Ms. Latha Karri
Founder Principal – Shantiniketan International School

Case 1:
A grade 2 student was brought to me as mother had burnt his arm. The child got all the boils on the arm and was unable to stay at school. He was trained to answer with the script given by the parent. The child started crying when enquired and said the truth. The mother was called and counseled for the deed. She agreed that she did this act as he didn’t fair well in the past exam and wanted him to do well that day.

Case 2: 
A grade 9 child was suddenly confiscated with all the gadgets at home, and wasn’t allowed to talk to her friends over phone once back from school. Parents say throughout the day the child was at school, why again she has to spend time talking to her friends at home. They wanted her to be on her own once back home. They assume their friends will spoil her.  Two different incidents (in fact many more spine-chilling stories surfaced out often), parental expectations are beyond students’ capacity or understanding.

We all need to understand that today’s children are different from a decade ago. We see innumerable changes in their behavioral and emotional upbringing.

For the majority of students today, more than grades or marks skills are equally important. These skills enable them to think beyond the sky. The young entrepreneurs in their early 20’s are setting up the best example of skills acquired during their schooling.

Leaving the toppers, who are just 8 to 10%, remaining 90% of the students, who are average or above average fair, equally good and even sometimes highly successful in life. Marks and grades are just a matter of standardisation or setting up the benchmarks. It actually helps the child to excel and shine to reach the nearest target according to many factors.

Many factors like home environment, parents support, siblings, peers, school, teachers, friends, age, emotions, hormones, social media, gadgets, etc matters a lot in the child’s growth. The more happy and wise a child is, more focus is attained. This eventually helps in scores.

Parents must trust their kids. This magically transforms them from nothing to something. And from something to everything.

Train students to have a proper study plan added with skills. Let’s not expect from them. Let us coach them. Let’s create a stress free happy gen next. 

A child’s memory is strong with their childhood, between 6 to 12 years. Give them blissful and everlasting memories. It’s in our hand’s dear parents. Happy parenting!

Note: Above two incidents are addressed and a proper counselling is given to parents.