But despite sending them to good schools and providing them with well-versed teachers, it isn’t always the case that the kids come out with flying colours. And there can be many reasons for this.

In many cases, I have noticed that there exists a discrepancy between the academic environment at home and school. While children might get good academic exposure in school, it’s not always the case that they find the same environment back home. In school, they’re taught by good teachers who instill love for knowledge and good values in them. But at home, they’re forced to confront their parents who are either too tired to teach them after a day-long work, or lack enough knowledge to do so. Hence, they suffer from what can be called as the lack of proper role models. And this, in turn, can have an adverse, long-term effect on their future.

The other reason, also the one that we complain about so frequently, has to do with the method of learning that is so popular in our culture: rote learning. Despite being discarded in the West long ago, the method still flourishes in a

country like ours, where learning by heart and mugging things up is the shorthand for education.

Things like children’s strengths and weaknesses and their preferred ways of learning are hardly even brought into question while teaching them. All that they are expected to do is mug up their texts and vomit them all out during exam. If our learning method doesn’t progress from this, I doubt if we are going to produce any world-renowned scholars in the future.

Along with this come the interests and preferences that all kids have. Both parents and teachers must keep in mind that every child has a hidden potential in one discipline or the other. A child might be good at maths and weak in language and literature, or he might be a good artist but a miserable maths student. So, they must make sure that their ward gets the right environment to develop his interests and learn more about the subject of his choice.

In the world that we live in, it isn’t necessary for a kid to become a doctor or a scientist to be regarded as a successful person. All he needs to do to be successful is to do better than the others in the discipline of his interest. Success will come following him. And for this to happen, it’s imperative that a child’s desires and interests be respected and nurtured.

Along with nurturing children’s interests and providing them with adequate attention and good environment to learn and grow, they must also be provided with goals. A person can achieve nothing in life without having a goal. And it’s better if a person learns to have an aim right from his childhood. So, it is important for parents to teach their kids how to dream big and work hard for it.

Last but not the least, we all must keep in mind that money doesn’t always dictate the quality of education that children receive. It isn’t always the case that expensive schools produce best minds. It doesn’t always happen that costly schools have the best faculty and environment necessary for the growth and development of the children. So please, let us end this rat race of competing for a place in expensive institutions.

Ktuwal is doing her BSc from Tri Chandra Multiple College