Watching a Hindi film with all the students might not be the first thing that comes to our mind in terms preparation of the adult during the Montessori course. Yet, for the training team at Supraja and the students of the 3-6 course, Jhund, ticked all the boxes for it.
This extraordinary film is based on life and work of Vijay Barse (played by Amitabh Bachchan) who started slum football in Nagpur. Jhund, at first glance, is about slum children who learn to play football, first for the money and then for the love of the game. But as we watched we found that Jhund was also about freedom, responsibility, deviation and normalisation, social change, loyalty, faith, prepared environment, spiritual preparation of the adult woven around the story that spoke out. Jhund was all things familiar about children in an unfamiliar territory of football.
Few instances in the film where the children open up about their lives, their everyday obstacles, their yearning for identity and the burden of branding they bear over their shoulders, touched each one of our hearts. It also brought back the familiar idea that, sometimes, teacher as observer and listener is all that is required to bring out the best in our children.
For many of us who watched Jhund, the struggles of the children kept coming back long after we got on with our lives, but along with their faces came the assurance that endless time and faith in children enables them to reach their potential.
– by Prasanna Srinivasan, AMI Elementary Trainer-in-training