Colours!!

Colours.. since when was it that teaching colours to children became a practice.. well, in a normal conversation with a child first its name is asked and then what colour is its frock or shirt.. and if the child dosen't answer.. then .. lo! it is a shame for the kid and more so to its parent.. and if it says it in its mother tongue immediately any adult around will supply the name in english...( and in many cases learning of English stops at that !
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and have we wondered why we ask the children which is its favourite colour? when i was asked this question.. much when i was an adult,i was perplexed.... can I have my favorite colour? but why/ because.. i was never consulted when my parents brought me dress , or a tooth brush.. colour was to me very natural.. the color of rice, the color of the chappati, the colour of the coffee powder... the colour of the butterflies in my garden... and there were so many greens that i even to day do not know to name them... i never felt the necessity even today to learn them...but i knew when it was time enough to pick some thing looking at the colour.. what if i did not know to name it!colour in that sense was very functional... so was smell... and texture...

now let me come to the schools i go to... the children are amidst nature... green of different kinds around them flowers of various kinds.... and how important is it to fill their class with colours? do they have any value?( there are no traffic lights here, yet!) did not these colours remove the children from the environment and draw them to shops where everything is colourfully displayed....( and because it is in the science book ..we give environmental lessons to kids to see colours in nature....) but which colour is valued more? sorry not the blue in the sky.. the wonderful colour of the sunrise and sunset.... the blue of the toffee, the orange of the fanta.. pink of the barbie doll....but the kids here learn to look everything wholistically....they know the plant s around them, they know to reap, by looking at the colour...they not only know an orange but also how to grow one!!(does any city bred child know about oranges other than its colour??)i am sorry if these kids are educated they will stop growing oranges and buy colourfully packed orange tang!!

now come to this question"which is your favourite"( i think this was created to create a consumer who could demand his choice and get it too)!! this is a question which has huge cultural implications.... the child exposed to this questoning learns that it can have a choice all the time... no, we were never asked this .. why am i not comfortable? because I belong to a society where everybody ate and drank what was made in the kitchen and we wore the dress that parents bought us..what happens if such questions are asked to children who come from families where they cannot afford to give choice?? won't the child think low of its family, grow up with inferiority complex? it was so painful to me to listen that children ( in the schools i work)do not go to school because they have no kaaja to take and even if taken it is very inferior... because some one brings a packet of biscuits( mind u it is the colour of the wrapper that makes it so wanted!) while he has only batmas( a local protein rich dal) to take!
so the capitalist has made a child as small as 5-6 years old disrespect the food the parents can afford !!
is any body listening??
Is asking such questions child centered clearning??