When the lockdown started last year and the main park in the locality was closed, we wandered to the end of our small township in Assam and my kids discovered bamboo scaffolding, possibly used for tents in better days. For the next 15 days, they would go there every day and climb the structure—sometimes, even foraging for wood apples from a nearby tree. With our three kids in the house—eight-year-old daughter and five year-old twin sons—there is never a lack of bizarre ideas for self-entertainment. The lockdown meant that house-helps were not allowed. The kids were told to help clean up. The elder one assumed the role of Cinderalla, touching the floor just so lightly with her broom and the younger ones ran trains in the room with their wet ‘pocha’. This would infuriate my adult mind that just wanted to get over with the job. But leisure is a hallmark of their lives. Pursuing things at their own pace, undisturbed by the hustle and bustle around them. Over the years, we parents have recognised leisure as a privilege few can afford in the present day and have come to relish these fursat ke raat din.
My kids are learning without school—there is no curriculum that educates them, they themselves do. The common term used for this is homeschooling, but there are as many approaches to it as the number of people practicing it. When we first thought of not sending our kids to school, two things strengthened our resolve—nurturing the children in freedom and their happiness in the present moment—not in some distant future where it depends on the money they earn. An externally imposed routine by the school would mean rushing them into things from morning till night, with little option to wake up at 3 am to watch a meteor shower or to spend hours collecting tamarind from a nearby tree. And then make tamarind candies or a jungle jalebi smoothie.
My daughter was two-and-a-half years old when the pressure to send her to school started building up. I saw kids going to school in a diaper and wondered how a child not yet ready to express her bodily needs will cope in an unknown environment. Education of alphabets and craft activities seemed useless and overburdening at a stage when all a child wanted was free play. Academics did worry us over a period of time, especially when we compared our children to the ones going to school so we placed a stack of books and educative games in the house, only to see it gathering dust. Of course, we would read to them every night. Academics began for my daughter, then six, only when she felt the need for it. She wanted to read a story and asked her grandmother to identify some alphabets. The curiosity of the written word led her to start reading three languages within a year.
My sons have still not felt that need. Their need, instead, is to reach that mango on the tree without getting stung by red ants. And the focus when they try to fit their tiny feet in the small crevices of the trunk tells me that they are getting a master class in botany, zoology and logistical thinking, all combined. One cannot divide life into subjects—it is holistic and inter-related. Learning is like breathing for children, unconsciously happening all the time, especially when they play. I relate it just a tad bit to the team-building games and outdoor activities at corporate hangouts. Management gurus have realised that even grown-ups learn through play.
Lockdown has changed things, though I secretly feel relieved that it did not impact our daily family rhythm. The hobby classes that my daughter went to have now become virtual. But that has only come with more choices, from various dance forms to theatre and sign language, everything is online, something that staying in a village, we could not access earlier. That reminds me of a third motive that pushed us towards homeschooling: survival skills. And Covid cemented for us the importance of staying close to nature, grow our own food and survive in minimal resources. So we traded a salary for a slowed down life in the village. Homeschooling definitely became a precursor to this decision. And now there is a lot of fursat to live in the moment.
