Friday, April 18, 2014

Q for Questioning - Within and Outside

Analysis and questioning – these are two aspects for an open mind and it has to start from one’s within. While second-guessing your own self on a continuous basis may not be good for the confidence, it is indeed needed to put a mirror in front of you and face a tough question or two to stay on course.

Outside - in quite a few situations, we just accept things lying down with a mindset that there won’t or can’t be any change by raising any voice or question.  Someone somewhere might gather courage to stand up against the atrocities and things might get changed. We, then, would end up thinking that we also thought about it but did not do anything to effect the change. A feeling of guilt encompasses but, it is too late, by then.
The point I am raising here is twofold. 

First, regarding the parenting and education system, do we really encourage our children to analyze and ask questions? It has been often seen that a question is not appreciated at home or by the teachers and an environment gets created where children just listen, and learn by rote.  There is hardly any effort to spark the light in their mind to analyze and ask – in the process, making them ready for future where they are required to address the unknowns faced in life. As we cannot make them prepared beforehand to face each and every situation in life, inculcating this ability is very important for them to confront the world on their own. I am not generalizing all parents, teachers and institutions here but hope you would agree that this is not very uncommon.

Secondly, it is related to standing up against the issues in our professional or social circles and even in the four corners of our home. While it is true we are forced to ignore a lot of misdeeds done to us or to the system, with a fear for life or name of ours and our near and dear ones, there are cases where we should have taken steps but just gave it a pass. There are ample cases where we just close our eyes without raising a single question and accept the things as it is. Can we not come out of shell and take small steps to change the course in such cases?

I do agree that people who have tread these steps, have paid the price with their lives. None of us have forgotten the whistle-blowing cases in relation to construction work for golden quadrilateral project in Uttar Pradesh. The brave man who could muster courage to raise his voice against malpractices was ruthlessly killed. While the Indian Government has decided to act on this by passing an act to protect such whistle-blowers, we do not feel safe and shy away from such scenarios. Knowing fully well the repercussions, yes, we need to have the line drawn in a pragmatic way and ask questions before leaving everything only to fate. 

18 comments:

  1. A very relevant and important post! I have seen people dodging the questions by children due to lack of interest or tiredness. This way a kid's curious mind doesn't get oxygen (answers to their questions). Also it hampers the creativity of a kid due to discouragement.
    Also on the other hand we pass on the issues, we don't question the authorities, and then we blame the system! We need to work, put efforts before leaving everything to fate!

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  2. Asking questions bring understanding.

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  3. I have a litmus test that I use with students in my class that tells me the comfort level they have when it comes to speaking up and raising an opinion with me. That test occurs each morning as they children enter the school. If I have created a learning environment that encourages students to put forth an idea or to respectfully question an idea of mine then, they will enter in the morning saying, "Mr. MacInnes, I have an idea for what we can do today!" If I have not created such a learning environment, those same students will enter my classroom and passively turn to me and ask, "What are we doing today, Mr. MacInnes?" No teacher worth their salt should ever give the impression that they are the only person in the classroom with an opinion worth stating or an idea worth exploring. When everyone feels able to contribute ideas and suggestions, we all benefit. :)

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    1. Dear Tom, World needs many more teachers like you and am sure they are there...Thanks for sharing this.

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  4. Jayant, it is very true that to save embarrassment and awkwardness we evade questions which we are shy of, be it at home, at work place or among friends.

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    1. Thanks, Ushaji, for your comments. Let's try to change the situation :-).

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  5. This is the second post I am reading today on questioning, enjoyed the post, thanks for sharing ! let us encourage ourselves and our children to question before we blindly accept anything ...

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  6. A very relevant post today, Jayanta. Yes we need to practice and encourage the art of questioning and independent thinking. There is way too much passive acceptance of a lot of nonsense, especially in our middle class India, I think. I am not talking of big stuff like accepting corruption and social inequalities, etc. Even at our most ordinary day-to-day life level we have forgotten to question why we do things the way we do or why we don't do certain things....the change might have to start with that elementary level of life and living. I don't know, I am just thinking aloud here. Also appreciate reading Tom's views here - the test he speaks of makes very good sense to me!
    Incidentally I too wrote about Questioning today :)

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    1. Dear Beloo, I think you are very correct. It has to start from elementary level and get into a habit of clear , independent thinking...

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  7. Great post on Questioning Jayanta, thought provoking as always...and I agree esp with children and growing inquisitive minds... it is best to almost always try and answer their questions or postpone the discussion to a time when one is not tired and then answer. Enjoyed reading the other's comments on your post too :)

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  8. Balanced post and detailed explanation on manipulations and office politics. Yes! We need to take a stand and it's a question of personal ethics where we just doesn't stand for ourselves but for the person being harmed. Of course, we pay a price but we can do it in a smart way. I believe in principles of justice and it's a topic that is very current in a corrupt system where the weak have an upper hand in terms of decision making.

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    1. Dear Vishal, Thanks for visiting my post and your comments. Much appreciated. Yes, I do agree, the stand is for person being harmed - be it us or someone else. It should never be only for us. Thanks again.

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  9. Questions always enhance knowledge, but asking the right questions is also an art we need to master. Right ?

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    1. Yes, very right. We should encourage them to analyze, questions will flow from there.

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  10. We as individual teachers may do what we may, but as a system we do not benchmark against best practices in the world.

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  11. Questioning always doesn't give us answers but it always opens the road to learn , to seek. We've a tendency to avoid questions on topics with which we're uncomfortable ...but I think we should show more patience and composure...
    A thought-provoking post Jayanta..

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