An Audacious Teacher

[Music]

i

am an audacious teacher i am audacious

because

i dare to teach in a class filled with

fun

i dare to teach children to question and

imagine

i impart fair and equal education

and above all i dare to love all my

students how could i do that

a girl who dropped out of college

because she was just

too bored to study who left her answer

papers blank

in spite of knowing everything

how could i manage all this

years after school and college beauty

pageants

films theaters and super successful

sitcoms later

the dropout decided to study again

i was 38 married with two sons

i think it was the desperation that

moved me

to become a teacher i saw chaos around

me

children suffering in the name of

schooling and education

children suffering because of the lack

of schooling and education

and i audaciously decided

to reduce the chaos

i decided to teach them all

i am probably the only educator

that has taught children from preschool

all the way

up to postgraduates probably the only

teacher

who is taught in government schools in

elite schools

taught children with schools and without

schools

how do i do that what do i do i teach

life skill education life skills

through drama the same curriculum

i use the same curriculum for little

children

in preschools and the same one for young

adults in post graduates

i use the same curriculum for government

schools

elite schools rural

urban the same curriculum

what exactly is it it’s art

in education but first let’s try to

understand

education education to me is

making strong and accurate decisions

to problem solve using creative and

critical thinking

understanding and managing emotions

help us to take correct decisions

this aids to a better understanding of

self

it empowers us and makes us more

empathetic

the cumulative effect is it helps us to

thrive as a society

i think this is education that makes

some sense

because i believe life is the real

school of learning

my instinct and my imagination is

really strong it helps me with my

lessons

my theories my classes

but i never leave it at the level of

intuition

i never leave my lessons just there

the great uh swedish director igmar

bergman

once said that he never argues with his

intuition but having said that he

doesn’t leave it at that level

he follows it up intellectually

you must go deep dark into the woods

where intuitions javelin has landed

and i do just that i go on foot to where

my

intuitions javelin has landed and that’s

what changes

knowing to understanding

art imagination and life skill

can make possible personal change

personal transformation

i have a story to tell you about a

little girl called sonal

she was studying in the kgbv kgb

or kasturba gandhi bali

are a scheme made by the government of

india

for girls between the age of 10 to 16.

these girls come from economical and

social backward circumstances

they suffer demons like gender disparity

poverty and lack of good education

lack of good education and unequal

education

is an unrelenting problem that

vulnerable and marginalized suffer

these girls experienced just that

sonal was 14 in grade 8 when i met her

she and 30 girls were participants in

the workshop called

drama and education to enhance life

skills

they learned life skills education

through

crazy drama games reflective diary

writing

reflections in the classroom

storytelling

listening to stories

they learned problem solving they

learned decision making

they learned to communicate effectively

and they had

so much fun learning

but they learned life skills really well

five years later i got a call from sonal

she wanted to share her story miss

after i left the workshop i participated

in vacher gujarat

gujarat’s reading program and i won

books worth 10 000 rupees

and i read them all

when i went from the kgpv i left them

behind

left them behind i asked why

she said man you taught me the skill of

empathy

my dear student sonal left her

prized collections of book behind so

that another sonal

could read them wow

and she continued you know man in our

community

girls are married off after the ninth

grade they’re not allowed to study ahead

and my parents wanted to do just that

and i was desperate i begged

i pleaded and then i used all the life

skills you taught me

problem solving decision making

effective communication

and finally my parents agreed

today i am in the science stream i’m

going to apply for medicine

ma’am you taught me to dream

this is one story and there are others

like the cute little rag picker on the

streets of

ahmedabad who re-learned how to read and

write

just because he wanted to learn the new

poem that was being taught in the drama

class

the little girl in the cotton fields of

ahmedabad oh sorry

on the on the cotton fields of amravati

she had never attended school yet

she could clearly and explicitly

explain the meaning of social

imagination she said

it means samaj

that is how society should be

and that naughty little goat heard in

nandurbar

who found a reason to learn and attended

classes

regularly just to participate in the

crazy drama claims that we played in the

class

these are some and there are many more

but along with the learning and

transformation of my students

there’s an important aspect of my

learning and transformation

because i was never merely an onlooker

as my life skills matured so did i

but the journey has not been easy beer

rejection

because i’m not a regular teacher she’s

an actor

how can she teach what does she know

being sneered at dismissals rejections

knockbacks because i come from a

privileged family

sometimes by the system sometimes by my

students

i remember once i traveled nine and a

half hours to interior maharashtra

only to learn that the participants of

my workshop

merely wanted to be photographed with me

and then

they plan to send me back to the big

city i came from

how dare she try to teach us

and often it is how can there be any

learning in a class that’s filled with

fun

so much noise in a classroom and to top

it all

she loves her students how is it

possible

the system doesn’t like audacious

teachers

luckily the students do but i have

persistence

and through this act of persistence i’ve

changed i’ve transformed

personal transformation for me is

very deep it is

about when an individual critically

examines their beliefs their values

their actions

takes risks and reinvents themselves

transformation is the domain of

improving

of changing of

bringing about personal change

looking at oneself

undoing warped views of the world

unfolding like a butterfly

and all the time remembering the

personal commitment

made towards creating a better society

thank you

you