One of the many consequences of low science literacy and high level of religiosity and the attendant belief in superstitions in the highly patriarchal Brahmanic society of Nepal is unabashed cruelty to females. One way the cruelty is meted out is in the way they are blamed for a newborn's sex as it that were determined by gestation and birthing. Science says otherwise, of course!
Nepali teachers do NOT use humor as much as they should. I do. And so in my workshops for them, I use it to demonstrate its effectiveness. Follow link for short videos of me in action -- telling jokes and making teachers and students laugh, to grab their attention and hold it.
Among other things, North-American teachers at St. Xavier's induced in me a love for words by teaching us the etymology of words during lessons. I am trying to do the same for Nepalis by offering online classes on words and their meanings.
As much as we are products of our culture, education, society, and people, and as much as a closed and inward-looking society and people might fail us, as individuals we are also influencers and shapers of our culture and society!
When it comes to verbal, emotional, and physical violence against children is concerned, for example, we Nepalis have a choice. We don't have to follow the dictates of our culture and society. We can instead teach about empathy and compassion and even display them towards our children to end the vicious cycle of childhood violence, a hallmark of child-rearing and educational practices.
Cultivating the mind of a child is analogous to cultivating a garden. In Nepal, however, our still very traditional and regressive ways is to tightly control, confine, and constrain the garden of the mind of a child. In order to cultivate the mind, what we must teach and learn to do is to free it.
Nepanglish is Nepal's very own English, but it's a little beast of a language. It inflicts a lot of harm in many children, holding them back. If we are to improve the quality of our education, we must do away with Nepanglish and use and teach English English.
