Should one suffer to become knowledgeable, hate school and teachers? In our society, the process of learning is thought to be “something to be learned with fear, and pain”.

Because, there’s a common tendency to believe that “whatever is difficult or painful is valuable”. The “No pain, No gain” a tendency is pronounced in the academia. So the teacher is made out to be someone to be afraid of.

Imagine the pain inside the heads of the school children who were recently thrashed by a school teacher!

Traditionally, we believe children

to be the potter’s clay. We force them

to endure our harsh imposition.

We want them to listen in silence

under strict orders. We have a

design set up and try to mould

them the way we want to. Unlike our traditional perceptions, Abraham Maslow says: ‘The child is to be

regarded not as clay to be shaped,

but as a living organism that must, in its own way, become fully human.’ Maslow couldn’t have said it any better. Nor is Francois Rabelais’s assertion: ‘A child is not a vase to

be filled but a fire to be kindled,’ more relevant to any other society.

There’s no doubt that discipline is required in educational houses. Sometimes things don’t easily come and there’ll be times when long and hard work inside and outside classroom is necessary to teach and to learn in a serious way.

Yet, evidence exists that whatever is pleasurable has a powerful lure of its own. Had it been wrong, the great poet Rabinadranath Tagore wouldn’t have said knowledge expands in his poetry where the mind is without fear.’

Fear, among many other factors, is one that slows many aspects of cognitive development, keeps the desire sealed, so if any guidance or teaching is to be successful, the learners’ intelligence must be quickened supported fully by a good and favorable environment. Or else, this desired end is unlikely to be achieved with force robbing all that is subtle.

It’s therefore very important that every child has to feel nurtured, supported, and encouraged to get his/her confidence boosted to take all challenges in their stride. The result: academic skills are strengthened and a stronger character becomes the wealth. So, let the mould be pliant.