Learning Netwrok conference

This december I got a chance to attend a conference on learning . Nearly 95 people attended the conference from all over India. People who are doing different kinds of work related to education were present. The questions raised and discussed were something like :

• How do you teach maths?
• How should language be taught?
• Role of Arts and crafts in curriculum?
• Relevance of Social Science in our curriculum( today's text books.)
  
• The way science should be taught in schools
• Adivasi education
• Role of different organisations in bringing a change in main stream education
• Why alternative education ?
  
• Exams and their significance , their impact on children.
• Understanding children behaviour
• Probing the children with the right questions. Questioning as an important part of class room interactions.

The energy was enormous and the passion with which people were doing their job was contagious. All these was being thought, worked and addressed by NGO's in rural setups. Looks like we should start sending our children to schools in these setups where the teachers and the organisations is thinking beyond he present day setup of main stream education. People who are involved in this network are thinking seriously about education and what it means to them.

Today our current main streams are very busy producing machines than human beings" thats what they are saying. Our main stream schools are getting our children ready with one particular skill. But is that enough? Do you call that education for which we are paying nearly a lakh per annum. What is that you want the schools to be doing ? Somewhere we have lost the whole purpose of education.
I feel its time we stop and assess what is the role of we parents in this? Are we questioning the school authority or are we equally ignorant and pushing our children into running this marathon. Very serious question to be asked by every parent today.