The Elephant in the Classroom : Why Our Schooling System Needs to Change

In the last episode of our Wise As Podcast, we discussed the staggering pace at which Artificial Intelligence (AI) is progressing and how within a space of five years, our world may completely change. We touched on implications for education towards the end, and how it too needs to adapt to the new technological paradigm.

We felt that we did not do the topic of education justice ... and certainly have a lot more to say on that account. So for our latest episode, we revisited the topic of schooling.

Reflecting on our personal experience with schooling, we table three key ideas that we think would not only enrich the learning experience, but also end up producing a wiser generation of humans. Watch the full episode on YouTube, stream on Spotify or Apple Podcast or read the summary and transcript below. Let us know what you think - Does our schooling system need to change?

Watch Episode 4 : Love School or Hate School - It Needs to Change.

 Revisiting Our School Days

Darren hated school while I loved it!

Given the deeply traditional cultural context in which I grew up in, education was seen as a gift, a privilege that a lot of women a generation before me did not have. When it finally came time for me to go to school, I could not wait - and by large, thrived in the academically oriented world of school. This was in spite of the overly authoritarian bent of our schooling system...

Darren, by contrast, harbored a deep disdain for school. He felt that his life only improved after leaving the confines of a rigid education system that did not cater for the creative types.

The Case for Personalised Learning

Being artistic from a very young age, Darren found the curriculum stifling, with the emphasis on rote memorization overshadowing his enjoyment of learning. He also found a lot of the subjects he was compelled to do, trying, especially when it involved learning something that had no practical application in life and were not aligned to his strengths.

I too felt held back by the rigidity of the standard curriculum - but for different reasons.

School was all too easy for me. The standard curriculum we had to endure did not account for the differences in learning abilities. Had my schooling accounted for the differences in learning abilities (and interest), I could have walked away from school with twice the knowledge than I did ...

While we both agreed for a need to have a solid curriculum that was focused on developing core skills, such as literacy and numeracy and general knowledge, we still felt the need for greater personalisation in not only the content that is taught, but also the way in which the teaching occurs.

The interests and strengths of a given child should be the central consideration here. Perhaps this is an area where AI could be applied in the near future e.g. to create a teacher's assistant that could deliver a personalised learning experience to a student.

I also echo Darren's call for reducing unnecessary rote learning, which doesn’t align with modern cognitive understanding or the accessibility of internet resources. In our 'Information Age', the emphasis must shift from memorization to understanding and application.

Mind Training & Ethics: The Missing Link in Our Curriculum

From my perspective, a glaring omission in today's educational frameworks is mind training. Studying contemplative and philosophical wisdom, we realized how essential it was to cultivate an understanding of our subjective experiences and emotional responses.

In our ever-changing world, teaching young learners the basics of self-awareness and mindfulness should be a priority.

Meditation practices in particular, should be part and parcel of school life as it helps to develop essential foundational skills that are being eroded by technology - attention and concentration.

All these teachings also need to be supported by the "scaffolding of ethics".

Secular ethics should form part of every high school curriculum and be taught in an engaging way that encourages young people examine life in all its complexity, understanding the grey areas and choices we all face, and then, thinking for themselves on how best to navigate these.

These are the skills that will ultimately enable children to navigate the vicissitudes of their future lies with wisdom - wisdom that our generation clearly lacks...

School is also, way too long …

For children to blossom as young adults, we must release them from the confines of extended schooling to explore. Up to age 16, comprehensive education should focus on developing core academic skills, nuanced understanding of ethics and morality, and cultivating mindfulness and self-awareness skills.

By the age of 16, children have well and truly become young adults. Confining this age-group within the institution of school makes no sense. A better use of time at that formative stage in our life is to travel and volunteer.

Travel either locally or internationally will allow these young adults to experience different communities to their own and in the process, get an appreciation of the diversity of human culture but also the uniformity of human aspirations.

But the biggest focus needs to be on volunteering. It's important that before spending most of their lives focused on themselves, children experience selfless service - the act of giving - and the transformative impact this has on one's wellbeing.

Governments should setup programs locally and internationally to allow this to happen -- it is a worthwhile investment as we will not only be raising smart and capable youths but also better human beings.

Schools as Incubators of Future Thinkers

It is crucial that our educational systems evolve to prepare students for the future. Schools need to be the birthplace of better, more aware individuals, capable of tackling both personal challenges and global issues with empathy and intelligence.

As we brace ourselves for a turbulent new future, let's ensure our education system arms students not just for the future job market, but for life.

While teachers do an incredible job within current constraints, it’s up to policy makers, curriculum developers, and educational leaders to re-envision education. It's time to unlock the potential for a different world, guided by creativity, curiosity, and compassion.

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Transcript: Episode 4 - Love School or Hate School - It Needs to Change

Reeta: We started talking about education last week and it was in context of AI and how it's changing the world of jobs. it was a discussion, about how education system would need to change and I don't think we did the topic justice. I think we need to revisit it.

Darren: In preparation for the AI doom.

Reeta: Not in, not only that, I think a broader reflection on what we learn formally, how we are formally educated and, perhaps share our experience of what it felt like to go through schooling, et cetera, and given the choice, if we had, a blank slate or the ability to influence some change in the system, 'cause it's a good time to change it: The world's changing, the skills that will be required in the future is completely different, so what, if any, changes we would make to the way the formal education occurs from when we are maybe five years old to up till 16, 17, 18 when we leave school.

Darren: 16?

Reeta: What do you think?

Darren: Yeah, let's talk about that.

Reeta: Yeah. All right. Cool. Okay. You wanna get energy up a little bit? Star jumps.

Darren: We've just been renovating....

Reeta: So I'm curious to understand what your experience of schooling as a whole was. And I think, I know you kind of went through different phases.

You did part of your schooling in Wales, in Cardiff mm and then you migrated to Australia as a 14-year-old and then finished high school in Australia.

So I think there's some variations there, but Yeah. Interested to hear your take. My take and then we probably move into a discussion around what we change.

Darren: Okay. So I hated school. I'll start with that one.

Reeta: Do you wanna moderate that opinion overall or,

Darren: Yeah, I just, my parents constantly said, enjoy them.

They'll be the best years of your life. You don't know at the moment, but you will after you've left looking back. And I can honestly say that I started to enjoy my life fully when I left school, and I can control my, my life more directly. So I didn't really enjoy a day of school at all

Reeta: A day- not even a day.

No. Art classes, maybe, oh dear. Sports, the sports side of things, but the rest of it, I didn't like it. I just, I hated it. So what was it? Was it about the education curriculum? Was it about the school, culture that you went to, the kids you went to school with? What was it? Anything in particular?

Darren: Know, I really don't know, to be honest. I just didn't really enjoy it outside of the sports and the, the art classes, I wasn't enjoying the subjects. I guess. it comes back to the fact that I was born an artist. what's, what kind of enjoyment am I gonna get from rote learning the multiplication or Pythagoras theorem or all of Henry VII's wives, when all you want to do is draw and paint and be creative. I just felt I was being held back In the direction I was, predestined to go.

Reeta: Yeah. Rote learning was a big feature of our education as well.

Darren: Yeah.

Reeta: So rote learning, but what about, can you think of good moments at school?

Good teachers, maybe good friends? You made. Anything? Yeah.

Darren: Well, there were friends. you don't really appreciate them at the time. I guess looking back, they were friends, but I wouldn't do it again.

Reeta: That's a bit depressing. Depressing way to start.

Darren: Yeah. but things got better when I left,

Yeah.

Reeta: My experience was completely different. I grew up in Fiji. The setting that I grew up in was very traditional. And it was so traditional, in fact that the generation before me, all of my dad's sisters, none of them were sent to school. They didn't have the opportunity. The boys went, but the girls didn't. So education in our family, in our society where I was, was very, special. It was almost like a special treat.

You get to go to school, you get to educate yourself, you get to learn. And I had an older brother and an older sister who were going to school while I was home watching them go away and left alone with the nanny. So by the time it came time for me to go to school, I just couldn't wait.

And I was so happy to go.

Darren: Your first, the first day.

Reeta: Oh, the first day I was so happy. I just was, oh my god. Mom tells this story of, my older brothers and sister probably just having a moment where they were crying and didn't wanna go to school. I just couldn't wait to get out house and go and do my own thing at school.

And, I really enjoyed my school life even though, you know, it was a very strict school environment.

So again, in Fiji, so this is 1989, I went to year one. The school system was still very, and kindergarten wasn't a formal year, so I started schooling at six. Right? So already you're quite old. And before that I just had a little bit of exposure to kindergarten, but nothing beyond that. No formal education, no preschool, no kindy. So I started at six and I was well and truly ready. I absorbed everything like a sponge. And overall school was very easy for me. It was very effortless for me to just learn everything that I was supposed to learn and, get good grades. And I, you know, topped the class, topped the school even all through high school. The academic side was very simple, and in fact, it was too simple for me. It felt like there were bits where I felt held back, but for different reasons than you. The curriculum, Fiji at that time didn't have a varied curriculum to account for, the differences in learning abilities between students.

So there was no opportunity for me to skip grades or move faster through, different curriculum. And there wasn't even different grades of maths. We all had to learn the same math, which was, you know, really difficult for some kids, especially once we went into high school and math wasn't their strong point. And once you start doing calculus, it's not for everyone. Right. So we had a very average curriculum which meant that most people can progress to the next year. And then there was a bit that was difficult. Maybe 5% of it was challenging to really bright students that many other kids wouldn't get to.

So I mean, It did not take into account the different learning abilities. It was a very average kind of curriculum and that's where perhaps it didn't give me as much as I wanted from school, especially in the early primary school years. The level at which we were taught literacy and numeracy was so basic, and I used to get bored out of my head in class itself.

But what I liked about school, the reason I liked is because it wasn't home. You know, at home we were, we had to do chores, I'm very glad my parents got us to do all the chores because now I have really good life skills.

Darren: I'm kind of smiling because I know what your father's like and how disciplined he is.

Reeta: Exactly. So we were weeding gardens, we are cleaning the chicken coop mom is a clean freak, so we were washing the windows, we were sweeping the house three times a day. And, you know, she's interested in cooking and creating and we had recipes and books. So we were always in the kitchen cooking, creating new things.

And in a way it was nice, but we always had that. And I mean, that was an education in itself. Now I'm very competent, you know, I can grow my own food. If I have to, I can, raise chickens and ducks and get one ready. Prep the full meal cook outside on a open fire. I have all those life skills thanks to that.

But you know, when you're a kid, you want to see the world outside it. When you want to hang out with different people, you want to have friends, you want to get a sense of other people's lives. And school was that portal into the other world. 'Cause again, you have to remember, there was no internet.

We didn't have television in Fiji until I was in year three and even then, for all of my life there, it was only one channel. And it started at maybe four o'clock or something like that. The radio stations was the main entertainment, but at home, mom and dad determined what radio stations we listened to. So it was the 'old people' radio we used to listen to all the time.

And, yeah. I mean, kids these days have so much authority at home to determine what goes on, and parents kind of revolve their lives around that. It wasn't like that with us. Mom and dad were the head of the family. We, you know, were grateful that they fed us and kept us.

And I'm not complaining. I think this, it was nice to have the demarcation to say, you know, they're the parents and you're the child. And that relationship obviously balanced out...

Darren: a, it's a, it became a bit of a blurry line, wasn't it? Didn't it? Between. You and your parents being the sort of dominant alpha?

Reeta: Well, my brother sister were older. Right,

Darren: because you were quite dominant to you?

Reeta: I was a third child, so it's a typical third child kind of story where you're more rebellious, you challenge more, you want to create more of a space. It's a normal dynamic that plays out. The first kid is the nicest, the second one sort of plays at the edges. The third one, you know, completely up ends, any parents view of their control.

But anyway, given the traditional environment that I grew up with, I always felt that school was special.

I should say my mom went to school, my mom was literate, my mom was working, has always worked ever since, you know, I've known her. So she kind of lived a more modern life, more modern, progressive life. Mm-hmm. And that's the life I wanted.

And my dad, thankfully was very modern and progressive as well. He didn't discriminate between his daughters and sons and both of them really didn't. And we had equal opportunity and we were brought up with very equal kind of roles. It was not an gendered kind of household where girls had to do this and boys had to do that.

Darren: It still put you below the dogs though, didn't he?

Reeta: No, he didn't. It's just a Him and my dad have a thing anyway,

so that's, that was my experience. I loved education. I loved in the context of where I was growing, it was such a privilege to go to school, to learn. And yeah, there were limitations in the way things were taught and with hindsight, and the teachers were really strict and that had a pros and crs and I had difficulties with a few teachers through high school. And by the time I reached year 12 and Fiji has 13 years of school, I was ready to leave school, which is what I did.

I did one final HSC equivalent exam and then instead of staying for another year to finish high school in Fiji, I moved to Australia and did a college, which was a bridging to a university. 'Cause I was well and truly done with school by that stage. I just could not stay in that environment. And again, it was a very particular issue with a particular teacher and the discipline and the constant kinda pressure that she put on me at school.

Darren: The one teacher?

Reeta: The one teacher. Yeah. it was, but because she was the main teacher it just became unbearable. Right. For me.

Darren: So you took her out, didn't you?

Reeta: I did not.I dunno what the issue was. I couldn't put a step, out of line. And I've always been very outspoken and I don't

Darren: mm-hmm.

Reeta: I've always been very outspoken and I've always rebelled against the traditional kind of notion that somebody should get respect by default of their position.

And I give them, by default, I'll give a person respect who's older than me 'cause that's how we were brought up. But if I see their behavior is not congruent to what they should be like, then I don't feel the need to be respectful towards them. And I've had this kind of streak all through my childhood, which was not the best streak to have in a very strict, disciplinarian environment. So it didn't always work out for me.

Darren: Yes, it's pretty common to not sort of kowtow to illegitimate authority. Absolutely. Very Chomskyan

Reeta: Yeah, that's me. Chomskyan makes me sound, makes me sound kind of more dignified. My rebellion nature, well, his nature. So that was, that was my experience with school.

But you know, there were also teachers that I met that were really good teachers. And if I think back now, I mean, when I went in primary went to primary school, I have to say there were some really even worse teachers who took on corporal punishment quite literally. And, you know, we were, we were whooped when we were in primary school. Everyone was whooped. My parents were whooped. They've got stories of, the sort of cruel punishments they had to go through. And we had our fair share. By the time we went to high school, things had sort of relaxed a bit. There was no hitting of kids.

But, there was a very, clear, and again, I don't think it's necessarily wrong, there was a clear division of role that your teachers are higher in authority than you are students, and you have to listen and obey in a way that inculcates a sense of discipline.

And because the teachers were so strict, we didn't have any issues with bullying at school because if you were outed as a bully, I mean, you'd get it,

Darren: Right.

Reeta: There was no, no way out. So there was no bullying. Absolutely no bullying when we grew up. Maybe a little bit of teasing, you know, as kids do but nothing vicious, like the stories you hear these days. Nothing like that.

Darren: Okay. That's unusual.

Reeta: What about in Wales? Did you have that?

Darren: There was quite a lot of, yeah. Bullying. It was quite a rough, a rough school. Every year. I remember the, the fourth form, so the younger form would beat up all the boys in the fifth form.

Reeta: What all of them physically beat up?

Darren: Physically beat them up. Yeah. So you just see these gangs just beating up these poor kids.

Reeta: Didn't the teachers do anything?

Darren: I think, they weren't there a lot of the time, and I think a lot of the time they were afraid of these kids.

Reeta: Oh my God. See, this is where I think that kinda imbalance in power between, teachers and having teachers have authority is actually not such a bad thing.

Darren: Oh no, you definitely need a lot of discipline.

Reeta: Yeah, absolutely.

Darren: teenagers and kids.

Reeta: It's only later in life as we went through high school when we are 16, 17, 18, where it was a different relationship with our parents and a different relationship with, with our teachers as well, where, you know, you are young adults and they begin to treat you like young adults, but before then, there's a lot of structure and discipline that, that kind of more strict, regime provides, which I thought was useful.

Darren: Yeah. I, I didn't have a problem with authority at all. It's probably the least of my worries at school.

Yeah. So I overall am grateful for the education and enjoyed the school. And, you know, I still keep, in touch with at least one friend who my bestie from high school. And she's one of the reasons I used to enjoy going to school. We had such a good time together, Yeah, I'm sure the audience don't really want to know about, how you went, got along with your friends and all that sort of stuff.

Reeta: So let's start with your, Stage. Yeah. So what would you, back to me, what would you change if you had to change something about school?

Darren: For me, I think I would've liked to have been, I think I'd like what the teachers to acknowledge that one student is different from another and has different needs early on. So early on they could see that I was drawn and painting and engaged and happy doing that. And then probably focused the teaching more on my creative needs.

So I know it sounds a bit privileged and asking a bit much just to change the whole curricular for, for one person, but I've just seen sort of generally that, the teaching system could actually just pinpoint, the specific needs early on and then have a broader direction rather than a narrow one. I'm not sure what it's like now. I'm sure it's a whole lot better, but I really, I mean, I battled with the, maths and the sciences till I was. Had a choice. Yeah. At maybe when the last year of school perhaps I could just get rid of physics. but it's a long time to be dealing with something you really loathe and it's totally against my grain. Whereas some more humanitarian subjects, the humanities or develop some more subjects for creative people.

Reeta: Yeah. I think it's a struggle even now, even in education systems that are advanced and better funded. Say in Australia in the public education environment, it's really difficult to have the resources, for personalized, more personalized learning.

It's interesting when people talk about artificial intelligence and technology, they see that opportunity. for AI to complement a teacher in a classroom and provide a kid a more, personalized learning experience for whatever given subject.

What you are describing though goes beyond that. You are describing sort of something that I don't think is within the control of teachers, which is, the subjects that you do because the way the standard curriculum works is there's a certain set of subjects that you have to do at a certain level for a long time.

I don't disagree with that necessarily because I think there's some core skills all kids need, whether they like math or not, They have to learn to be numerical. Everyone should have not only good numeracy skills, I think, and given my 10 years in banking and seeing the really bad side of people not being numerate, not making good decisions, not having any sort of control over their financial life,

Darren: That's not, not got nothing to do with learning calculus.

Reeta: Yeah, with that, financial

Darren: responsibility and learning, I'm talking about at a

Reeta: young age, numeracy core. Numeracy, core financial.

Darren: But that's got nothing to do with skills the illiterate, financial acumen in the workplace.

Reeta: It has to do with being confident with numbers. People, there's a lot of people who leave school, even in the bank I used to find there's a lot of adults who are not confident in their numeracy skills. And I don't understand why, why people have this fear of numbers.

Part of the reason. I wanted the first Willow the Wonderer book to be about counting and to do it in a fun and engaging way so that kids are looking for hidden creatures and learning to count in a fun way is because I've seen adults having a fear of numbers. My theory is that it's because of the way maths is taught at school as it's not natural. Reading isn't a natural thing for a lot of kids. Numeracy and maths is not a natural thing for a lot of kids, right?

And so by forcing them to rote learn and making them feel dumb when they don't learn to read at a certain level or when they don't learn math at a certain level, it just plants a lifelong fear of numbers and words. That's not helpful because everybody needs core literacy and numeracy skills to navigate life.

So I think there's a certain amount of learning that's absolutely necessary around those things. Even if you are artistically inclined.

Darren: Well, I didn't mind early on. I didn't mind, learning the times table learning basic addition Okay. And all that sort of stuff. The basics. I can do the basics. It's when you get to calculus

Reeta: and Algera...

Darren: Everything else outside of that you'll never, ever use

Reeta: Yeah. Okay. No, I do agree with that point of view. For me, it was the road learning that was particularly painful and part of the reason I didn't go towards the sciences, I never did.

I went towards commerce because I didn't like the mode of learning where you had to sit and memorize a whole lot of things. And I did not like that aspect of learning. I liked, using reason, I liked using logic. I'd like understanding the core, principles and then applying it, which is why I, went towards commerce because I felt that in subjects like economics and accounting, which is what we see, we started studying that in high school,there was more opportunity to apply, whereas the science education in high school, you were still learning your periodic tables and all the fundamentals, which I guess you have to, but even then, in today's world where everybody will have the internet, artificial intelligence, some sort of assistance at their fingertips, you have to question the need to sort of memorize all these things, in the way we currently do in a lot of the educational setting.

So it's that memory, that rote learning aspect that never worked for me.

Darren: Okay,

Reeta: So what you would change is you would change, so there's some core literacy, numeracy and other skills you have to develop. But then very early on, you'd like, the child to be freed from doing unnecessary things that doesn't really add to their life or aligned to their strengths.

Darren: Yeah.

Reeta: that what you're saying?

Darren: Yeah. Am I asking too much?

Reeta: Oh, well, I would challenge that a little bit. What about things like history? Don't you think even if some kid finds history boring, they should know the basics?

We were never taught history. I feel very ignorant. It was never a subject in the schools that I went to, and I personally have felt in my adult life that there's so much I don't know? And that I've had to educate myself later on.

Darren: Yeah, I think general knowledge is generally a good thing. I think I just resented having to learn all the, of Henry VII's wives and when they lived and when they died and when they went to the toilet in, you know, the ins and outs of their lives.

Reeta: To do an exam on it where you have to say, exact year that Alexandra Bell invented the telephone, or it was nice to know that he did. I liked reading about them. It was fascinating to hear of all the discoveries.

But it was the memorization of the,

Darren: And then being judged, then being judged on the result of not wanting to remember all of Henry the Y's wives and when they lived and died and how they died.

Reeta: 

Darren: Rather than be encouraged to just, learn about them without, being tested and then feeling like an idiot when you can't remember the name of the last wife.

Reeta: I mean, the fact that internet is going to give us all the information that we need, we have to really question whether we need exams and learning to be so focused on memory and recollection 'cause it's no longer a skill. They, it used to be a valuable skill pre-internet age, but now information can be accessed very easily.

I mean, does it make sense to still score kids on recollection?

Darren: Probably not.

Reeta: Probably not. and so I think there is a cause for, people who are focused and, really thinking about education and really involved and have a say in how curriculum and exams are developed to question the need for all of these things. 'cause hopefully, you know, kids are not going through the same thing.

There is a certain element of memorization that's important, for example, when you're learning to read. So this comes back to how things are taught.

So going back to Willow the Wonderer, with the first book, numeracy was one of the core skills we wanted kids to develop in a very natural and fun way.

The second element was literacy.

It's with every book. When you read a book, you are learning how to read, right? Literacy is a core component and so again, the books you read can have an influence on how easy and hard that is.

The reason we wrote all the Willow the Wonderer, Books in Rhyme, even though I got so much advice and also pressure not to write in rhyme...

The world of publishing has changed and essentially, if you write children's book in rhyme, a lot of editors in large publishing housesthey don't like receiving books in Rhyme. One because it limits the ability to translate the book. And two, they will say, oh, there's so much bad rhyme. We don't want bad rhyme.

But, you know, you work with editors, line editors, copy editors. You as a writer yourself, you put in the effort to make sure you're doing a good job with rhythm and rhyme. Then you can produce good works.

And we've endeavored to do that, to develop our work at a very high standard.

So this sort of blanket kind of attitude towards, books written in rhyme is not helpful because one of the core skills in learning to read is phonics --Developing the understanding of different letters and how different combination of letters make different sounds. Right. It's something kids have to learn.

So by reading, or listening to a book written in rhyme they start seeing the patterns very naturally.

 Rhyming just sort of naturally teaches them over time how to learn to read.

Darren: It's a bit like picking up English from songs. If it's not your first language and you hear songs, you can pick up English because it's easy to remember. Because there's a tune and a rhythm and a melody. So it sticks in your head. and with rhyme, there's a. rhythm isn't there.

Reeta: The point was to say that, it's not necessarily about what you learn. It's how you learn. I'm sure school curriculums are already focusing and has evolved beyond what we experienced as kids at school. So I don't think there's as much, I hope so, as much rote learning or We hope so.

Darren: Let us know.

So what would you change about the way you were schooled? If you were to go back, what would you change?

Reeta: The main thing would be, reflecting the work we do at Wise As Stories, which is create stories with wisdom, the main thing that was lacking in our education system, I think, and I still cannot believe in this day and age, it's still not part of the education system or the standard curriculum, is mind training.

I cannot understand with the level of mental health issues that young people are experiencing today, With the challenges they have today. I cannot understand why schools education ministers, education departments have not put effort into introducing mind training classes into school, right?

It is a complete rejection of everything science has told us about the mind in the last, what, 50 years and what contemplatives and philosophers have been telling us about the mind for the last, I don't know, two to 5,000 years, right? We cannot, in this day and age pretend that the world is just made of objective reality factors.

We cannot, in this day and age, not acknowledge that we have an inner subjective world, and this inner subjective world is what determines our reality, it's how we experience the world. We experience it within ourselves.

So there has to be a way to communicate that very explicitly to children from a very young age so they understand that they are experiencing the world within them. And what they may experience at a point in time is not what their friend experiences at that point in time, depending on who someone is, what their experience is, where they're coming from, they're experiencing the world in a slightly different way, but more importantly that everybody has the ability to condition, the state of their inner world.

If there's one thing that I've learned in the world of contemplative and philosophy, it's that, How we feel about the world is in our control- That was a line in one of our Willow the Wonderer books.

How we feel about life is in our control and, that's a knowledge that was never given to us going through school.

Darren: That's right.

Reeta: Yeah. It always feels like things happen to us and we are reacting to it. But there's a space you can build around when things happen and how you react and what you actually control is your reaction.

And depending on how you react, you can either diffuse whatever is happening or you can make it bigger and worse for yourself and for everyone else. Creating that space between, events occurring and you reacting is all part of that broader knowledge.

Darren: Yeah. Well, that's pretty much what I was gonna say.

No, but I would've probably brought in to the curriculum, some formal teachings on the stoicism, which then I would then lead into the Eastern philosophies, the more secular religions, the Buddhism and, the, Upanishads

Reeta: Yoga, sort of the yogic side of,

Darren: it's all pretty much

Reeta: Hinduism,

Darren: The whole thread through those and even through into, modern psychiatry and psychotherapy is what you were talking about.

The fact that, we do have that in a subjective state, and it is separate from the outside world, and we can choose to not react to it or we have a choice. Whereas, again, all through our lives, we're just taught to do anything but that, to be reactive.

Reeta: It's never explicitly explained to us, right. So if you are listening to this for the first time and you are new to this world of what is mind training? What are mind sciences? It's that awareness that there's an inner subjective experience of life and that we are in control of that.

Now, the way that has been taught for thousands of years in eastern contemplative cultures and western philosophical cultures is, through a series of meditation practices, for example.

When you start, you are cultivating, attention. You are cultivating concentration. You're looking at an object and learning to focus on that object without being distracted by anything. And that's concentration and attention. Now, there's nothing spooky about that.

Concentration and attention are two very critical skills that's actually been lost in today's world, thanks to technology, thanks to social media, thanks to Shorts and TikTok, right? People cannot hold their attention so much so that they can't have the patience to read a book from end to end these days. And so just imagine countering that by bringing in a meditation practice for kids when they're starting out at kindergarten that says, pick your favorite rock or stone and look at it for a minute and don't think about anything else, but just look at your rock and stone and observe it,

And then. when they're in year one or two, maybe it becomes a bit more subtle. It says, sit for two minutes. You're in year two. So sit for two minutes and feel the breath move in and out of your body. a more subtle kind of object that they're learning to focus and concentrate on.

And in year four, maybe it's a four minute walk at the beginning of the, school day where they're silently and quietly walking through a school compound and learning to observe everything that's happening around them and within them, And so developing, and this is how that, training begins.

Concentration attention, awareness, mindfulness.

Darren: About being present, feeling the ground as you walk and being attentive to that,

Reeta: All These practices cultivates these skills, right? It cultivates this ability to focus, it cultivates this ability to observe. And all these things are so, such critical skills.

That's how people who have, made amazing scientific discoveries that we take for granted today. That's where it started. It was their ability to focus and observe and see and become aware of something that other people didn't. And we are losing these skills.

School is a wonderful place to introduce some of these skills.

Darren: Yeah, I'm sure some of those leaps in the sciences- Newton when he first saw their apple drop and how he then, thought of gravity and what it means in a macro scale. I can imagine he'd have to be in a very meditative state to actually then extrapolate what he saw to what he then, envisaged on a macro scale with gravity.

Reeta: Yeah. And you need the time and space anyway at any point in your life, even if it's not as profound a discovery as Newton.

Darren: Yeah. But, you can imagine in a moment though, he would've had to been present. Right. Exactly. 'cause he would, you can imagine

Reeta: Exactly.

Darren: And then

Reeta: it,

Darren: And the idea then just dropped into his head. And I'm also thinking of Einstein when he, you know, discovered, his great equations and they were creative moments, quiet moments where he had to actually think outside the box.

Reeta: Hmm.

Darren: They are contemplative moments.

Reeta: And I think we can teach that to be present and. I think it's called in to be in a fugue state in the moment. And athletes talk about it and

Darren: Even the racing formula one drivers-, you can't actually think about, each corner. You have to be almost in a meditative state where your sixth sense is turning before the corner comes and the good drivers, are, just in that meditative zone but they don't even know it.

Reeta: It's a moment of deep concentration, right? And where things just happen. By itself. But yeah, I think whenever you find it quiet space, if you're working through problems, difficult problems and you're quite not kind of getting it or you're trying to under get an inspiration, it's those quiet moments where it drops in.

But you have to cultivate those quiet moments and that's what some of these training and teaching can be about.

 I think this whole mind science is an area, is a curriculum, is a beautiful, rich curriculum that can be developed by bringing the best of the western philosophical traditions, for example, what the stoics taught, and the eastern contemplative traditions, for example, the mind training exercises in Buddhism or, in yoga sciences or yogic tradition. You can bring those together to create a very comprehensive curriculum.

 But that brings me to my criticism of probably the modern mindfulness movement, which is part of modern day psychology.

 It was a derivation of Buddhism:

 They have taken the meditation practices, but they took away the scaffolding around the meditation practices, which was ethical and moral behavior. They've said, you can concentrate- it's like a Formula One driver concentrating-It's a good form of concentration. It helps you achieve whatever outcome you are going for, Which is winning. but it's devoid of any ethical and moral foundation so it is not as profound as it could be.

Darren: Yeah. It doesn't develop their character, does it?

Reeta: It doesn't. No. And if you look at what's happening in the world today, all these conflicts and leadersthat are creating all these conflicts that we have elevated into positions of power and authority, all of them fundamentally lack a strong ethical foundation.

Darren: I think, the ones that are

Reeta: causing problems around the world right now,

Darren: I think there's one, there's not,

Reeta: one in particular, no names mentioned, but a lot of them do not have strong, ethical, moral foundations. Andwe sort of accept that within politicians. But it's the same trait in a lot of business leaders, right?

And it's that aspect which is missing in our education system, which is, which is teaching basic secular ethics and morality and decency, from a very young age, in a very engaging way, in a very nuanced way. Not in a sort of dictorial way, you must do this, you must do that, but in a way that encourages them to think in a way that encourages them to explore the boundaries, the grey areas, and then sort of make decisions for themselves that what would I do when faced in this circumstances debate within themselves from a very young age.

What is the grey area and how to navigate grey areas because then by the time they are grown up and in these positions of leadership, et cetera, they've sort of thought through these things in a very deep way. So I think that's the other thing I would introduce.

Darren: Okay.

Reeta: There is one more thing.

Darren: okay. While the sun's gone down and we're getting rain down, done great.

And eaten up by mosquitoes. Is, was there anything else you could, add to. That rant.

Reeta: One last thing I would do. I think school goes on for too long and I think part of it is because we are being taught a lot of things that we're never gonna use in life and we're taught just because, right? They exist in curriculum.

I think what will be better is really for educators, teachers, education ministers to sit down and say, what are the core skill sets we need students to develop by the time they're 16? Because I feel once people are 16, you have transformed into a young adult. All your hormones are raging, you are a young adult.

I personally felt really caged in a school environment at the age of 16. Age of 16 is when I think we should let kids go and explore.

By that stage, we should have taught them about ethics and morality.

We should have taught them about mind training and subjective nature of reality, and given them some meditation practices and tools and techniques that they can use to navigate difficult situations within the framework of their own mind.

By that time, they should have literacy and numeracy skills, and they have had developed a sense of themselves and what their strengths are and where they should probably place their focus on, and we've given them good education and training about their own body and their own sexual health, so they can take control of those things in a way that we weren't taught.

Armed with all that knowledge, at that age of 16, they should be set free. School should have ended and they're no longer in a rigid environment. In between that period of finishing school and then adulting- so taking on, future education or an apprenticeship or going to university, college, vocational training, whatever, there should be at least one year where kids are encouraged to travel and volunteer.

There should be programs put in place by governments all over the world that gives children and kids at that age free board, free food in exchange for their time volunteering. They should volunteer in aged care facilities. They should volunteer to look after the environment. They should volunteer whatever charity work, whatever it is, but a year of travel and selfless service.

Because if kids do these two things, the world isn't just going to be about me, me, me, me, me, my strengths, my job, my career, my education, my money. It'll be about stepping outside of self and being selfless and just giving. A lot of people experience this aspect of selfless service and just how amazing it is for your soul, for your own wellbeing,a lot of us only experience this when we are much older and we are training other kids, other young people at work or when we are volunteering ourselves. If you ask people, this is one of the most, it is, what is the word? Rewarding thing you can do.

Darren: Yeah. Life affirming. I think one of the best Christmases I've had, I volunteered at a men's halfway house in Wollomollo. And I was just cooking for them and feeding them at Christmas day. And there was, a father there and he had three of his young children, they must have been between six and 10.

And I asked him, it's Christmas. Shouldn't you be on holiday or something? And he said that, life's been good to him he's come into money because he, he's been very lucky. He's worked out, but he's, he hasn't come from money. He worked really hard and he wanted to his kids to, he wanted to show his kids the other side of life, so they appreciate what they have.

Hmm. And so these kids were helping out on Christmas and that was their Christmas and it was so life affirming and, and yeah, it was just wonderful to see.

Reeta: And I'm sure with hindsight, the kids will absolutely love that, you know?

Darren: And it, it comes back to what we're talking about, the curricula. If, they incorporate something like that in the system.

Reeta: I know,

Darren: Especially the privileged children. I mean, it'd just be a better world.

Reeta: It will be before you sort of go on a path of just focusing on yourself, one pointed focus on yourself, your skills, your career, your job, your income,have that year where you just give. The sort of humans that we'll raise in the world will be very different, because I think part of the suffering in these early adulthood years is because we are so inwardly focus on us, on ourselves and our success as individuals.

And that is something that's conditioned in us through school because there's very little teamwork. It's about individuals, it's about individual grades Sport and other things does help to create a sort of broader, team kind of values. But even then, that's within a very contained tribe. So it's sort of, it can get quite tribal as well.

So I think, it's just opening up and that's why travel is an important part of it.

It's important that at that age, 16, 17, 18, you are leaving your tribe that you grew up with and going and moving somewhere completely different, experiencing a different part of world, different set of people, different cultures, and seeing just how similar all humans are. And then just without asking for anything in return, being grateful, you know, not having to worry about your food and board and just being able to give,

Darren: Oh, it's a very first world privileged position to be in though.

Reeta: I mean, it's not traveling to the other part of the world. It can be traveling to a different community. The point is, you get away, you know, if you're in Eastern suburbs and you've always grown up in eastern suburbs, go to Northern Territory or go to Western Sydney, or go to, somewhere else and do your volunteering in a different part.

Darren: Okay,

Reeta: So that you kind of get out of this mindset that, oh, I'm in this clique and this is it, and people over here are like me and everyone else isn't. And that's an attitude that needs to change. So yes, that's, that's, that's, I think it's about to rain. Do we wanna quickly wrap it up

Darren: Yeah.

Reeta: School is great and the not, I think one thing I want to say is this talk wasn't about saying anything about teachers. I think they do a phenomenal job all around with what they have to work with, and it's not easy being a teacher. So this is not a criticism about any teachers, any education system that we've been through.

It's a tough gig, right? And this is not something necessarily teachers can do. This is something that school principals and public policy kind of people really need to get their head around. Is the curriculum, what's taught to students-

Does it arm them for the future?

Does it give them the ability to navigate life?

And does it make them better humans?

That's what we, I think, really need to focus on as we get ready for a different kind of world over the next five to 10 years.

Darren: Yeah. Let's get ready.

Reeta: Let's get ready. Thank you for listening.