WhatsApp and What a Wonderful World……

The school that my daughter attends for music decided to participate in the annual day celebrations of a school for children with special needs. When it was their turn, they got to the stage and stood shoulder to shoulder with the choir group of the celebrating school. Together they presented the popular song, “What a wonderful world” by Louis Armstrong. I felt it was quite an intense and emotional experience for all the participants as well as their parents. As they sang together

“I see trees of green, red roses too
I see them bloom for me and you
And I think to myself what a wonderful world……”

it was a defining experience for those kids who had little idea about the challenges associated with the term “special needs”.

But this is not the subject of this post. In preparation of the program, the teacher in charge had formed a group in the “WhatsApp”. She coordinated with the parent of this small group of voluntary participants letting us know about the time to drop-offs, pick-ups for rehearsals, dress codes and other critical details about the venue, meeting points etc. related to the final day. The kids these days are fully occupied and finding a common free time to rehearse by itself is no mean task.

“WhatsApp” was a great tool for those 5 weeks and it can be extremely efficient as long as it is strictly used for purpose. No customary “good mornings”, no forwarded messages, no spam… pure business. After the program, the group became defunct.

I wish we could use technology with such prudence….always! Not letting it infringe our personal space to dump others views, opinions or frustrations and create havoc!