The Lost Art
Yesterday I started this new academic year with a course under the larger conceptual umbrella of PLAY & INVENT, something I have never done before.
As always, I had some plans in place and a lot of it kept elastic for good measure.
Unlike other times, this time, I have deliberately decided to operate differently, call it an educator's experiment if you will! Not just with the kind fo content that is delivered, but also the way in which it unfolds in small packets, each different from another, beating my obsession for an otherwise incremental and almost logical progression of content and learning outcomes.
So, the plan for yesterday was to work with memories and connections. As a part of which, the students were asked to create concentric circles of proximity of the people they felt connected to in various degrees, them being at the centre of the circle. I tried hard to ignore questions like "can it be a pet, because I can't think of people" or "can it be a character and not a real person" etc.
Following this, they were to make a trip to the nearby post office. I say nearby because 2kms to a lot of us is walking distance, but to all 16 students, it was a cab/auto-rickshaw distance, which I discovered upon their return!
What follows is a series of conversations and discussions that took place once they came back.
I was ever so slightly disheartened when I asked them what the interactions were like at the post office and they said it was 'normal' and nothing worth talking about. I would imagine that the person at the counter would show some signs of astonishment at the sight of a dozen teenagers asking for 10post-cards / inland letters each in this day and age, where every bit of communication is literally at your fingertips!
Turns out, no one had really noticed the people across the counters.
Then I asked them if any of them had bought stamps along with the post cards and inland letters and turns out some of them gasped, ofcourse without realising that both, the postcards and inland letters actually had pre-printed stamps carrying currencies on them! I never intended it to be a trick question, but turns out it became one!
Thereafter, I asked them to write letters to the people that they had listed, but as though they were 10yr, 30yr, 50yr olds.
What followed was a volley of questions that to me were unfathomable and I was definitely not prepared for. One asked me, which side he should write on, to which I smiled and said "you decide". Another asked me if he should start the letter with a To and end it with a yours sincerely. Then came one who asked me with the tiredeness of an 80 yr old, if he has to go all the way to the post office to get stamps for his post card, to which I said "please turn the card over, it has a stamp on it", the grin that followed was the most sheepish I have seen in a long time and like that wasn't enough, the neighbour was thrilled to discover that there was a number on it too, but he was unsure if that worked as well as a stamp! The best however was saved for the last. This child looked perplexed because she had bought only envelopes. I assumed her dilemma was when and how to get the stamps, but turns out her dilemma was how to use the envelopes. I suggested that she write the letters in plain paper and put them inside the envelopes, to which she pointed at a dozen post-cards and with utter relief said "how about I write on these and put them inside the envelopes?"
In all sincerity, I did not know how to react, so all I said was "why use both, when either serves the purpose"
The lunch break was much needed after all that had presented itself. However, what I overheard in the corridor made me want to yell with joy, because I heard a student showing his letters and the sheet with the circles and telling his friends from another class "dude, she is playing with our emotions"! I suppressed my laughter and walked away, only to be reminded of the name of the unit 'play and invent'.
Just when I thought the drama was over and being the smart kids that they are, I thought they knew what was to follow, they took me by surprise even then. When i declared that they had to post these letters to the people concerned, the collective gasp that ran through the class was truly amusing. I heard things like "no way", "i would have written it differently if I knew I had to send them out", "its all politically incorrect stuff", "the people will wonder if I am on drugs if I send them a letter", "I have emotional stuff in there, how can I possibly send it"....so on and so forth!
I even asked them how this was so difficult, despite the fact that they had chosen the people to write to from the closest circles on the paper, that they had drafted out themselves. That, left them a little bewildered I think, because they didn't know why?
In all this, I was left wondering, what this experience meant to them.
Was it the patience it took to write with one's hand that was painful, was it the unhindered, unpublicized, uncontrived one-on-one acknowledgement of the people that you think you are connected to ever so much through social media or was it the fear of being ridiculed for connecting with a medium that to them is obsolete and hence useless?
I don't know!
While the computers and laptops have made writing easier, have humans forgotten to use their hands to leave marks in ways that are unique to them?
The postcards and inland letters had only so much space, but we wrote what we wanted to as crisply as possible and yet always managed to get the important news across lands and seas. Have humans forgotten to identify the truly 'important' in a bid to voice and express ourselves endlessly.
Social media has allowed us to locate people from all walks of not just our lives but others too and has made our web of connections so widespread. Yet, why is it so difficult to identify 10 people in our lives that we are truly connected to, not my blood but by other means.
What makes it so difficult to hold on to a piece of information for more than a few micro seconds or wait for something to unfold/unravel in its due time?
What is 'due time' for anything in today's time?
As always, I had some plans in place and a lot of it kept elastic for good measure.
Unlike other times, this time, I have deliberately decided to operate differently, call it an educator's experiment if you will! Not just with the kind fo content that is delivered, but also the way in which it unfolds in small packets, each different from another, beating my obsession for an otherwise incremental and almost logical progression of content and learning outcomes.
So, the plan for yesterday was to work with memories and connections. As a part of which, the students were asked to create concentric circles of proximity of the people they felt connected to in various degrees, them being at the centre of the circle. I tried hard to ignore questions like "can it be a pet, because I can't think of people" or "can it be a character and not a real person" etc.
Following this, they were to make a trip to the nearby post office. I say nearby because 2kms to a lot of us is walking distance, but to all 16 students, it was a cab/auto-rickshaw distance, which I discovered upon their return!
What follows is a series of conversations and discussions that took place once they came back.
I was ever so slightly disheartened when I asked them what the interactions were like at the post office and they said it was 'normal' and nothing worth talking about. I would imagine that the person at the counter would show some signs of astonishment at the sight of a dozen teenagers asking for 10post-cards / inland letters each in this day and age, where every bit of communication is literally at your fingertips!
Turns out, no one had really noticed the people across the counters.
Then I asked them if any of them had bought stamps along with the post cards and inland letters and turns out some of them gasped, ofcourse without realising that both, the postcards and inland letters actually had pre-printed stamps carrying currencies on them! I never intended it to be a trick question, but turns out it became one!
Thereafter, I asked them to write letters to the people that they had listed, but as though they were 10yr, 30yr, 50yr olds.
What followed was a volley of questions that to me were unfathomable and I was definitely not prepared for. One asked me, which side he should write on, to which I smiled and said "you decide". Another asked me if he should start the letter with a To and end it with a yours sincerely. Then came one who asked me with the tiredeness of an 80 yr old, if he has to go all the way to the post office to get stamps for his post card, to which I said "please turn the card over, it has a stamp on it", the grin that followed was the most sheepish I have seen in a long time and like that wasn't enough, the neighbour was thrilled to discover that there was a number on it too, but he was unsure if that worked as well as a stamp! The best however was saved for the last. This child looked perplexed because she had bought only envelopes. I assumed her dilemma was when and how to get the stamps, but turns out her dilemma was how to use the envelopes. I suggested that she write the letters in plain paper and put them inside the envelopes, to which she pointed at a dozen post-cards and with utter relief said "how about I write on these and put them inside the envelopes?"
In all sincerity, I did not know how to react, so all I said was "why use both, when either serves the purpose"
The lunch break was much needed after all that had presented itself. However, what I overheard in the corridor made me want to yell with joy, because I heard a student showing his letters and the sheet with the circles and telling his friends from another class "dude, she is playing with our emotions"! I suppressed my laughter and walked away, only to be reminded of the name of the unit 'play and invent'.
Just when I thought the drama was over and being the smart kids that they are, I thought they knew what was to follow, they took me by surprise even then. When i declared that they had to post these letters to the people concerned, the collective gasp that ran through the class was truly amusing. I heard things like "no way", "i would have written it differently if I knew I had to send them out", "its all politically incorrect stuff", "the people will wonder if I am on drugs if I send them a letter", "I have emotional stuff in there, how can I possibly send it"....so on and so forth!
I even asked them how this was so difficult, despite the fact that they had chosen the people to write to from the closest circles on the paper, that they had drafted out themselves. That, left them a little bewildered I think, because they didn't know why?
In all this, I was left wondering, what this experience meant to them.
Was it the patience it took to write with one's hand that was painful, was it the unhindered, unpublicized, uncontrived one-on-one acknowledgement of the people that you think you are connected to ever so much through social media or was it the fear of being ridiculed for connecting with a medium that to them is obsolete and hence useless?
I don't know!
While the computers and laptops have made writing easier, have humans forgotten to use their hands to leave marks in ways that are unique to them?
The postcards and inland letters had only so much space, but we wrote what we wanted to as crisply as possible and yet always managed to get the important news across lands and seas. Have humans forgotten to identify the truly 'important' in a bid to voice and express ourselves endlessly.
Social media has allowed us to locate people from all walks of not just our lives but others too and has made our web of connections so widespread. Yet, why is it so difficult to identify 10 people in our lives that we are truly connected to, not my blood but by other means.
What makes it so difficult to hold on to a piece of information for more than a few micro seconds or wait for something to unfold/unravel in its due time?
What is 'due time' for anything in today's time?
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