Plight of Indian Mom

(Declaration – This is not serious medical literature. Please do not read further if you lack sense of humour or if you are of sensitive disposition. You WILL be offended.)

In most middle class and upper middle class families, a strange thing happens as soon as a woman gets pregnant – Like baby turtles emerging from underground nest on a full moon night, grandparents are born with this news of pregnancy! Grandmother, who till now, was lost in her addiction of afternoon TV, suddenly springs into action, forgets everything about her creaking knees, heart trouble, migraine, etc. and prepares for a complete takeover of life of a young woman whose only real fault is that she let her family know about pregnancy.

Grand journey of helplessness for poor mother starts here. As her parents, parents-in-law and everyone who was ever pregnant in last hundred years, start to insinuate in her most precious, personal experience.

In the most cases the mother-to-be, is so shocked by this onslaught of concerned relatives that she loses will to control her body, mind, clothes, food, body-functions, baby and husband. As pregnancy advances, so does the takeover of mother’s life. She is brain washed into believing that pregnancy is a massive undertaking and without active management skills of all these people, she will do something seriously harmful to the baby and future of mankind.

Towards end of pregnancy, this takeover is complete. This chubby, rotund, waddling woman, who until recently was a capable, lovely, young person becomes a distant (and substantially more rounded) shadow of her former confident self. In Indian sub-continent, very few women, if at all, can go back to their pre-pregnancy state of being.

If any humiliation was remaining, it is completed with actual birth of the baby. (Let’s assume that it is a baby boy as chance of a girl being born is quite slim, thanks to prenatal sonography.) Senior members now start doling out their “expert advice” on everything related to baby. Their most powerful tools are mother’s natural concern for welfare of her baby and her fatigue that is also a natural consequence of labour, feeding, eating and sleepless nights.

In the name of “helping young and inexperienced mother”, baby is taken away from her for most of his waking hours. There is always someone available to take the baby away as soon as he is awake, playful, smiling, quiet or mildly irritated. As soon as the baby is really cranky, sleepy or asleep, he is handed back to mother. As mother’s quality bonding time with baby is completely destroyed, she gradually starts to believe that this baby is a big mistake and coping with demands of motherhood is beyond her healthy human capacity. She starts living in terror of this infant tyrant and is more than willing to give up the baby to grandparents and wants to return to her safe and familiar zone of office work (this
transition coupled with drying up of breast milk under stress, marks end of maternity leave in India).

Further complications are directly proportional to the “help” offered by family members to real parents. In last decade, with ease of telecommunication, mothers cannot escape this torment even if they are on a different continent.

In fact living in western countries worsens mother’s difficulties. Matter of fact approach to pregnancy, so main stream in west, really scares them. No weekly doctor’s visits, no fortnightly sonographies, no doctor at the end of phone line to explain every ache, pain and missed heartbeat, nothing like how it is “back home”. This is very scary for middle class Indian family (“no wonder these people have so few kids, nobody cares for mother and baby in this country!”) On top of that, grandparents extend their stay to maximum limit allowed by visa regulations. If they cannot stay on, then, skype calls many times a day to “their” grandchild! I don’t think that anybody expected this out of increased life expectancy, affluence and telecom revolution!

Back to India, net result of this mostly good intentioned but deadly hijack is that there are multiple parent figures with conflicting set of parenting ideas. As real parents look for solace at workplace, child is gradually left without any one being in charge for real. This vacuum in parent authority is filled up by child’s desire to control his life.

Real parents, specially mothers, continue to feel increasingly helpless in front of this all powerful and precious child. She oscillates between desire to take control (expressed as anger outbursts and emotional blackmail) and helplessness ( expressed as permissive, tired parenting and “children now-a-days are too much…”). This is fertile ground to breed all sorts of behavioural issues starting at home and
spilling over at school and social spheres. As child becomes more difficult to connect with, parents start feeling even more helpless and look for
professional help. Severe emotional and marital disturbance emerges and depression, etc. is not far behind. In a culture where your child’s position vis-a-vis his peers defines your identity, this is a real breaking point.

Helping families at this point is a real challenge. Main task is to help parents feel confident enough to re-develop parent-child relationship. Invitation to participate in Family therapy can be extended to grandparents also. Re-alignment of common and age appropriate family goals are possible if parents are willing treat this “infant terrible” as per his real age.  It takes at least six months to get this train back on the track.

Fortunately, if parents can see this problem as emotional struggle of their evolving family then corrective steps are possible. When parents show courage to do what is right, happy ending is almost always possible. What else do you expect for people brought up on Bollywood?

(P.S. – you may be surprised and ask, “where is father of the child when all this is happening to his beloved wife and child?” I share your surprise.

Reality of Learning by Rote

“Rote learning” has been bedrock of Indian teaching method since ancient times. A person blurting out passages from ancient texts was held in high esteem by the so called higher casts. In days before printing reached India, there was no way to access the knowledge other than storing it in your head, to be retrieved on demand.

I grew up in Nashik, a small town famous for its place in Ramayan. Every year, on the banks of river Godawari, there was a contest to recite various ancient shlokas and sutras. A panel of near senile, overweight and Dhoti clad men asked contestants to start reciting from any word that came to their mind and to contestant being able match his memory to their whims would be winner. I can imagine a few hundred generations doing exactly the same thing as pursuit of “knowledge”.

In contrast there are thousands of stories in ancient literature of such “knowledgeable” men falling prey to simplest tasks in life and often unable to save their own life. All these stories insist that “Wisdom” and “application of knowledge” is always more valued than being a mere “data bank”.

Lord Macaulay was looking for this dumbing down when he planned his infamous mass education system for India. And most of us are still victims of this “data bank” kind of education. A lot of schools still insist that students reproduce answers in exactly the same sequence of words as prescribed by textbooks.

Now there is this universal protest in more enlightened homes against forcing kids to learn by rote. I was asked this question by Dr. Venkat Panchgnula, an eminent scientist at National Chemical Laboratory, Pune. (Venkat does not agree with the “eminent” bit, so I will keep it for sake of controversy, after all what is a blog without controversy?)

Venkat’s daughter’s school has prescribed learning tables (up to 10, i think). He asked – “school teacher wants rote learning of tables. First occasion in my daughter’s schooling where rote learning is expected. I have encouraged concept learning so far, is it worth standing my ground or not? I am letting kid decide what she is comfortable with. Obviously, she is not comfortable with memorizing tables.”

Venkat is not alone this dilemma. Most sensitive and intelligent parents feel same.

My answer is –

Dear Venkat,

Rote learning is a tricky thing. There are certain data that need to be available to us “in a flash”. This saves on precious brain recourse of processing speed and time, e.g. – name, address, phone no. , passwords, etc. thousands of things. We memorize these things as we go along in life. We go on accumulating this “unconscious learning” thru our life. Even kinetic memory like walking, cycling, swimming, touch typing, etc is rote memory of muscles!

Tables are no different. In fact all kids should memorize 30 by 15 tables if possible. Our senior generation, they knew tables of 0.5, 0.75, 1.25! This facilitates higher learning in math. Without number tables, math can become a laborious, tiring exercise. It is one of the fundamental skills to learn math. You can compare it to learning atomic symbols and basic formulae.

So let your daughter learn tables by heart, it will give huge dividends very soon.

Best Wishes,

-Bhooshan

P.S. – I am completely against rote learning of concepts. Everything that can be understood must be understood and not learned by rote. You will agree that there is nothing to understand in tables. It is just data that should be conveniently available at the fingertips (like anniversaries and birthdays)

Within a day, my thoughts were challenged by my friends Amit Paranjape and (Dr.) Navin Kabra. Both insisted that though it helps a great deal to remember tables, there is no need to learn tables beyond 10! You can learn to use various multiplication tricks to come up with necessary answers. When Amit and Navin say these kind of things, I have to take notice as they both got into IIT, Mumbai ( it was IIT, Bombay then) and Navin did that without attending coaching classes ! (Amit also insists that learning tricks of multiplication is not to everyone’s liking in such cases tables should be learned by rote)

So my suggestion is that you must learn tables up to 10. And then try to learn multiplication tricks. If you realize that you cannot use these tricks with required speed, you have options

  • Learn tables by rote
  • Do not attempt IIT entrance exam
  • Learn to use calculator
  • Become an artist.

Navin suggested two books that propelled him towards math (by his own admission, he was “weak” in math till 8th STD!)

  • Figuring, the Joy of Numbers by Shakuntala Devi
  • Figures for Fun by Yakov Perelman.

Both are available for Rs. 100 or less, each, on Flipkart.

So like all good questions Venkat’s queston raised more issues than it solved. I like that. That is how we learn and grow and have fun with little bit of rote on the way.

Inside the Mind of a Creative Genius

Today was a very special day for
me. I got a chance to spend almost three hours with a great music composer,
Rahul Ranade (www.rahulranade.com).

 

Rahul is best known for his music but he has acted, directed and created in marathi and hindi. He is one of the founders of GRIPS theatre in India.

After composing music for
countless plays, films, serials and even political campaigns, Rahul continues
to enjoy music like a child in a sweet shop – amused, thrilled, fascinated and
intensely in love with music. I feel Rahul is at his best when he writes
melancholic music and also when he lets loose his natural flamboyance and writes
riotous, joyous music.

He talked about the kind of music
I like to listen to, helped me choose music and suggested what I should
experiment with. It was a fascinating experience. I felt like I was given the
key to Alibaba’s cave and could experience the wealth!

As it often happens, our
discussion turned towards his creative process and Rahul told me about how he
has changed as a composer since the first time he wrote music (he was 16
then!). He is composing for thirty years now and still enjoys it every bit.

When he started, it was all
analog music where, every music player, every piece of machinery and intimate
mechanical knowledge were vital for creating music. Now it is all digital and
with one machine, he can create whatever he wants to! It is fantastic to be
able to create all by yourself with the help of a machine.

I am impressed by Rahul’s ability
and willingness to keep learning this huge change in technology and use it
positively. I have heard stories about brilliant music artists unable to adjust
with this change and being sidelined and almost starving. Rahul knows quite a
few of them and agrees that if one cannot change with the flow, it is all over!

This brings home two important
points for me as a parent and human being-

1. Change is perpetual. I must
inculcate the capacity to flow and bend and grow with my environment. If my
education does not help me to learn this process of learning, it is useless
education.

2. Human brain has great
plasticity at all ages and we can learn throughout life. This is opposite of
what is told to you by phony parenting coaches – human brain grows till age of
five so cram in everything till then. This is a marketing gimmick to fool you
into buying their brain stimulation products. Creative and happy people like Rahul
will tell you that when you follow your heart’s direction and your natural
talent, learning becomes a part of you and you continue to grow without realizing
it.

 

Another thing that Rahul talked
about was his pattern of taking a day or two off every week and spending it
listening to music, watching movies or doing things that give him tranquility. This
means he gets away from excessive stimulation and gives his creativity a
chance. This is exactly what I have tried to convey in my previous blog on
creativity. This ability to spend unstructured time is the most valuable human
ability and it is mother of all human genius.

 

I came away feeling blessed and
happy. Music has a quality to make you feel emotional and because of Rahul and
his music this became a very intense experience helping me to explore more
corners of my mind that are inaccessible to words!

Creativity

One Step Solution to
Creativity…….and Boredom

“The Spontaneous
overflow of powerful emotions recollected in tranquillity” is what
William Wordsworth said about poetry.

Creativity does not get
any better than composing a poem. It involves deep processing of a
thought, experience and emotion and its expression in such a way that
it not only strikes a cord in the reader but does it in a musical
melodious way..

Most creativity actually
fulfils all these criteria of beauty and usefulness.

And as it happens with
most important things in life, creativity is a much abused word. You
hear it spread across billboards, advertisements, boardrooms, school
classrooms even coaching classes !

I have attended some
talks and workshops on creativity, read a lot of stuff about it and
talked to many creative people in various walks of life like science,
sports, music, arts and cinema, business, homemaking, medicine even
accountants ! There is a lot written about this process of creativity
by some poets and authors. To name a few in my mother tongue,
Marathi, – Pu La Deshpande, Padgaonkar, Shantabai Shelke and of
course “poet” Borkar ( Bakibab). Even companies like Google do a
lot of creativity facilitation in their workplaces and have developed
strategies for it.

What I present now is a
synthesis of all this with special attention to our children-

Creative process has a
few pre-conditions. It requires gathering of information,
experimental data, processing time, uncritical environment where
these experiments can be discussed – a good sounding board and
freedom to do all this- autonomy !

Processing this further,
I have realized that it requires-

  1. A long process of
    just looking around, exploring, thinking, gradually getting curious
    about something and exploring it further.

  2. During these
    explorations the child must have the freedom to experiment, break
    things, use them in a non-conventional way. – Autonomy

  3. Show this off to
    interested people and soak in their admiration and encouragement.

  4. Continue this
    process over and over again….infinite number of times….develop
    this into a lifelong habit.

You must have realised
quickly that this a long process and it is not outcome oriented but
process oriented. So it will take lot of time and space. Immediate
outcomes will be focussed attention, curiosity, exclusion of
distractions, enthusiasm, happiness and creative frustration. Long
term outcomes are – an active mind that looks at the world in a
curious way and finds normal life experiences exciting. This mind can
look for unusual solution to common problems and simple solutions to
complicated issues, a process of innovation. This mind will have a
very high frustration tolerance and low need for superficial
excitement.

This will require time
and one most important thing –

when we think, mull over
things and let our mental processes work, we need peace – from our
eyes and ears – visual and auditory stimulation, if it happens
early on in the creative process, will destroy the process. Familiar
music does not have destructive influence but rapid changing visuals
are very destructive. All creative people have repeated this many
times – they need time away from passive visual stimulation like
TV, video games, internet,etc. This kind of visual stimulation takes
up huge amount of procession space in brain and suspends everything
else. Imagine a child watching TV and you have an example of what I
am trying to express.

This does not mean that
children should sit with closed eyes, it means that kids should have
quiet time away from rapidly changing visuals. Looking out of the
window, just staring at something absent-mindedly of listening to
familiar music while going about experimenting with things provides
just the right kind soothing trance that a creative process needs. It
is bit like meditation, you give your mind a nonsensical, low
stimulation toy to play with repeatedly so that large part of your
brain can be protected from distractions and go to work on creative
processes.

Now back to the problem
of real life and our kids-

some steps that I can
think of-

  1. From earliest days
    of life, leave kids alone to play. They are not our toys and source
    of entertainment. Let them get used to spending time by themselves,
    preferably alone in the room or if that is not feasible then with
    non-intruding adult in the same room. Babies as young as 10 days can
    spend up to 30 Min playing by themselves, if allowed by adults.

  2. Do not instruct
    children on “proper” way of playing. If you stop instructing,
    they will use the same play material in may different ways to
    generate many plays.

  3. Let them tell you
    stories and tales without interruption, instructions and do not get
    too curious about themes in their mind. Even violent and destructive
    fantasies are healthy and necessary.

  4. Take them on walks
    whenever you can. Just let them run around, explore and ask
    questions without bombarding them with “knowledge”.

  5. When they come up
    with solutions to their problems, let them try out, even if you
    totally disagree with the solution. This will help them develop a
    self evaluation process – most important skill in life.

As you can see, this will
not increase your child’s marks in exam but it will make them
independent thinkers, courageous solution finders and will help them
live a life that is not filled with need of constant stimulation,
novelty. Their idea of having a good time will extend beyond visiting
malls and playing computer games.

( This piece of writing
was inspired by a you tube video (
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6XAPnuFjJc )suggested by my creative
businessman friend Ameya Navathe. I also found some inspiration from
a book “A Good Enough Parent” by Bruno Bettelheim.)

Basic Rules of Discipline

Recently I read a book – “Supernanny” by Jo Frost.

Jo Frost did a great show on Channel Four in the UK few years ago. I happend to see it and was impressed by her warm yet no nonsense approach to disciplining kids.

You should buy her book if you are one of the troubled parent. But remember, badly behaved children mostly are oucome of some issue in parenting, so be prepared to look at yourself and other adults in the house before you point a finger at kids.

 

Here is a summary of Jo’s ten golden rules as given in her book – SUPERNANNY

 

Top
Ten Rules

By
Jo
Frost,
Supernanny

  1. PRAISE
    AND REWARD

Praise
and positive reinforcement are important when it comes to teaching
social skills. Notice good behaviour. Don’t use toys as a treat on a
regular basis.

  1. CONSISTENCY

Don’t
change or make up rules as you go along. Follow through and make sure
your partner backs you up. Constantly reinforce important rules, like
those about crossing the road safely.

  1. ROUTINE

Build
time into schedule for play, indoors and out. Vary play activities
and have special treats or games up your sleeve for days when it is
not possible to go out. Try to get outdoors as much as possible to
let children blow off steam.

  1. BOUNDARIES

Be
clear abut your rules and what you expect in terms of behaviour. Set
limits on TV watching. Teach respect for possessions by keeping chaos
under control. Don’t give into whining and whingeing.

  1. DISCIPLINE

Use
time out / naughty step technique for unacceptable behaviour like
fighting and aggression.

  1. WARNINGS

Give
warnings about what is happening next so that your child can prepare.
Don’t interrupt play suddenly and expect your child to move smoothly
onto the next activity. Give warning before disciplining so that
child can correct behaviour himself.

  1. EXPLANATIONS

Show
and tell your child how you expect him to behave when it comes to
“grey areas”. Always talk over the reason behind fears and give
plenty of assurance. Teach your children how to play games and how to
play with toys.

  1. RESTRAINTS

Don’t
buy your child the entire content of the toy shop. Improvised toys
are just as much fun. Practise toy rotation so that everything’s not
out at once. Take control of TV and monitor what your children are
watching.

  1. RESPONSIBILITY

Teach
your children how to share and take turns. Don’t always hover over
your kids when they play. Use involvement technique for shopping and
other times when you need to be busy.

  1. RELAXATION

Enjoy
your children. Get involved in their play and let then direct it.
Cuddle up with them and read them a story.