Saturday 1 September 2012

Spelling, that difficult thing!

I spent a year in the village of Nerur, a fertile little place on the banks of ‘Aganda-Kaveri’. The year: 1923 - 1924.

This tiny hamlet contained one little school, run by the village Panchayath.

My father, learned man that he was, wanted to initiate me into the world of formal schooling. I was to be inserted into the 3rd class directly.
My admission though was rather funny, as always, at my expense.

The teacher there wanted to test my language skills prior admission.

He dictated then, those two Tamil words, ‘naaku’ and ‘mooku’ ('tongue' and 'nose'). I promptly wrote down, ‘nakku’ and ‘mukku’ ('lick' & 'pant').
This somehow seemed to satisfy him. I had after all shortened those words effectively and the new words weren’t entirely alien!
He graciously placed me into the 3rd class, trusting that I would learn, since I was already over aged!!


Looking back, maybe it does not matter at all how a child studies that young. We all learn, eventually.

1 comment:

  1. Every now and then, there is this argument at home about what academic performance our 6 year old son needs to display to be successful in life. I say it is experiences in life and learning to effectively handle those experiences that makes a person better and successful and not the years we spend getting those fancy degrees. I completely agree to your final statement, Sir. "We all learn, eventually"

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