Delving into the depths of a child’s being

A highly informative and analytical panel discussion on child behaviour and inclusivity during the critical school years was held on Saturday afternoon at The Circle: Caring For Children – a therapy centre for children suffering from autism, hearing & speech impairment and other learning disorders.

The panel discussion was on the very important subject of whether inclusive education – that is, putting children with special needs in regular schools with regular children – was a panacea or not a perfect “fit all” solution.

The discussion also evaluated if our teachers and school system were equipped to balance the differing needs of these two different types of children.

The distinguished panel comprised Judith Bradshaw, principal of the Pathways British School, who brings with her 35 years of experience in inclusive education; Dr Rubina Sial, a psychiatrist with over 28 years of experience working with children and adults with various neurological disorders; and Dr Tania Nadeem, assistant professor in the Department of Psychiatry at the Aga Khan University Hospital and a diplomate in child and adolescent psychiatry.

Starting off the discussion, Dr Tania Nadeem said: “We don’t have a good schooling system. If a child is behaving in an odd way, my job is to tell the parents that he’s not doing so on purpose.”

She said it was incumbent on us to determine the strengths in the child’s personality and focus on these, adding that they might be totally outside the academic sphere.

“You may have a child who’s unhappy, and if not understood by parents or teachers, his future may be marred for life. We should make sure that the child doesn’t lose self-esteem. Socialising is equally important.”

Dr Rubina Sial said: “Our concept of success is purely academically oriented. Parents are on edge trying their level best to see to it that their children get good grades at school, as at the back of their minds is the goal of the child getting a plum job after he’s through with his studies, economic compulsions being the main factor.”

She said parents just did not realise that the child’s genius might be in some other direction, that he might have talents that were not academically oriented.

In the US, they have different sets of programmes, and it is determined by teachers and parents as to which of these sets would be most applicable to the child’s genius, she added.

Judith Bradshaw said: “We need special institutes to develop a child’s inherent skills, by working together, playing together. We should see to it that the child does not feel isolated.”

She said that all children were anxious to learn and were supportive, adding that parents and teachers must talk things over with the children. “If we can make the generation more tolerant and respectful, we’ll be doing the children a mighty service.”

The discussion among the three panellists was followed by an animated question-answer session, as most of the participants were teachers or parents of school-going children. Many parents had their personal problems involving their children.

Referring to Judith’s assertion about making the generation more tolerant and respectful, a questioner asked if that could be possible where authoritarianism was the collective mindset rather than tolerance, where in the classrooms children were socially divided on the basis of their parents’ social standing, where, in the true capitalist tradition, children from affluent backgrounds looked upon the not-so-affluent children with disdain.

Judith agreed in principle that it was difficult, but since there were a whole lot of participants from the so-called elite, there was disagreement too. The consensus at the end of the programme was that the community had a vital role to play in this regard.