As we begin the fifth year of integral education program, we sit back and reflect on our achievements and mistakes. As such, the time has come for us to review the work of the past five years and face our reflections as facilitators in an honest and sometimes brutal manner.
IEP began with a simple goal in 2004. The goal was to bring a group of children together for a period of one year, and impart to them the need for integrality in education, where all aspects of the being, the physical, the vital, the mental, the psychic and the spiritual, have to be grown and developed. The group would meet every two weeks, with the exception of holidays and we would embark together with the children on this great adventure.
So, have we achieved this goal? As is the answer to most questions, the answer to this, too, is Yes and No. Yes, because parents, children and facilitators have, despite various challenges, worked together to run the program successfully for the past four years. No, because sometimes we, due to external influences and commitments, have failed to give ourselves completely to the program, thereby allowing the program to fall short of its ideal goals. But what have we achieved?
As a facilitator, nothing gives me a greater pleasure than to see the child bloom as he goes through the IEP year.
How does the child bloom? - One may ask. It is a question that one is unable to answer. A parent who called me some weeks ago to enquire about enrolling her child asked me this question. “How does the child’s personality improve by attending IEP?” Again, one can’t answer this. It is impossible for a facilitator to tell a parent, “Send your child to IEP for one year and we guarantee that he will be obedient, concentrate better in his studies, be punctual etc etc…” In fact, the child may grow up to be more free spirited than obedient by attending IEP. So it brings us back to the question – How does the child bloom?
In his book Integral Education, an inspirational guide, Sraddhalu Ranade writes that each child has his own inner nature, an inner quality. No two children are the same. One cannot take a rice plant, beat it with a stick and tell it “Become wheat! Become Wheat!” The plant would soon wither because it is not in its intrinsic nature to become wheat.
A couple of years ago, I planted in my balcony a creeper commonly known as the money plant. I watered it daily and watched it grow fast, using the balcony grills for support. Encouraged by my success and convinced that I was a great gardener; I bought a pot of flowering plants and set them in my garden. I watered them as efficiently as I had watered the money plant, took just as much care of them. But for a mysterious reason, in a month, the plant had withered and died. Why though? The money plant was still thriving in the neighboring pot!
Many of us keep plants in our homes. We would notice that some plants thrive best when watered daily. Others, such as a cactus or an African violet require the soil to be moderately dry in order to thrive. Some plants, such as orchids, do not thrive when planted in soil, they need a combination of charcoal or husk to adhere to and grow. Some require full sunlight; others need a bright but shady environment (My poor flowering plant had required full sunlight, an impossibility in a balcony). Those who have little gardens can understand the satisfaction it gives one to see their garden thriving, and knowing that it is thriving because you have understood your plants and have cared for them as they require. In the same way, less beats the regret one feels at looking at dry and withered plants and realizing that we have, for some reason, not taken care of them properly.
Fortunately for us, there are guidebooks and resources that tell us which plants thrive best under what conditions. Unfortunately, children do not come with a guidebook, nor are there resources that tell us precisely what kind of environment is best for which child. To make matters even more difficult for us, each child is different. There is no common “species”, where one can refer to others who have brought up similar children.
So when I say that the child blooms, it means that something from within the child - a shining light – comes forward. It manifests itself in several forms, a tendency towards leadership, helpfulness, sincerity, and an aspiration towards perfection… the qualities being exhibited differing with each child. There are activities, talks and games that are aimed at developing “personality aspects” of the child, such as leadership and teamwork. But more than that, we as facilitators aim to bring with us an atmosphere that will enable the child to identify for himself what his inner nature is, and that which develops it.
So in the end, the activities carried out are just vehicles for the growth and advent of a much more important part of the being, the child’s own inner star.
IEP began with a simple goal in 2004. The goal was to bring a group of children together for a period of one year, and impart to them the need for integrality in education, where all aspects of the being, the physical, the vital, the mental, the psychic and the spiritual, have to be grown and developed. The group would meet every two weeks, with the exception of holidays and we would embark together with the children on this great adventure.
So, have we achieved this goal? As is the answer to most questions, the answer to this, too, is Yes and No. Yes, because parents, children and facilitators have, despite various challenges, worked together to run the program successfully for the past four years. No, because sometimes we, due to external influences and commitments, have failed to give ourselves completely to the program, thereby allowing the program to fall short of its ideal goals. But what have we achieved?
As a facilitator, nothing gives me a greater pleasure than to see the child bloom as he goes through the IEP year.
How does the child bloom? - One may ask. It is a question that one is unable to answer. A parent who called me some weeks ago to enquire about enrolling her child asked me this question. “How does the child’s personality improve by attending IEP?” Again, one can’t answer this. It is impossible for a facilitator to tell a parent, “Send your child to IEP for one year and we guarantee that he will be obedient, concentrate better in his studies, be punctual etc etc…” In fact, the child may grow up to be more free spirited than obedient by attending IEP. So it brings us back to the question – How does the child bloom?
In his book Integral Education, an inspirational guide, Sraddhalu Ranade writes that each child has his own inner nature, an inner quality. No two children are the same. One cannot take a rice plant, beat it with a stick and tell it “Become wheat! Become Wheat!” The plant would soon wither because it is not in its intrinsic nature to become wheat.
A couple of years ago, I planted in my balcony a creeper commonly known as the money plant. I watered it daily and watched it grow fast, using the balcony grills for support. Encouraged by my success and convinced that I was a great gardener; I bought a pot of flowering plants and set them in my garden. I watered them as efficiently as I had watered the money plant, took just as much care of them. But for a mysterious reason, in a month, the plant had withered and died. Why though? The money plant was still thriving in the neighboring pot!
Many of us keep plants in our homes. We would notice that some plants thrive best when watered daily. Others, such as a cactus or an African violet require the soil to be moderately dry in order to thrive. Some plants, such as orchids, do not thrive when planted in soil, they need a combination of charcoal or husk to adhere to and grow. Some require full sunlight; others need a bright but shady environment (My poor flowering plant had required full sunlight, an impossibility in a balcony). Those who have little gardens can understand the satisfaction it gives one to see their garden thriving, and knowing that it is thriving because you have understood your plants and have cared for them as they require. In the same way, less beats the regret one feels at looking at dry and withered plants and realizing that we have, for some reason, not taken care of them properly.
Fortunately for us, there are guidebooks and resources that tell us which plants thrive best under what conditions. Unfortunately, children do not come with a guidebook, nor are there resources that tell us precisely what kind of environment is best for which child. To make matters even more difficult for us, each child is different. There is no common “species”, where one can refer to others who have brought up similar children.
So when I say that the child blooms, it means that something from within the child - a shining light – comes forward. It manifests itself in several forms, a tendency towards leadership, helpfulness, sincerity, and an aspiration towards perfection… the qualities being exhibited differing with each child. There are activities, talks and games that are aimed at developing “personality aspects” of the child, such as leadership and teamwork. But more than that, we as facilitators aim to bring with us an atmosphere that will enable the child to identify for himself what his inner nature is, and that which develops it.
So in the end, the activities carried out are just vehicles for the growth and advent of a much more important part of the being, the child’s own inner star.
- Kiruthika
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