Jaidip, Parent Parents and teachers getting together to talk about a common concern: the child. At school, at home and in the wider world. The hope being that, together, one arrives at some measure of insight into the Childs life, which could help everyone. How then, should we as parents approach these meetings?   I would think that objectivity and a certain absence of identification with the child would be very important. An ability to see ‘a’child and not’My’child. We have just been to the meeting and I’m sad to say the above is much easier said than done.   I was frankly astonished at the extent of my perception of Sagar as an extension of myself. To say I preened every time I thought of an observation as ‘positive’ and was pretty downcast (or felt argumentative) when the opposite happened would not be entirely untrue. In short: Sagar was Me. Does it not then follow that I was talking about myself most of the time and not about Sagar at all?   If one says that the be...

Viji and Kumaran   This is Viji & Kumaran (parents of Tejasvi & Srishti), and this is our roller-coaster experience over the last week.  Over the last few weeks the excitement level kept going up for Tejasvi, who was getting more excited and animated whenever she talked about her school excursion to Sahyadri.  She told her awe-stuck friends at home that she is going for one week [yes, ONE WEEK] to Sahyadri.  Sure, unlike her seven year old [kid] friends, she is SEVEN years old, and, yes, it is normal that she goes on week long trips.  Not that she knew where Sahyadri was, but she knew that it entailed a train ride with her class mates, and she knew that it meant no amma or appa to nag for a sometime.  Overall it sounded like a happy proposition…  Srishti was in a dilemma - the norm demanded that she follow the suit and insist that she goes as well; but she was not up to staying without amma and appa for any length of time (nagging or not), but more importantly, she was down...