learnings

As a teacher and Counsellor I have had many students come up to me to share their feelings and thoughts. As parents the only thing we can and should offer is a safe home- emotionally safe ( I am not getting into personal/physical safety). A home where children feel emotionally secure, a home where they WANT to go back to....This is the simplest but most difficult to accomplish. Are we being 'open' to our children? Are we ready to 'accept' them as separate entities? Are we giving them love with 'no strings attached'? Are we just 'listening' to them? Are we even 'seeing' them? Are we 'caring' ? Children don't need your gifts. They need You. In several instance when homes aren't such safe havens, the next place is the school. Are schools i.e teachers equipped to bring about an atmosphere of happiness, caring, acceptance and love? Can we make our schools at least  a safe haven? 

After a long hiatus I return. I had vowed to myself that I would merely gloss over the newspaper to avoid the anger and depression that well in me on reading in detail! Yet I couldn't help reading 2 articles relating to the CALLOUSNESS of the teachers concerned. Article 1: In Srinagar a young boy of 17/18  years committed suicide. Reason? he had failed in his favourite subject. On revaluation it was found that he had actually topped the class. Yes the boy should not have taken this path. He should have /could have... But then is it also not the responsibility of the evaluator? Should not the evaluating teacher be concerned and cautious of the papers he or she is evaluating. If we know someone is failing can we not take a few moments to cross check if we have missed out/ evaluated properly/ check if we can give some grace marks??? Cannot we teachers be more humane while correcting papers/tests? If the student has not attempted answers or has done it very badly then it is underst