Thursday 29 June 2017

What Should be the Real Concern...By Neha Khanna, Teacher, Sunbeam School Lahartara, Varanasi

                                         What Should be the Real Concern...

Einstein said "It is the supreme art of the teacher to awaken joy in creative expression and knowledge". Years ago, Einstein, an intellectual genius, had beautifully expressed his thoughts with such simplicity that somehow seems to be obsolete in the ever so fast moving world of today.

                  The tech savvy generation of the present world spends each day in the struggle of keeping pace with the swift changes that affect their world every now and then. The ones who are most affected by the changes in the face of education are the parents, and even teachers, who still live with their individual experiences and struggles of their student lives. They often develop certain inhibitions towards the increasing complexities of the education system and start bombarding their children with advice, suggestions, warnings etc. which eventually do more harm than good to them as it keeps adding on to the pressure on the children. Each step taken by the anxious parents act as bricks that build the humongous structure of pressure on the young impressionable minds.

                   The focus these days seem to be only on the marks and results of the students. In this process the students fail to enjoy the most endearing part of their education - the student life. We must have heard it before that the journey is more important than the destination. But we completely seem to ignore it when it comes to a child's educational journey. The fixation with the end results and the numbers reflected on the report card is so strong that it completely overpowers our moral reasoning.

                   Sadly enough, in the present educational system numbers seem to define and certify a child's capabilities. This clearly explains the obsession of the parents as well as the students with the results. It's high time we sit and ponder over what  will actually matter in the long run. Is it the numbers on the report card or the true qualities of a child that will make him/her a successful and more importantly a HAPPY person.
                  Our respected Prime Minister had rightly said "Never let the child in you die". But the question that we need to ask ourselves is "Are we taking away the childhood from our children?" Hope we all are in a position to give a confident NO as a reply to this question.


Monday 19 June 2017

Getting on with Life Once a TV Series Ends by Aditi Agarwal, Student, Eco (H), Kamla Nehru College, DU

Getting on with Life Once a TV Series Ends 

When you invest hours upon hours in a story, the characters, the relationships, and the emotions, you form an attachment to that TV series. Watching it and waiting to watch it becomes a habit you can't seem to shake off. You think about what happened in the last episode you watched when you wake up and you wonder about what will happen next when you go to bed. You start breathing, living, and dreaming in the world of those beloved characters. You obsess and you want to get to the end. But when you do, it hits you like a sledgehammer.
It's not easy to move on from the life you had experienced alongside your own. It was as if it's yours, too. You were with them right there on the island, too. So, how to get out of the funk and get on with your life when it's ended?

Here are 5 ways how...

1. START WATCHING A NEW SERIES.

Well, isn't that the most obvious option? To stop obsessing over one thing, and to start obsessing over something else. As simple as that. Not exactly healthy. But, well, a person in need got to do what they got to do.

2. WRITE AND SCRAPBOOK.

Get it out, darling. Whatever it is that comes to your head when you think of it, write it down in a separate notebook/ scrapbook. Paste pictures, and little trinkets that remind you of that favorite scene, write stuff about characters and write about your opinions on a particular twist that the new season brought about. And once you have it all poured over the pages, make a time capsule and put the notebook away for next, say, 2 years. You will reminisce and be so damn happy when you get to see it again.

3. START A FANBLOG.

It's the new cool. People love to find people with similar interests. Write reviews of episodes, your opinions about different relationships throughout the series, how it could have turned out better, how it couldn't have been any better, characters and their lives, the actors and their lives...blog it out of your system.

 4. START YOUR OWN RANGE OF MEMORABILIA MERCHANDISE.
If you have the funds and the time, you can start your own range of merchandise dedicated to the series. This will engage your creative sides and will make the ideas swirling inside your head a beautiful reality. This will get you to stop going crazy and will be like a productive transformation of the series in your life. Not to mention, you will make money out of it.
Who doesn't want an amazing pendant, or ring, or keychain, or mugs, or tee-shirts which reminds them of their beloved series?

5. REWATCH.

Rewatch the whole series again. Maybe then you will get over it and stop obsessing. When it becomes predictable and not so wonderful anymore, maybe it won't be that great for you. Maybe you will realize that all it was meant for was 2 reruns and now it's time to move on.
 Getting over something isn't easy. It takes time and patience. A TV series is nothing different. So, try to get over it, do stuff that might help, but if you aren't able to move on, maybe you aren't meant to. Not yet.

(NOTE: This isn't only about moving on from a TV series. These steps can be followed to get over anything. If it's a relationship --with friends, with family, whatever --maybe you got to start trying. Or, maybe not. It's your call. Take your time. With a little improvising these steps can be used to get over anything in life. All you need is patience. And, a little faith.)