Parwarish started a 3 months,
pre-service teachers’ certification program at Haldwani, Uttrakhand under the
aegis of Ray Foundation in November 2016. The aim of this
training is to empower the teachers in nurturing No-limitness of students.The program also finds a mention
on official website of Uttarakhand's Directorate of Higher Education. Here, a team member shares her experience of leading the programme.
THE BEGINNING
Precisely
6 days into training. 8th day since the time I moved to Haldwani…
does anything seem to be different? Does anything seem to be changed?
A
decision taken approximately 3 months back- ‘lets open a teachers training
institute somewhere outside Delhi’. Reaction from the team was like - ‘extremely
excited’.
Next
question- who will be the one leaving everything back home and going to stay
there in the foothills of Nainital and lead the Program? Not to forget-
‘starting from the scratch’?
Answer-
Nupur/ Sushant!
Reasons-
Sushant because he is the Director of Parwarish
Nupur,
because she remains keen and eager to go out, travel and pick up something new.
What else, it defines her completely! It brings the best out of her! That’s
what she is!
While
still being on my Euro trip, I get a confirmation message from Sushant, saying-
“So should I say a yes for October 20th?”
I was still confused. As much excited as I was earlier; this question really
required some serious thinking from my end. My mind suddenly became skeptic and
wanted to play safe! It felt like buying some more time and suddenly I found
myself replying- “lemme come back and
have a serious discussion with my peeps back home”. Heart in heart I knew
that they have no say in this! If I decide that I want to go out, stay there
and lead this program, I will eventually end up doing it!
One
of the biggest problems in being able to understand and articulate your
feelings so well is that then your inner voice doesn’t let it die! You are so
damn clear about your fears and what is stopping you, that it then just doesn’t
let you be maintaining your peace and being in your own comfort zone! Then it
becomes that big red bug with black polka dots that do not let you sleep. The
questions that kept on haunting me throughout were something like these:
“Nupur, you know you want to go, then what are you stopping yourself from in
saying a yes to the project?’ “Nupur, don’t act such a coward! Go and take it
up”, “Nupur, you know you will enjoy it immensely and you will cry your heart
out if someone else goes and you sit here doing the usual/ regular stuff! You
are going and saying a yes to it tomorrow!”
The
result- as much as I resisted myself, but I eventually found myself packing for
boarding the train to Haldwani on 4th Nov’2016!
Coming
here and setting it up in the 1st place was never easy! With pictures
and imaginations of a beautiful small apartment with 2 separate rooms and a
nice small balcony; I had pushed myself already to move forward for a new life
for at least 3 months. Leaving friends and family back; I prayed to reach on
time for catching the train as I had almost missed it! Reached the station at
4:05, were as the train was scheduled to reach at 4pm. With the train coming in
late at the platform; it made me almost sure that this project has to start
with you Nupur, with you being the main lead!
Reaching
Haldwani shattered not only dreams for a great place to stay, but it also let
me down in terms of the arrangements made there. Apart from the 2 beds, the
house also offered us with 2 guests- these were 2 girls who were supposed to be
our participants from the next day onwards! We had nothing else to sustain
ourselves with.
Next
day had to start with leading the 1st batch of TTI Haldwani; and a night before
we were looking at how to sustain ourselves with the minimum amounts of means
to survive the night to be able to lead the next day!
The
day started with a bang! We met 14 people. They had everything different! The
way they looked, the way they dressed, the way they spoke… I think I was ready
for facing a different world out here, but I dint imagine it would be so
different! As we proceeded with our day 1, with rounds of introductions and
activities to make them a part of the program and owning it up; my fears and
apprehensions of how will I be able to lead the program went on increasing!
Sushant
was expected to leave the next day. My apprehensions were so great that I
wanted him to stay here like forever. I wanted him to lead on the 2nd
day as well. However, he made a wise decision to stay aside and not come in
when I was leading…and I managed my way through on 2nd day of
leading as well
How
is the group? Eager, keen, enthusiastic bunch of people from Haldwani who have
joined and are looking forward to become great teachers. Meritoriously, they
are B.Ed, but due to some gaps these people are without jobs.
I
was completely uncertain about how to take them forward on day 1. I shared my
apprehensions with my team. With no background of speaking English, many of
them having no experiences in teaching; my biggest apprehension was- “Will they
be able to think through? Will they be able to see the importance of building connect
with children? Or will they just be pushing me ahead with – we want you to tell
us which teaching aids to use and don’t give us all this which is
‘non-teaching’!”
ANOTHER DAY…
The
situation really got heated up between 2 participants- A and B today. (names
hidden for confidentiality)
I
wanted to resolve it, but I was held back by something: Is it the right time to
do it? As I thought it will be best resolved by ‘Working out Together’ (WOT) exercise.
However,
the situation became really tough today.
More
than anything else, I was upset. Upset about why did this fight had to happen?
Now this will ruin my plan of doing WOT with the group! Yes!! That’s me! I was
thinking about ‘Bloody hell, any which way I am too wary of doing WOT with any
group; and now this would be too difficult to do within the group: and that too
with the 2 most amazingly different leading participants of the group! Ms. A and Ms. B! ( names hidden for confidentiality)
The
point is not about how I would want to define each one of them. But it’s about how
their heated arguments disrupted my plans about WOT! Aaahhhh...I felt like crying over there! Now I
am at my wits end! The trainer side of me tells me that this needs to be
resolved in a proper manner and it also tells me how this needs to be done at
the earliest. On the same hand, I have to make them complete the understanding of
VARK learning styles (another concept), then take them to ownership. I had
planned to then take it to the resolving the timing issues and the issues with
leaves, using the WOT model. But now what!!!
The
trainer side of me can also envisage what will happen when I will ask them to
come in the front to talk about it. The kinds of resistance that I would have
to face from both of them. How will I make them reach the exact problem? B will
become too defensive and will not open up! All of these are my huge assumptions
about them! Yes they are but then, isn’t it also coming from my experiences
with them? Yes of course!
Aaarrgghh...the
point is I am too afraid that I will not be able to either resolve their issue,
nor will I be able to make the class understand WOT in the best possible
manner! Putting at stake class’s understanding of WOT at the cost of solving
their problem- which apparently none of them wanted to resolve? Moreover, what
about resolving the timing issues using WOT?
Anyway,
planning the way ahead is the only thing of sanity left. So let me start doing
it from tomorrow. I will have to pick it up from somewhere! After all the
trainer within me is too strong to let me take it as a failure already, without
even giving it a try! As I addressed in the class, these emotions and reactions
had already started coming up against each other in the class, but were
somewhere very under the surface. The exercise today, blew it up! So, let me
take it as an opportunity and bring all the emotions up and give my class the
ways to handle such problems, even when they themselves will face all of this
being the class teachers.
Also,
I have to focus upon how important is a person doing all the earlier concepts,
that have really built a rock-solid base for people to take a stand for
resolving all these issues. Will really have to see how A picks it up, even
without the base work.
You
know at these times, what is the best 1 liner that I like saying to myself?
‘YOU CAN DO IT NUPUR!’
Experiencing the process of science in one of the session
Written By Nupur Mahajan, Parwarish
Experiencing the process of science in one of the session
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