Nurturing Curiosity in a Distracted World: The Little Girl at the Window
[August 2024 Vol 46]
One of the recommendations for this month at the book club that I am a part of was “Totto Chan: The Girl at the Window”. While I initially almost dismissed it as a “children’s” book, I am glad I decided to lay aside my reservations and just dig into it! Written by Tetsuko Kuroyanagi, the book is a delightful read and describes the adventures of Totto Chan, a little girl growing up in Japan in the 1940s.
This heart-warming childhood memoir describes the unconventional education that Kuroyanagi received at Tomoe Gakuen, a Tokyo elementary school, founded by the visionary educator Sosaku Kobayashi before World War II.
Image courtesy: Wikipedia
Totto Chan’s school was one where the classrooms were old railroad carriages. The unconventional education here included allowing children to learn music notes by scribbling on the floor, assigning each child their “own” tree in the school premises and encouraging them to learn to climb their tree, and inspiring them to bring food from home in a lunch box that contained ‘something from the mountains and something from the seas’, a way of saying that their lunches should contain both seafood, and vegetables or poultry etc.
There is the beautiful and endearing innocence of childhood that runs through the length of the book. A school where each child’s natural exuberance is celebrated, the school’s irrepressible headmaster tells his children what they must fear the most is….
“Having eyes but not seeing beauty; having ears but not hearing music; having minds, but not perceiving the truth; having hearts that are never moved and therefore never set on fire. These are the things to fear”.
This book offers a refreshing perspective on learning and allowing children’s potential to blossom in an environment that nurtures their curiosity and individuality…
Mastering focussed learning amidst distractions
Cut to the present – the world we inhabit now is a far cry from Totto Chan’s idyllic and quaint world of learning.
Our present world demands that we learn continuously in order to keep up with the rapid and at times, dizzying pace of innovation and advancement in all spheres. And yet, how do we effectively focus and sustain our learning with the constant disruptions in the form of notifications, pings and algorithmically-optimised content that is delivered through our smartphones and other devices?
Read our blog to understand how you could not just get on but also thrive on the learning bandwagon at a pace that is convenient with small, easy-to-digest chunks of content.
Ramp up your cybersecurity efforts
Learning is a lifelong pursuit and picking up new skills and knowledge helps us reach our full potential and adapt to a changing world. Keeping our mission – Skill a Million – in mind, Adeptic, one of the sponsors, is participating in the Agamya Cyber Tech Conference being held at Hubballi on August 31st and 1st September 2024.
Our team will be running a workshop on Business Continuity Planning and Disaster Recovery as well as moderating a panel discussion on Building Cybersecurity Workforce for Industry: Skills, Roles and Competencies in Enterprise Cybersecurity. Do join us if you can and click here to find more details.
Till next time,
- Tara Chacko
Key Account Manager