Some of the most important lessons I have learned in school were never written on a blackboard.
By Prerana Kuppanatti
Principal, Matoshree Vitthai Podar Learn School, Niphad
There are days when I walk into school carrying a long list of things to accomplish—meetings to attend, decisions to make, concerns to resolve, targets to review and responsibilities that seem endless.
And then, somewhere between the morning assembly and the last bell, a child smiles at me.
A child waves.
Someone comes running to tell me about a small achievement.
Another child quietly says, “Ma’am, I wanted to tell you something.”
And suddenly, I remember why I am here.
I may be the Principal of the school, but every day, my students remind me that I am still a learner.
Because children teach us lessons no textbook can ever contain.
The child who taught me that small victories matter
I remember watching a child struggle to come on stage.
For some, standing before an audience is effortless.
For that child, it was a mountain.
There was hesitation. Fear. Nervousness.
But eventually, the child stepped forward.
Perhaps it wasn’t the most perfect performance.
Perhaps there were mistakes.
But when that child finished, there was something far more important than perfection – courage.
That day, I was reminded that achievement is not always about winning.
Sometimes, achievement is simply finding the courage to try.
And perhaps we adults need to celebrate that more often.
The child who reminded me that marks are not a measure of a human being
As educators and parents, we often ask children:
“How much did you score?”
But perhaps we should also ask:
“What did you learn?”
“Whom did you help?”
“What did you try even though you were afraid?”
“Did you become a little better than yesterday?”
A report card can tell us a child’s academic performance.
It cannot tell us how compassionate that child is.
It cannot measure resilience.
It cannot calculate kindness.
It cannot give a score for integrity, courage, creativity or empathy.
Marks are important, but they are not the identity of a child.
Our children are not machines designed to produce perfect scores.
They are human beings being prepared to enter a complicated world.
And our greatest responsibility as educators is not to create children who can merely answer questions.
It is to create young people who know how to face life.
The child who taught me forgiveness
Children can fight over something as small as a pencil.
For five minutes, they may declare that they will never speak to each other again.
And then…
they share their lunch.
They laugh.
They play.
They move on.
Watching them often makes me wonder:
When did we adults become so good at holding on?
Children forgive quickly.
They don’t maintain files of yesterday’s mistakes.
They don’t carry every disagreement into tomorrow.
Perhaps one of the greatest lessons they give us is this:
Life becomes lighter when we learn to let go.
The child who taught me that every learner has a different light
Every school has the academically brilliant child.
But it also has the child who struggles with mathematics and shines on the football field.
The child who finds textbooks difficult but can create something beautiful with their hands.
The quiet child who rarely speaks but notices when a friend is upset.
The child who may not win the race but never stops participating.
The child whose greatest achievement may simply be that they did not give up.
These children remind me that education cannot be one-size-fits-all.
Every child carries a different strength.
Our job is not to make every child shine in the same way.
Our job is to help each child discover their own light.
The child who taught me to listen
Sometimes a child walks into my office and says something that seems very small.
A friendship problem.
A fear.
A little disappointment.
A story from home.
Something that, to an adult, may appear insignificant.
But to that child, it may be the biggest thing in the world.
And sometimes, they don’t need a solution.
They simply need someone to listen.
That has taught me one of the most important lessons of leadership:
Listening is also leadership.
Before we correct a child, we must understand them.
Before we judge, we must listen.
Before we expect, we must connect.
Because children may forget many of our instructions.
But they rarely forget how we made them feel.
What I hope my students remember
Years from now, my students may not remember every lesson taught in their classrooms.
They may not remember every examination.
They may not remember every timetable or every school rule.
But I hope they remember something deeper.
That their teachers believed in them.
That their school gave them the courage to try.
That failure was not something to be ashamed of.
That kindness mattered.
That success was not only about standing first.
That their voice mattered.
That they were allowed to dream.
And most importantly – that they were valued not merely for what they achieved, but for who they were becoming.
Because when I look at a school, I don’t see only classrooms, corridors and report cards.
I see young lives in the making.
And that makes the responsibility of an educator enormous.
We are not simply teaching subjects.
We are influencing futures.
Every word we speak can build confidence or break it.
Every comparison can create insecurity.
Every encouragement can create courage.
Every opportunity we provide can open a door.
That is why I believe education must go beyond marks.
We are not preparing children merely to pass examinations.
We are preparing them to pass through life—with courage, character, compassion and confidence.
A Principal’s Diary
At the end of a long day, when the corridors become quiet and the classrooms are empty, I sometimes think about the hundreds of little faces I saw that day.
Some were happy. Some were struggling. Some were discovering something new. Some were simply trying to find their place in the world. And I realise that being a Principal is not only about managing a school. It is about being entrusted with a small part of someone’s childhood. That is a privilege I never want to take lightly.
So tomorrow, when the gates open and those little footsteps fill the corridors again, I will walk into school with the same purpose.
To teach.
To guide.
To listen.
To encourage.
And to learn.
Because after all these years, I have come to understand something beautifully simple:
A school may begin with teachers teaching children.
But the finest schools are built when teachers remain humble enough to let children teach them too.
And if one day my students remember me, I don’t want them to remember me simply as the principal who asked them to score higher.
I want them to remember me as the Principal who made them believe they could become more.