Learning Parks of Possibilities

As part of the "Udaipur as a Learning City" process, Shikshantar: The Peoples’ Institute for Rethinking Education and Development has been working with children, young adults and their families to generate learning parks of possibilities throughout Udaipur (a city in Rajasthan, India). The "parks" are self-organizing spaces of learning that organically grow in different neighborhoods, in which people come together to creatively explore their questions, form new friendships, and unlearn debilitating attitudes/expectations. The participants in the parks range in age from 3 to 70; yet they are all co-learners, each with valuable experiences and ideas to share. Significantly, there is no compulsion, competition or coercion (rewards or punishments) in the learning parks.

What kinds of possibilities have emerged in the learning parks? Multiple expressions of individual and community potential, mostly in Udaipur’s local language (Mewari), like the creation of puppets, wallpapers, newsletters, songs, skits, dances, musical instruments, drawings, gardening, cooperative games, local festivals... Notably, none of the parks’ activities have used money; rather, people have harnessed the unique energy and materials already existing in themselves and their communities.