Comments and Responses to "Learning Parks of Possibilities"
Dear Mr.Manish,
Best wishes for
a very happy & meaningful new year!
I just received
the excellent paper by Shilpa, sumi, Ajay & parijat. It is such a pleasure to read it. I will try to send detailed comments a few days
later.
Kindly send
similar materials
Regards
S.N.Gananath
SUVIDYA
#206,39th A
Cross, 9th Main,
5 th Block,
Jayanagar
BANGALORE 560
041
INDIA
Tel :
91-080-6658580
Fax :
91-080-6540710
e-mail :
suvidya1@vsnl.com
Hi Manish,
Thanks for your
New Year's wishes. May I extend the same to you, Shilpa, and the Shikshantar family. Yes,
I have long been hoping for us to find ways to stay more interconnected. Let's hope this
year we see more of it.
I'll certainly
contact Sunita Gandhi. It would be my pleasure to play a role in your conference. I would
hope you would also be able to participate in ours (slotted for the third week of Nov
2001).
I'm not sure if
I will be able to attend the meetings on Jan 10 to 13. I'll need to confirm this. However,
we are definitely committed to working on the project.
BTW, I read and
enjoyed the Learning Park article. I'll be interested to follow its development.
Regards,
Steve Rudolph
Jiva Institute
steve@jiva.org
Dear Manish,
I have
thoroughly enjoyed reading the article about learning parks. Philosophically I am in
agreement with so much that it stands for and I do hope that the learning parks concept is
further developed.
I have a
concern though that I need to share. It is around the idea that children can be left free
to do as they like without being given access to skills, particularly interpersonal and
intrapersonal skills. The following from the article helps to illustrate my point:
"We are
also unlearning how to handle disputes. Occasionally, when the fighting among children has
gotten to be too much, we have used a form of emotional blackmail, saying that we could
not continue to come and learn with the children if they behaved like this. Clearly, this
is not the best way to handle conflicts, and we are seeking other strategies for dealing
with them. Because we do not believe in using rewards or punishments, and because we do
not believe that children should be controlled, we either try to engage them in a dialogue
around questions like “What happened? What did you do? How else can you handle this
situation?” or we leave them to solve their disputes on their own. It takes time and
patience, but we feel that in the long run, only methods like these will support the
processes of self-discipline and conflict transformation that are essential for living and
learning together."
You will be
familiar with the book Lord of the Flies that illustrates how children can turn into
savages when left to their own devices. The challenge, I believe, is to develop an
educational system not a schooling one! In so many places in the world it is crude
schooling that exists in the name of education. In Nepal I recall seeing so many schools
being set up in the villages that were not remotely educational. They are set up to teach
the children to read and write and then to leave to work in Kathmandu in a polluted
environment. NGOs and charities are all supporting these schools that, in my view, are
doing so much harm to the social infrastructure of the country. Similar in parts of India?
Therefore, the writers of the article should avoid falling into the trap of the
deschoolers by selling the children short by setting up a process that appears to be based
on a freedom principle. Freedom comes when people accept personal responsibility and that
requires a high degree of personal discipline. Otherwise the rule of the bully reigns and
negative human instincts triumph!
In her book, A
Quiet Revolution, Frances Farrer (Random Books ISBN 0 7126 0577-0) tells the story about a
school that enabled children to develop personal freedom through developing their own
inner self -esteem and self-discipline, thereby becoming civil members of society. The
school demonstrated that it is possible to change the relationship between teacher and
taught from one based on control to mutual support. I offer this book as a discussion
point for developing schools throughout the world. It is so relevant in every context. I
am deeply concerned that in our efforts to be educators we prevent the children from
having access the the richness of the world because they are not helped to develop the
necessary internal spiritual skills that the 21st Century requires us to have if we are
going to survive on this planet together.
I am very
excited at being able to discuss such important matters with all your colleagues.
My hope for
2001 is that all creative minded educators around the world will unite to nurture the
quality of civility in all children everywhere.
Warmest of good
wishes.
Neil Hawkes
<neil.hawkes@talk21.com>
"Peter
Birks" <Foxspike@aol.com>
Dear Peter,
Manish has just
sent me this article. I am by way of coping this e-mail to him, letting him know that I
have past it on to you. I'm sure that he will be delighted to learn that a creative
educational thinker who has been influential in the UK system has access to the
literature. I'm sure your thoughts would be welcome as we must link global thinkers
together if we are to create a learning community for the future.
Best wishes.
Neil
Manish - Peter
Birks is the former Principal Adviser to the Isle of Wight Educational Service in the UK
and a respected adviser and inspector of schools. He is well known for his thinking about
how pupils learn and are most effectively organised in school. He has also written on
aspects of spirituality from a Christian perspective.
Happy New Year!
Neil
Dear Manish,
I most
sincerely regret the delay in acknowledging the mail and expressing my profound sense of
joy while going through the paper.
I shall get
back to you and Shilpa on my return from abroad mid January.
Wish you all
the best,
AK JALALUDDIN
<jalal@del3.vsnl.net.in>
|
Dear Manish,
Great to hear
from you. I just traveled over from Iceland to Prague and will take time out to read this
wonderful title...I am running a bit slow on getting my article to you but this is on my
mind and once I get going, I can get it done fairly quickly, so there is hope.
Please convey
my greetings to all at Shikshantar.
Greetings,
Sunita Gandhi
<sgandhi9@yahoo.com> |
sgandhi@globaleducation.org
Dear Manish,
I read with
great interest the article, and will share it with some colleagues if I may.
Thanks for your
Christmas greetings. I wish you all the very best for Christmas and the New Year, and
really do hope to get to Udaipur some time this year.
Warm regards
Janice
Richardson <JaniceRichardson@compuserve.com>
Dear Mr. Jain,
Thank you for
your article on "learning parks". I
shall respond a little later when I have fully reviewed the article. I request you to
please list me in your mailing for your newsletter, "Vimukt Shiksha".
Thank you
Vasavi
A R Vasavi
<arvasavi@hamsadvani.serc.iisc.ernet.in> |
Add: A.R. Vasavi
National Inst
of Advanced Studies
Indian
Institute of Science Campus
Bangalore-560012
Dear Mr. Jain,
Thanks for the
paper. We will pass them on to our education coordination and our education consultant.
Meanwhile we
would like to send you 2 papers which deal with our approach to education and learning.
1. Education
against Tyranny
2. Education
-Needs verses Rights
We would look
forward to your feed back to our papers.
Our website is
"http://www.workingchild.org"
www.workingchild.org
Hope you find
it interesting. The section 'Interventions' carries the issues related to education.
Regards,
Kavita
cwc@pobox.com
Thanks for the
paper. Quite fascinating. And I am sure, lot's of fun for both adults and children.
Speaking as a manager developer, I wish one could offer many adults the opportunity to
interact with children in learning parks. Suppose I could come to Udaipur, what minimum
period would you recommend?
Nandan Maluste
Kotak Mahindra
Capital Company, Mumbai, India
Tel: +91 22 282
6655 x163; Fax: +91 22 282 6632
nandan maluste
<nandan.maluste@kotak.com> |
CC:
'pervin varma
off' <pervin.varma@crymail.org>, 'puja marwaha' <puja.marwaha@crymail.org>
Good to hear
from you. I forwarded your paper to Keith
Yocam at www.schoolsonline.org. They are in 17 countries and will be going into 40 more
including India, setting up "Internet learning centers" and supporting teacher
training.
At the end of
Feb. I may be in Delhi (if the group gets money for my ticket) for the opening of a new
media center, Sarai, run by a fellow I have not met, Ravi Sundaram <>.
Steve Cisler
<cisler@pobox.com> |
Thank you for
the information on learning parks. I think
the paper is great in terms of the way you have changed the negatives into positives and
all the activites, projects are very customer focused i.e. the childeren and their
interest. this is an excellent way to
motivate learning and I think this is an issue that needs to be address across the board. I shall pass this paper to people within the local education authority.
Seasons
greeting to Vidhi and yourself
Regards
Pratibha
Hindocha
<P.Hindocha@derby.ac.uk>
|
dear manish
thanx for the
article - i enjoyed reading it since it resonates some of my own ideas about learning. i
also shared it with an ngo that has set up recreational/learning spaces for children while
working on universalisation of a quality elementary education. good to have heard from
you. my trip to udaipur has not yet materialised - hopefully next year it will so that i
may be a co-learner with the children. would love that. if you ever come to bangalore do
come stay with us. my phone no. is (080) 5285877
BEST WISHES FOR
THE NEW YEAR.
salam - tasqeen
Tasqeen M
<tasqeenm@actionaidindia.org> |
Dear Manish,
Thank you for
sharing your ideas which are so pertinent.
Best wishes for
the New Year 2001
Aïcha
"Bah_Diallo,_Aïcha" <A.Bah-diallo@unesco.org> |