As a follow-up to a roundtable involving faculty members of District Institute of Education (DIET) and Training and Block Resource Teacher Educators (BRTEs), the Department of Women’s Studies, Bharathidasan University, conducted a day-long consultative workshop for preparing training modules on “developing positive discipline on social equity” under the aegis of Sarva Siksha Abhiyan on Tuesday.
Participants in the consultative workshop constituted 50 primary and upper primary children of Syed Murtuza Government Higher School in the morning session and teachers and BRTEs of Tiruchi, Ariyalur, and Thanjavur districts in the afternoon session.
Teachers working in management schools, faculty members of DIET, scholars of Women’s Studies Department, and college faculty members specialising on social equality took part and contributed inputs for the modules.
N. Manimekalai, Professor, Department of Women’s Studies, explained how development of positive discipline in children would help build a healthy society.
Children should be equipped to understand the politics of discrimination and unequal power relationship in a patriarchal, capitalist, and feudal set up.
Students expressed their desire for affectionate treatment, and extra care for slow learners among them. They called upon teachers to desist from engaging students for their personal works. They wanted the burden of weighty bags to be reduced and requested for clean and safe drinking water and proper sanitation.
Teachers empathised with students, and acknowledged the need to promote positive thinking among children through yoga and meditation, alongside fulfilling their basic needs. They suggested that there must be specific modules for mentally challenged children and those affected by domestic turmoil in families. Parents must be involved in the exercise, the teachers said.
S. Saravanan, Assistant Programme Officer, presided over the programme.
S. Sivakumar, Senior Lecturer, DIET, oriented the participants on the guidelines.
