Chennai
While some parents stand in long queues to seek admission in good schools for their children, there are others who have opted to home-school.
Karthi Sekar’s daughters, 10 and five years old, have a packed schedule every day. Apart from studying, they attend a host of classes, including gymnastics and athletics. He is looking forward to admitting in pottery classes as well. There is only one thing different about them. They don’t go to school; they get their education at home.
Home schooling as a concept is extremely popular abroad and it’s slowly catching up in the city. In fact, there is a Facebook page called The Chennai Homeschoolers that has parents who follow this form of education.
Karthi, an entrepreneur, points out the flaws in the Indian education system where it is just about books and very little about life skills. “In schools, we often see that it is all about marks and children are forced to be part of the rat race. The individuality of a child gets lost. I wanted my children to find their passion, hone their talents and pursue a career in it,” says Karthi, who swears never to send his children to a school.
Educationist K.R. Maalathi, says, “It’s usually the third or fourth-generation, educated parents who are opting for this education system. In fact, there are many centres that help students write the 10th and 12th board exams privately.”
Home schooling was earlier only associated with kids with special needs but the trend is slowly changing. Vidya Shankar, founder of Cascade Family Learning Cooperative, realised the need for a system that encouraged holistic development of a child when her children were not happy in school. “I took my son out and put him in an alternative school, where many children had a learning disability. Though my son had no such problems, I put him there for a different learning experience. The problem started when my daughter finished class 10. A studious girl, she wanted to pursue her core subjects. She wanted to understand the subjects at her own pace, but the school was in a rush to finish the course. There were no alternative options,” says Vidya, who then thought of creating an alternative space for students to learn. In 2011, she started Cascade FLC, a private, family membership-based Montessori resource centre under the aegis of the Relief Foundation, with a vision to be an ideal model of education where parents are aware and participating in the process of education for life for their children. Here children are engaged in a variety of activities by AMI-certified Pre-primary (36) and Elementary (6-12) teachers who guide the class through materials and experiments. Classes are conducted with flexible timings for children to attend sessions four to five times a week.
One may argue that a child may miss out on overall development if deprived from the school atmosphere. To that, Karthi says, “In school, kids get to interact with peers from the same age and social background. However, through different classes they attend, children have an opportunity to interact with a range of other kids. They become more aware about diversity.”
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