I have some kind of contact with them because I write for young children. Many stories of their suffering that others may never know, I know from time to time. Tears welled up in my eyes as I wrote the letter, and the letter was covered - I have received many such letters. I also know what it means to suddenly stop receiving regular letters from a dying teenager. A person who is completely frustrated with a little encouragement has started a new life - I have enjoyed that joy countless times. I don't know if everyone has noticed the issue, in the lives of many of the children of our country now some issues like competition are starting to sit like heavy stones on their chests.
When we were little, we had nothing to do but go to school and spend the rest of the time running around in the fields. Never once did I think life was incomplete. It's not that sometimes there aren't any competitions at school, I've written long essays in essay competitions, I've tried to recite in recitation competitions (in regional accents), I've run behind everyone in running competitions - I never seem to get a prize anywhere. I don't know why, I never thought competition was fun. What was not fun for me as a child is still not fun at all for many children and teenagers?
We first thought about it before we started the Maths Olympiad in our country. If we want to send a team to the World Mathematical Olympiad, we have to find young mathematicians in this country and if we want to do that, we have to find it through some kind of competition. Yet we somehow didn’t want to start the whole process just as a competition. So after much thought we named it 'Math Festival'.
Only a few are the winners of the competition but everyone joins the festivities. It's not just the name of the festival that ended the responsibility, it's the whole Mathematical Olympiad that's really a festival - everyone has tried hard to prove it, and we think we've been very successful.
Whenever I get a chance to attend a Maths Olympiad and if the kids are given a chance to say something, I spend the whole time trying to convince them that part of the competition is not important at this festival; It has to be done only out of necessity and the festival is the real thing. Fifty-sixty-seventy prizes are awarded, not just the champion, runners-up prizes when it comes time to award prizes.
(The World Literary Center is unmatched in this regard. Thousands of children attend their awards ceremonies and all receive prizes. Not only that, the big prizes in bundles of huge books are given by lottery. It may be a pity not to be named in the lottery, but the shame of losing.) Don't stay!)
2.
But when we start real life there is no sign of competition; Everything is done with cooperation. When I teach my students, I don't tell other teachers in my department, "You teach, I teach too, let's see who can teach better!" When I ask questions, I don't challenge everyone and say, "Let's see who can ask better questions than me!" While looking at the exam book, everyone does not compete among themselves by looking at a book together!
When the real work has to be done, everyone has to do it together, whoever is good is allowed to do it. Not all work is joyful, joyless work is shared among all. If someone can't do one thing, others do it. How well a job is done depends on how well everyone works together.
If collaboration is the key to success in life, then why do we push our children into competition every moment? Why do we teach him to be selfish without preparing for real life? Is the real word in the competition pushing everyone else, punching them with the elbow, leaving them behind and moving forward on their own?
We see the joy of the winner, why not see the sorrow of the losers?
As I said at the beginning, I know the sadness and frustration of many young children. From that claim, I can say that this competition is a big reason for their grief and frustration. It is a pity that he does not get the prize for taking part in the competition. Then it is the responsibility of his relatives to encourage him and bring him out of that sorrow. But in our country now a very diverse kind of ‘parent species’ has been born whose job it is to push children into all sorts of competitions.
Not only that, if you can't succeed in that competition, insult your own son or daughter, shame them, compare them with others and throw them to the ground! Unbeknownst to the parents, sometimes they push their children to a place where they think of suicide in shame and grief. Adolescence is an age of emotion; At that time, there is nothing to be surprised if someone puts a rope around his neck out of shame, grief and humiliation.
Parents have become emotionally disturbed by stress and psychiatrists are no longer able to normalize them, an example I have seen many times!
I don't have to watch a lot of cruelty because I don't watch television. Absolutely I knew it was a children’s song competition. I accidentally had to watch a special part of that competition at someone's house. I was fascinated to see the wonderful vocals of the little ones, the incredible grasp of the melody. But at one point I was shocked to discover that some of the children in the competition were dropping out and my heart broke when I saw the cries of those children. Who gave the big hartakarta-bidhatas of television the right to call small children and twist their little hearts?
I was invited to various events. Sometimes he is invited to be a judge of big competitions. I never accept that invitation. I cannot judge one person as good and the other as bad; Everyone is fine with me. (The most bizarre invitation to be a judge was to judge the beauty of my students or girls of a student's age in some kind of beauty pageant. I had a hard time convincing the organizers that it could not be my job.)
I remember an incident. I was taken as a spectator in a song competition on a television in Sylhet. The contestants are not children so it doesn’t have to be put in the ‘child abuse’ category, so I agreed. I was seated next to the judges and the contestants came on stage one by one and started singing.
As soon as I finished singing a song, the judges politely asked for my comment. I've been a little bit happier all my life, so I started praising me with such exuberance and the judges had no choice but to select the singer after hearing such exuberant praise. It happened every time a song was sung and I was overwhelmed with praise for the singer or singers and seeing my excitement the judges started choosing one after the other out of embarrassment. Luckily I didn’t have much time. So when I wanted to say goodbye, everyone said goodbye to me with great interest and enthusiasm and went back to the conventional cruelty of the television channel.
3.
Nowadays a new type of competition called GPA-Five or Golden-Five has started. I'm not denying that everyone wants to do well in exams and if someone gets a Golden-Five, it can be enjoyed a hundred times. But when a boy or girl does not get the Golden-Five, his or her parents start abusing him or her; Nothing could be more horrible than that. The boy or girl who is expecting a good result in the test is upset if it is not to his liking. Then the responsibility of guardian, relatives, friends to bring him back to normal with encouragement. But when the opposite happens, what could be more heartbreaking than treating him as a failure and punishing him?
Our test method is not good. We still can't evaluate children properly. So I am not surprised when I see that those who are giving something to the country, society or the world are not the children who have got Golden-Five in wholesale. There are many kinds of intelligence in human life, there are many kinds of talents whereas we judge a person only by verifying the intelligence of education.
We may not consider a girl to be the best student because she did not have a GPA-five, but we may never find out that this girl's mother has died, raising her younger sisters, fulfilling many responsibilities in the family. If she had the opportunity to consider these extra things as her talent, wouldn't she be considered the best student of all?
We only give prizes to the winners of education competitions, but why don't we look for talents that everyone has their own kind of talent besides education? Why not try to develop it?
4.
No matter how much I speak out against the competition, not everyone will agree with me. There are so many competitions in the world, so now we encourage everyone to be competitive, to teach the rules to survive in the competition. Many believe that only by competing can a huge team learn a lot very quickly and there is truth in their words.
So when I get the chance, I tell the kids, don't compete against others, if you have to compete, do it with yourself. Competing with others makes you feel bad when you lose, no one ever loses in competing with themselves. Better a poor horse than no horse at all. No one loses, no one gets upset. You can win this competition without getting a prize.
I don't know if my parents will read this article. If you read it, I will tell them in a loud voice:
“Don't push your children into meaningless competition. If they themselves want to take part in something, let them take part. If they do well, they will be overjoyed, but do not rebuke them if they do not receive the reward. Encourage them to have a happy childhood. ”
Nowhere in my childhood did I feel like I had won a prize in a competition. But nowhere did the joy of my childhood fade for him.
Many of you don't know how much you have poisoned your life by pushing your helpless children into meaningless competition. They don't dare tell you that and tell me with tears in their eyes.
If childhood is not joyful, can that life be a fulfilling life?