School Students

TRANSCEND MEMBERS, 29 Jul 2024

Dr. Ravi P. Bhatia – TRANSCEND Media Service

I live in a Colony in Delhi  that is nearby a market with its few shops. It is also near a government school . Students often come to a spot near my colony after their school is over and enjoy their freedom for some time — maybe an hour or so before catching a bus that goes to or near their homes. The buses are not school buses — just ordinary buses that ply on the roads in different directions of the city of Delhi where I live.

The school is co-educational — boys and girls study in the same school.  The students are required to wear school dress — blue shirts and white pants for boys; the dress is usually called salwaar – kameez for girl students.

Since the school is near my home,  I go and talk to some students who come out of their schools after the school is over and enjoy themselves — their freedom for an hour or so before catching the buses that go to or near their homes. The buses are government buses and one has to buy tickets after getting into them . The tickets are generally very cheap and often girls don’t have to pay anything to travel in the various buses.

Certain schools which are generally expensive in terms of fees charged by them, have their own school buses but I am referring only to ordinary schools who don’t have their own fleet of buses. The latter are government schools which don’t need to charge expensive fees from students. These schools get infrastructural support from the government in various ways, so they need to charge only moderate  fees from students.

While waiting for buses to take  students home, students  enjoy themselves by talking to each other or sometimes even singing a song or two in their bland voices. There is no fixed menu while waiting.

I often go near the students and talk to them. I ask them what class they are studying and what subjects they like or find difficult . The students are generally quite frank in admitting that they don’t like certain subjects — Maths or English etc. Perhaps the teachers teaching these subjects don’t come down to the level that makes their learning interesting.

Sometimes I try to teach a few topics to students on the road itself. I think that students enjoy themselves when I teach them — it is a novelty for them.

I enjoy sharing a topic or two that can be taught without any blackboard  or any special equipment that is available  only in a laboratory .

Teaching some topics to students in this manner, is interesting for them and also for me.

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Dr Ravi P Bhatia is a member of the TRANSCEND Network for Peace Development Environment, an educationist, Gandhian scholar and peace researcher. Retired professor, Delhi University. His new book, A Garland of Ideas—Gandhian, Religious, Educational, Environmental was published recently in Delhi. ravipbhatia@gmail.com

This article originally appeared on Transcend Media Service (TMS) on 29 Jul 2024.

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One Response to “School Students”

  1. Deep Mathur says:

    Good write up on a nice topic based on personal experience written in a lucid and easy flowing style.
    I hope to read in coming write up about what students feel about current status of things as they perceive.

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