Battling mindsets.

So the 4th grade class teacher, who had been on sick leave for a while, returned to school at the end of September. One day, she decided to drop by her classroom as I taught. She offered to write for me on the board and I tell her that first I need to explain the concept to the students and she looked at me like I was nuts and went, 'Why bother with THAT?'
I had to tell her that is the way we teach in our classes and she said OK. I revised what the kids had learned previously about flowers and then went on to describe seed germination to them. The kids were behaving amazingly well that day thanks to the presence of their old teacher and I was really enjoying teaching for the first time in days!

Towards the end of my class, this mother of one of the kids walks into the classroom as I'm winding up checking my kids' classwork and can't see where her son is seated so she loudly calls out his name. She spots him then asks him if he found his notebook. He says no and the mother starts going on about how it is the Pathan kids that steal stuff and how the teacher and the principal should take responsibility for this. The Pathan students' sentiments are set ablaze and they turn on her and start defending themselves by saying they lose their notebooks all the time but they never say that the 'Mohajir' or the 'Sindhis'/'Saraikis' stole them. And hence my class turns into a war zone, with kids being rude to the parent and the parent ignoring my requests to leave the classroom. That day the class was going so well and then this happened. Discrimination on the basis of race is really an issue here and racist comments that lead to verbal and physical assault are quite the norm. I feel this is a really important area we as fellows need to work on, to teach them to ignore their differences and be united as one. This hate can spiral out of control and can spawn for generations. If we manage to stop it here and now, my what a difference we’ll be making!

Children also have a tendency to make fun of others just because of the way they are. If someone is a garbage picker, he's made fun of. If someone can't comprehend Urdu, he's made fun of. If someone draws poorly or makes a mistake, he's made fun of. Recently I heard a couple of children making fun of a pair of brothers who are learning to work as tailors. And that got me to think back to the educational story I had written before our training had begun. I had written about how it peeved me when people thought of a particular profession as lowly just because it didn't pay well or just because it is considered to be 'corrupt'. But then such professions have a very important role in our lives. What would we do without tailors? Without cooks, the police, the teachers, the taxi drivers? As long as one is earning through legit means and is working honestly, then why should it matter what profession he's in? I hope to be able to inculcate a sense of respect for all professions in my students by the end of the fellowship. They must not grow up to chase money.