Teachers:Lisbeth
by Author::Lisbeth, September 2015
Center School
I arrived in Auroville in 1971 and as I had no children of my own yet and we were fully involved first in Silence (now Bharat Nivas campus) and later in the first settlement in Kottakarai – with tree planting, farming and handicrafts – my interest in schools in Auroville wasn't yet awakened. We lived a hard-working, simple, collective farmer’s life: sharing meals, resources and the care of small children. It wasn't until 1976 when my oldest child was 3 and I was pregnant with my second child that a small Kindergarten in Center Field was opened. We called it Entity::Center School, and it is still the site of the Kindergarten today. The Kottakarai children came there by horse cart or were piled in a wobbly basket on the back of an old cycle.
Parents shared the 'teaching' and being with the kids. The few trees were still small and spaced far apart, and there was not much shade around, so I took my little group once a week to the Matrimandir Nursery where Narad told us about flowers and how Mother named many of them. This grew into the 'Nursery classes'. As we all felt so well there in the shady paradise in the middle of the red hot desert, I asked permission for the class to stay the rest of the morning. This became our routine, and after the class with Narad I would tell the children fairy tale stories I made up – imagining olden times before people lived here, and dragons, fairy folk and angels mingled. Then we played games and at lunchtime trekked back to school.
A visiting geography teacher taught for a while in such an inspiring manner that I was led to turn my interest in geography (already my favorite subject) into a research and study project; and I started holding geography class with different groups in Center School. The class wasn't very academic as such, though we did make notes and drawings; instead learning was mostly hands-on. We would take a daylong walk, following the Greenbelt canyon all the way to the sea, swimming and marveling at the sea made red (from laterite soil of the plateau washing into the ocean); learning about watersheds, the lay of the land, directions; visiting the Matrimandir construction site and helping there.
Some children later went to Equals One in Pondi, and some attended Kodaikanal International School (where my own children went for a few years, much later, to do their International Baccalaureate, as there was at the time no high school in Auroville).
Smaller créches and kindergartens were started at Samata's house and in Fraternity, Promesse, Isaiambalam, Udavi and other places. In these small schools, parents and children came together in a common space, often with kids from the villages. Everyone had their turn for a few days a week, so that the other days they could work elsewhere: planting trees, starting new communities, working at Matrimandir and building Auroville.
Last School
After the book burning event in 1976, not much happened on the Aspiration side of town until some older children demanded schooling. Some children had missed several years of school (there was talk of the 'missed generation'). Gordon and Jean’s boarding and school in Fraternity had young Tamil children, and when those students were older they also joined Last School.
At first in Entity::Last School we had a very academic program with apparently attentive students, but it turned out that what we took as interest was a kind of silent awe – the language being way above their understanding. So soon our teaching had to be adapted. Last School grew with Deepti, George, Jean, Ela, Rauf, Hero and many others working there.
I remember a particular course that Ela as the science teacher – and I as the geography teacher – designed; it ran a whole week and was called “The Universe”. We studied our place in the Universe; there was a small play, student-made skits, lectures, slide shows, a film; the project applied language, writing and poetry, astronomy and physics and the math related to that. We got all the teachers involved in their specific subjects and expertise, and it was a great success.
Later we were invited by Kireet Joshi to present this project in Delhi. (I still have a termite-affected file with that curriculum work, hand typed!). I also remember a great field trip with the school to Bangalore, Mysore and Shravannabellagola: the famous Jain shrine, and amazingly creative annual plays with Johnny, performed in the Last School amphitheatre.
CFL, Transition School and the Teachers' Center
When Chali and Luc started the Centre for Further Learning located in the “Curd Cups” on the Last School campus, I taught the first O and A levels geography course. When the school moved to the new building in the Cultural Zone it was called Future School, and I continued the course for a few years.
In 1990 I studied for a year at Colorado University, USA on a grant from Stichting de Zaaier. It was a great opportunity to learn and exchange knowledge and experience,.
I have always been involved in Transition School with the same kind of work. I also worked as a class teacher of the 7th and 8th grades for some years, and for six years lived in the campus staff quarters, helping with the maintenance of the school. This involvement in many aspects of schools and teaching has given me an understanding of the growth and development of schooling in Auroville.
When I stopped working as a class teacher, I continued teaching geography, environmental studies and Garbology classes, organizing field trips, and showing documentaries.
In 2013 I started working with Heidi, Francoise and Maya on the idea of a small Teachers’ Center. This came from a recognition that teachers need to be trained for the very specific Auroville school situation. The workshops Heidi has given over the years, and many Aurovilians Antioch in New England, has given an enormous impetus to this work.
Through the Teachers' Center I became involved with New Era Secondary School (NESS), first doing classroom observation and giving feedback to class teachers. I taught a geography course there and offered some teachers’ workshops on topics including class management, study skills, preparing for a new school year, and accompanying students on field trips.
At the Teachers’ Center (which materialized with its own space in 2014), we now have a small library of books that can be borrowed, and a team of volunteers making teaching materials. We sponsor the weekly 'Conversations on Integral Education', with speakers, power-point presentations, films on educational experiments, and this year a Special Needs Course. With all these activities we have already outgrown the small space, but plans are ahead for a larger Teachers’ Center in the Cultural Zone, easily accessible to all teachers.
I am passionate about teaching in Auroville. Having taught first as practice work in the US and later in a Lycee in Holland, I can really see and appreciate the difference in students, teachers and the environment. I see the influence of the teachings of Sri Aurobindo and Mother which infuse our lives, our learning and our society. In Auroville we enjoy an enormous freedom and many opportunities and possibilities. We are surrounded by beauty but also by the harsher life realities of our bioregion and India. For me teaching becomes interesting and whole when connections can be made with life, our environment and our place in the world. It is rewarding to meet old students and remember with them a particular field trip we took or maps we worked on, and it is gratifying that some of my old students were inspired to study environment-related subjects in University – sometimes they bring this knowledge back to Auroville.
Being involved with all these different aspects of schooling in Auroville has been, and continues to be, a very enriching experience.
See also