More from H.H. B.V. Swami Maharaja on Gurukul syllabus

In a meeting held at Salem with the agenda of Farms and Gurukula- strategies to establish, following are a few points emphasized by Guru Maharaja.

1. The main reasons for failure of our society's earlier attempts to give good guidance to our kids in our Gurukula are as follows.After Srila Prabhupada's leaving this world, the focus of our leaders attention was disproportionately on the book distribution(because of some misuse of the competition spirit encouraged by Srila Prabhupada on distributing books) to the extent that supervision of Gurukulas suffered.Another reason was lack of training of the Gurukula teachers. Sometimes kids were mistreated.Yet another reason was lack of mature teachers and this resulted in child abuse.
2. As far as the curriculum is concerned, Srila Prabhupada books are the curriculum.On repeated occasions Guru Maharaja has emphasized this. Teach them from Srila Prabhupada books from very beginning.Kids have the capacity to understand philosophy if presented properly.Keep the mundane subjects' study to the minimum.Let the kids be absorbed in Krishna Consciousness from the beginning.In modern curriculum we are trained to view the world through our imperfect material senses.This brings havoc to them and the society. At the time when such a person gets the chance to come in contact with a pure devotee and pure teachings of the scriptures,due to his perverted training to view everything from his contracted vision,he tries to understand even them through his imperfect senses and as expected, gets baffled,resulting in complete misunderstanding and thus lose the great opportunity afforded by human birth.Thus in our Gurukulas we have to train our kids to see every thing(including themselves)from Sastra caksu i.e. eye of Lord Sri Krishna.A complete shift of paradigm. Then the kids can themselves appreciate how everyone except the devotees are in maya and will never get attracted to adopt their values of life.
3. The atmosphere should be spiritually very enlivening so that the children feel very happy in contrast to how the children feel burdened by the modern curriculum.
4. History can be taught from Srila Prabhupada's perspective. That is from history we can learn how great leaders because of not being Krsna conscious brought miseries to people and were frustrated in there attempts to help others- to give an example.
5. Emphasis should be also on spontaneous education and not just systematic education.Take the kids on yatras and teach them as you encounter different things and phenomenon from the perspective of Krsna Consciousness.That was the traditional system that children learn by hearing from the Guru.
6. Sanskrit helps to raise the consciousness of one who learns it,uses it for communication etc.Thus from the beginning kids should be taught sanskrit, if needed even karmi teachers can be employed.Proper pronunciation should be taught.Many languages should be taught from the early age as they have the capacity to pick up many languages simultaneously.
7. Ramayana, Mahabharat to be taught. Hitopadesh and Canakya niti can also be taught for wordly wisdom.
8. Teach them playing Mridanga and karatala. Music should be taught.
9. For physical exercises, wrestling, swimming and simple sports can be put into use with the care that sportive mentality is cultivated instead of the the competitive mentality.