing it from today.
New Home Work Buddies — The parents have dived into the competitions among the kids one getting the home works done. My friend who is also a teacher says, it is very unusual for her to see the whole class solved all the problems/tasks as perfect it can get. She senses the involvement of parents to keep their children in the top tier of performers all the time. These practices don’t help the organic growth in children. Learning things through trial and error is essential to develop good problem-solving skills in everyone. Involvement from parents to drive their children towards their methods doesn’t help the out of the box thinkers either. By doing so you’re ruining the Einstein in your children. Would you do that?
As a parent what you are doing might look less harmful to you, Take a minute and think of yourself in your kid's situation. You will never want your parents to ruin your fun-filled school life like how you are doing now, isn’t it?
Let the kids be themselves, they deserve a lot of fun.
Leave the teachers free at their workplace, do not invade someone's work environment.
Be a good parent. :)
