What else does any parent need from their child?
Background
I was attending my kid’s school event today, initially, I was not focused on the theme but thought of making her happy by attending it. However, I was totally stumped by the show put up by the kids and kudos to all the teachers and other staff in putting such a nice performance.
The topic was on School trips and they did a splendid job in conveying the underlying rationale for doing these trips, and how they play a vital role in the upbringing of the kids. All their experiences were very well enacted by kids, and some of the experiences shared by 10+2 kids from the Leh/Ladakh trip gave us goosebumps. The entire audience became emotional when one of the kid read a letter from the Kargil war.
Post the session, I was so impressed that I thought of sharing my views and learnings from these great efforts of the school. I know it is not an easy effort with so many kids but the school management is so stubborn they are continuing these trips with the same rigor and passion every year.
Kick off
Going to the school itself is a big change for any kid, and with the little support they will be able to overcome this very soon, and that is when the seed gets rooted for their transformation journey. Though it looks like a small thing externally, from a kids standpoint it is still a big change. We definitely need to respect and motivate them to continue the journey which I believe most of us do without any doubts. Over a period of time, they get accustomed to the school environment and start their baby steps towards becoming a more independent individual.
To accelerate their journey towards this exciting state, School has their plans of conducting these trips effective 3rd grade.
The first trip is short and sweet with an overnight stay. The intent here is to give that “out of the home” experience to kids staying away from their parents. Though I am all for it, I couldn’t motivate my elder one picking this but somehow I was able to convince my younger one to experience this. I truly believe in these trips as they help the kids to conduct themselves independently and this in a way helps in boosting their confidence, and I can definitely see some change in my kid post the trip.
The next trip will take them little far and engage them more with team activities, this helps them in learning the team dynamics and life skills. This is more of a transition period where they start taking care of themselves and learn in taking some small and simple decisions, etc. (decision can be as simple as picking a dress to wear). Besides, these trips also help in seeding so many skills with respect to planning, organizing, and peer learning, etc. It is more of giving a societal outlook such that they can become a better individual as they transform into future.
Accelerate
By now kids will become more comfortable, clear from all their fears and home-sickness, and will be gearing up to pick bigger challenges and adventures. This is the time, school trips take a different route picking some education aspects like making them visit factories, understand how things get produced/manufactured, etc.
With every class, they will be touching different themes covering various states, cultures, historical aspects, etc. Kids getting the first-hand experience on these themes (like visiting Gandhi’s ashram) will definitely help in boosting the morale for all the future efforts.
Visiting Wagah border and watching the parade is going to give a complete picture of the country, our geographic borders along with the sacrifices our armed forces are making, crystal clear for the kids.
Post all these trips, kids will
- be able to correlate what they studied to what they have seen,
- become more confident,
- know how to mingle and work in teams,
Overall they will become more well-rounded, disciplined and turn into matured individuals.
Final Comments
The last leg of this journey will be the trip they do in their 10+2 to Leh/Ladakh, this is one of the lifetime memory for all the kids as they will be exposed to the tough climatic conditions, their interactions with the army makes them sensitive to so many things about the country and they start understanding the big picture on how things work, etc. This will make them tough and help them realize that things cannot be taken for granted and they need to work hard to do their bit towards the society.
All this cannot happen overnight and has to be instilled over a period of time nurturing them with the right ethics and values, and these trips will definitely come in handy filling that practical perspective.
Net Net, the way these trips getting orchestrated, the Kid will be able to evolve from a dependent state to an independent, and further to an interdependent state seamlessly, and the experiences gained from these trips will definitely help them in becoming tomorrow’s superhuman beings. Agree?
Note: School referred above— “The Future Kids’ School”, Hyderabad.