Unity & Caring - Super7 BHIS

UNITY IS STRENGTH

Unity is a significant feature of human life. Without unity, we cannot go through a single day. Unity has a great value in every walk of life. Unity is essential to save any country and its countrymen.  People can enjoy a tension free life if they are united with the values and outlook of society. It is thus said, 'United we stand, divided we fall’. It is true that we can break a single stick easily. On the other hand, breaking a bundle of sticks is really difficult or impossible.

When work is done in a unified manner for obtaining a common goal, the participants develop a special relationship among themselves - they demonstrate unity. A pertinent example will be our group - Super7.  Many of us joined as complete strangers but as the sessions move forward we are working together and moving towards the common goal of internalising the necessary values.

Once there was a CCA class for basketball. A new coach had joined the school on that day and it was his first class. There is a child in my class with special needs and she had opted for basketball. For some reason, she wasn’t able to communicate with the coach what she wanted. She felt shy to talk to a coach about her own needs. She had a specific problem and wanted to take rest on that day. The other children in my class came together leaving their match and conveyed to the coach about the child’s need. The coach then understood and the smile on the child’s face was commendable. This shows there is unity in the whole class and the care was also not missed for each other. Caring for and helping other people is driven by deep value-based motivations and concerns to make a positive and practical difference to the lives of other people. Caring can take many forms. At home, it might involve being a parent or looking after an elderly, sick, disabled or needy member of the family. Outside the family it might involve voluntary work in all sorts of organisations that help particular groups of people, for example, befriending the elderly, providing home help or gardening, tutoring school children etc.

Caring allows an individual to connect with others, respecting human dignity and responding with compassion. Actively listening and being emotionally present, as well as providing support for important aspects of caring relationships. I had one special child in my class. He was a mild autistic child. A shadow teacher always accompanied him. We wanted him to become independent. He used to do most things independently but whenever he wanted to go to the washroom he needed shadow teacher’s support. We wanted to remove his anxiety so we had decided that we will try to send him alone to the washroom. We will just keep an eye on him. So one day I purposely sent the shadow teacher out from the class. During recess, I asked him to go to the washroom. He was searching for his teacher, but I forced him to go alone. Suddenly Kewal, one boy from the class came to me and said, “Teacher I will go with him, How would he go alone’’? All other students were also ready to go with him but no one wanted him to go alone. I was surprised and felt proud that whatever we taught them in the class about helping and caring for others, they are following that. I could see emotional attachment and caring nature in all the children. Care or concern automatically become an inherent part of the teaching-learning process. Teachers continue to try endlessly only because they care. Students listen to us because they can feel our concern. As a teacher, it's our responsibility not only to address the academic need of a child but also to help him enhance his overall personality. To be able to do so, teachers need to know their learners well which can be achieved through patient listening. Teachers need to be good listeners and sharp observers. It is also important for teachers to be able to demonstrate the feeling of compassion. We need to treat each child with respect and provide constructive criticism. Even while reprimanding a child, we need to demonstrate our concern. Only then will a child realize the mistake and strive to mend his ways. Care is generated by the way we act toward every student, in class. Care comes when a student sees you treat a difficult student with compassion, courtesy and kindness - particularly at the most difficult of times. Teachers genuinely care about their students as they come into the classroom with very different circumstances. Knowing about those will help make the learning experience much more successful. Unity in a class gives students courage, power and strength. We can see unity in the classroom when students work together in order to complete the target, some students create groups so that they can help each other in studies as unity always supports and helps. If students work alone there can be chances that people get defeated, but if they work as a team chances of success increases as they come up with creativity.

Super 7 @ Billabong High International School, Thane -Sayantani Mukherjee, Dimple Awasthi, Ritu Chitnis, Manjusha Saji, Jyoti Ramdhave, Vijaylaxmi Ramesh & Sumati Muthukumar