When I took up the job as an English teacher at Treamis World School, my father – a retired teacher, offered me lots of advice including “be friendly but not friends with your students.” I did not understand it anything beyond the wordplay. I now live on campus in quarters adjacent to the students’ dormitory. This means, I hear knock on the door at odd hours. Often they come to complain about something or to share their troubles or to ask for help with studies. Frequently, I even have to play their study partner which involves me asking the questions from their notes and hearing them answer. Although my experiences as a student were not quite like that, there is nothing out of the ordinary in these. But what really surprised me is, often students come to me just for a casual chat. They talk about their family, friends, school and everything that fancies them at the time. But, they don’t specifically ask me for any inputs on those matters. They just want me to listen like a good friend. Being a teacher is more than an instructor. On a typical day, I don the roles of a facilitator, a comforter, a guide, a parent and a friend. Or, perhaps a good friendship should embody all these. I don’t mind being their good sounding board. But often they get carried away and try to gossip about their classmates and teachers. And that is where I draw the line and remind them that I am not their friend. Now my dad’s advice makes sense to me.
I am an enthusiastic mom who loves to involve myself in my child’s learning process. Before my daughter could start her schooling, there used to be relevant questions and dilemma in my mind such as, ‘ What makes a classroom more active- a smart board or a smart mentor? How should a Gen Z classroom look like’, where I understand that the modern schools are expected to use digital tools in active ways.’ I reflected on the thought that is the new generation pattern of learning digressing from the ‘gurukul learning environment’ which I experienced.
Today, I am happy to share with this generation parents, that I am no more confused. I cherish the way my daughter is learning in her school, which is a true international and child-centric place with respect to its learning environment with the same Midas touch of the gurukul system.
I’ve seen that the lingo ‘digital classroom’, many a times, is wrongly perceived as ‘a student can learn better with a tablet in hand than pen-paper’. What it actually should signify is how proactively technology can be integrated in the learning process so as to complement the hands-on tools. No technological device has brains to comprehend and analyse my child’s specific needs. The device needs a master to program it so well that it can be rightly used at the right point of time to give the apt exposure to children, according to their subjective needs. And..the master is none but the mentor. Coming to a very common scenario now-a- days… children are reluctant to learn spellings, write on paper to express their thoughts but rather type in word pad where there is a spell check option. Students should introspect that the automated script for this option is also programmed by the human brains.
I believe that it is the smart mentor whose enthusiastic presence, involvement and attachment with the class adds life to the lessons and help students have a long lasting knowledge. Smart use of smart boards facilitate the process just like a tool as peer group learning, experiential hands on and so on. Each student is unique and magical in his/her own way. It is the expertise of the mentor to move the wand in the right direction to get the magic out of the child!
‘As you sow, so shall you reap’, this commonly heard proverb in the literal sense held very true to the students of Grade 5. On the February 16th, the students got to harvest the fruits of the seeds they had planted. They could not contain their excitement and amazement on seeing what their love, effort, hard work and dedication to this project had got them. The
students got corn cobs, potatoes, tomato, chilly, avrekalu, green gram, mustard seeds, wheat, spinach, coriander, onions, radish, carrots and sesame seeds. In addition to students, the school gardener Chinnappa put in a lot of effort by helping the students right from sowing to watering the plants.
The journey till the harvest day has been a wonderful experience for these students. Some of the vegetables were consumed by the construction workers on the campus. The students were happy to see that their work helped few people to have good food. Though the parents were amazed as to how the students could squeeze some time to work on this activity, they were happy that the children learnt how to make the environment greener.
Winning the house cup is a big achievement – and big achievements require teamwork, perseverance and an all-round personality. That’s what the Phoenix house students showed, whether it was in building the quickest human pyramid, having the courage to run 1600 meters or acting out a humorous play. At the same time, the House mentors, Ms. Bindu and Ms. Ankitha, helped me greatly to manage and organise the team in every event that we participated in. So, it was because of every student and teacher’s involvement that we won the Overall trophy.
The constitution of India came into a legal circulation at 10:18 AM on the 26th of January, 1950 replacing the Government of India Act (1935) as the governing document of India.
India, which was a British dominion since independence (August 15, 1947) transformed into Republic of India on January 26, 1950.
Even though the constitution was adopted on Nov. 26, 1949, the date of January 26 was selected to commemorate Purna Swaraj, a declaration of Independence of India promulgated by the Indian National Congress on January 26, 1930 for complete self-rule (Home rule) independent of British Empire.
The Constituent Assembly met in sessions open to the public, for 166 days, spread over a period of 2 years, 11 months and 18 days making 2000 amendments to the Draft prepared by the committee headed by Dr. B. R. Ambedkar before adopting the Constitution
The 308 members of the Assembly signed two copies of the document (one each in Hindi and English) on 24 January 1950. The official cost estimate for developing constitution was Rs. one crore.
India has the longest written constitution of any sovereign country in the world, containing 448 articles in 25 parts, 12 schedules, 5 appendices and 98 amendments (out of 120 Constitution Amendment Bills).
The original Constitution of India is hand-written with beautiful calligraphy, each page beautified and decorated by artists from Shantiniketan including Beohar Rammanohar Sinha and Nandalal Bose.
The original hand-written copies of the constitution are kept in helium-filled cases in the Library of Parliament House.
The Lion Capital of Ashoka dating back to 250 BC with the inscription of the motto ”Satyameva Jayate” was adopted as national emblem on Jan 26, 1950. The motto (translation: Truth Alone Triumphs), a mantra from the ancient Indian scripture Mundaka Upanishad, was popularized by Pundit Madan Mohan Malaviya
Rabindranath Tagore wroteJana Gana Mana in Bengali first. It was translated by Abid Ali into Hindi, in 1911, and officially adopted as the Indian National Anthem on January 24, 1950. It takes 52 seconds to sing the complete National Anthem.
Rajendra Prasad took oath as India’s first President on January 26, 1950.
Wreaths are placed on republic day by the Prime Minister of India and Chiefs of Armed Forces at ‘Amar Jawan Jyoti’ or the flame of the immortal soldier, a structure with reversed rifle capped by war helmet bound by four earns erected under the India Gate, New Delhi.
On Republic Day, a 21-gun salute, the firing of cannons or firearms as military honor, is given to the National Flag and the President, during the Flag Hoisting Ceremony.
India’s major national awards (such as Bharat Ratna, Padma Bhushan, Chakra – Veer, Shaurya, Ashoka) are awarded during this ceremony.
The Republic Day Celebrations happen over 3 days and it ends on January 29.
The ‘Beating Retreat’, a fanfare sounded by the trumpeters along with pipes, buglers and drum bands, is conducted on the evening of January 29, by the bands of three wings of military at Rajsina Hills and Vijay Chowk in the presence of the chief guest, the president of India. The Christian hymn ‘Abide with me’ is played in this event.
All round development, success and a happy life ahead – this is what we truly desire for our children at Treamis. We aim for a great schooling experience – not just through good grades, but also through independent thinking.
Checking on your child’s progress can be turned into a collaborative effort for your child’s development.
Turning the bright minds we meet at school into success stories is no easy task. It requires constant teamwork and support from our larger pool of talented minds – the parents, who are the best support network that a school can hope for. And now we come to you, asking for your help in turning these formative years into the best possible foundation for your child.
How? It’s not just notes to the teacher to check his / her progress or appreciative messages to the school. This is the 5 finger rule that you can follow to help us deliver the best learning experience for your child.
The Treamis approach is about encouraging your child to be independent, yet welcome towards diversity. We ask you to encourage the same at home. Welcome and celebrate diversity in opinion at home. Find space to cherish your values and connect them with the broader perspective.
2. Be the role model you wish for your child to follow:
Children are always watching and listening, be it for the red light you might have missed or a rude word from your mouth. How you balance your work, handle stress and take time out for them are all lessons in practice.
3. Let us know:
If your child has special needs or there has been an emergency at home, let us know. If your child may miss his / her assessment or may be required at home during school timings, let us know. Most importantly, we must know about any and every change at home which significantly affects them.
4. Maintain respect:
Remember, children learn by example. We therefore request you to maintain the hierarchical order while contacting any of us, keep discussions over your child’s progress to arranged meetings and when required, seek a meeting instead of looking at communication on mail or phone. Often the last two forms of communication cannot fully address areas regarding a child’s progress as a physical-parent teacher meeting.
5. Allow your child to make mistakes:
In today’s fast-paced competitive world, all of us scared at the prospect of our children being left behind by not being absolute all-rounders. Let it go – it is mistakes that help us learn the most and your child’s mistakes today would help them deal with tomorrow better than our constant efforts at steering them in the right direction.
To know more, we would like you to go through an exhaustive, 30-point list that has been put together by Ann V Klotz for parents at the Laurel School, where she talks from her experience in dealing with young students.
