Last Thursday was one heck of a day for me. I was back from
Kolkata after the Pujas and did not really feel up to making a detailed lesson
plan for the next day, especially for standard – IX. On Friday, after lunch,
we, the class teachers were busy with the arrangement of the halls for the Trial
and by the time I could meet Standard-IX A, there was simply some 35/40 minutes
left of the the scheduled time. I might have taken some 5 minutes of the time to acquaint the
students with my plans for the next few days before deciding on giving a try to
the yet-to-be done poem by Maya Angelou. Sometimes even 30 minutes of intro and
discussion is a huge bonus.
I had the following objectives in my mind at the start of
the lesson:
1.
Students should be able to talk about the
poetess,
2.
Predict about the content of the poem from the
title,
3.
Read the poem with the correct intonation and
pronunciation.
4.
Share their feelings about the poem, and have
fun while reading and talking about the poem.
So I asked one student to read out what is written in the book
about Maya Angelou, the poetess. Some of the points I wanted them to take note
of were – her birthday (i.e. 4th of April, 1928), her birthplace,
the different roles she played as a poet, essayist, producer, director etc. and
finally some of her works including the present poem.
Then I wrote the title of the poem: I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings
on the board and asked the class to guess what the poem might be all about by
looking at the title. Someone, who had already glanced through the poem,
remarked that it is all about a caged bird and his desire for freedom. I asked
them if they all valued their freedom. All heads nodded in unison. I also told
them that some hundred years back people in some parts of Bhutan were not as
lucky as they are today. There was a system of slavery prevailing in the
country at that time. It took someone like the third kind to abolish this
practice of owning serfs or slaves in the late 1960s. I went on to inform them
that Bhutan was not the only country to practise the system of slavery. In many
other parts of the world, the practice prevailed and those poor slaves led a
miserable life.
I then asked the students to read the poem silently to
themselves. They were given 4 minutes to do so. Interestingly as soon as the
time was over 4 hands were raised to show their willingness to read the poem
aloud to the class. I asked two of them to have a go at it and was quite
impressed with their readings of the poem. In the meantime, Karma Zangmo had
raised her hand to express her desire to read the poem aloud for the third
time. Though time was turning out to be a nagging factor, I let Karma read out
as well. Scarcely had she finished reading, when Karma sought permission to
share her feelings about the poem with the class.
I was highly impressed with her view and it was at that very
precise moment that a story that teaches the value of freedom came to mind.
Considering the fact that there was just 5 minutes for the bell and there was
no point really trying to start with the explanation of the poem, I asked them
if they would be interested in a story. On confirmation, I told them that the
story is entitled Androcles and the
Lion. It is a very popular story. Androcles was a slave who was sold off
to his master by his poor parents. He was a strong and handsome young man who
craved for freedom from the very first day of his slave-life. He just wanted to be free like the free bird. Naturally he
was never happy with the life he had to lead. Getting up early in the morning
and toiling hard, day in and day out, in the land of his master.
In the early hours of one morning, when it was still dark,
he got up, decided to take his chance and decided to run away. He ran like a
wild fire, as fast and as far as his legs could carry him. By midday, he was unimaginably tired and desperately needed to rest. Sitting on a fallen log, he
looked in the direction from when he had come, expecting his pursuers to bump
into him at any time. He was still panting and looking around, when he had an
uneasy feeling of being observed by something, someone from nearby. On turning
his head, he froze at the sight of this huge monster, a ferocious lion which
nearly took his wits out of him. Was he not
scared? He simply wanted to get up and run for his life. But something, some
inexplicable common sense or call it what you will, held him rooted to the spot. Androceleas
closed his eyes expecting his final hour to have come. Waiting for certain
death, he was surprised when the lion did not pounce on him.
Only then he could see the thorn stuck in the upraised front
paw of the monstrous lion. After the initial hesitation, he mastered up enough
courage to stand up and take a step forward to the lion. Slowly but steadily,
he crawled forward to the king of the jungle. Crouching from a distance he plucked the thorn out with all his might. Blood started oozing out of the place
where it got stuck.
With the thorn plucked out, he expected the lion to go for
the kill and finish him off, once and for good. Instead he noticed a strange
look on the lion’s face. The beast then turned majestically away from him. By
then Androcles had wasted some precious time and his pursuers covered up
enough ground to capture him. His master’s wrath knew no bounds and
consequently Androcleas was to be thrown in front of a hungry lion in the open
arena of the stadium for daring to run away.
On that day, the whole town gathered in the enclosed
stadium. [The bell had gone in the meantime and sitting on the chair near the
teacher’s table, Karma Zangmo pleaded with me: Please Sir, continue. Please
….] Androcles then, I continued, was led out in the open arena. A caged lion,
which was caught and kept hungry for the last two days, was also let out of the
cage through the gate. When the door of the cage was lifted, out came the
hungry predator charging at Androcles. Some people in the spectators closed
their eyes expecting the monster to tear Androcles to pieces. But low and
behold, as the beast was a yard away and about to pounce on him, something
stopped him. Then slowly like a pet cat, wagging its tail, the lion started
licking his feet!
The whole stadium had never seen anything like this before.
Androcles was then brought before his nonplussed master. On demand, the brave-heart bared his story about his encounter in the forest. His valour and
love for freedom left the owner highly impressed. Androcles was set free! I
concluded, thinking the teacher for the next class to be waiting outside, with
the words:
So you see, you are really lucky to be born free in this
majestic country of yours But there are people across the globe even today, who aren't as lucky and craving and crying every single minute of their waking lives for freedom like the caged bird in the poem.
To be continued ....
