CURRICULAR MODULE

Iryna Babik, Department of Psychological Science, Boise State University

This curricular module could be used for high schoolers or undergraduate university students exploring cultural traditions in India. Specifically, this module explores the ways religious and spiritual beliefs and practices are passed from generation to generation in India. In this module, students will first explore different ways (e.g., family, community/society, education system, storytelling traditions, and media) religious and spiritual beliefs and practices are passed from generation to generation in India. Next, students will read and analyze narratives of parents in India describing the ways they pass their religious and spiritual beliefs to their children

Part 1

Religious and spiritual practices in India are deeply embedded in the cultural fabric of the nation, transcending generations through a complex interplay of familial, societal, and institutional influences. The transmission of these practices is a dynamic process, ensuring the continuity of India’s diverse religious heritage.

•  Familial Influence

The family serves as the primary unit for the transmission of religious and spiritual practices. From a young age, children are introduced to the rituals, prayers, and festivals that are integral to their family’s religious identity. Parents and grandparents play a crucial role in imparting religious knowledge and practices. For instance, in Hindu families, children are taught to perform daily rituals such as lighting a lamp before a deity, reciting prayers, and participating in festivals like Diwali and Holi. These practices are not just taught but are often performed together, fostering a sense of communal participation and belonging.

•  Social and Community Networks

Beyond the family, social and community networks play a significant role in the perpetuation of religious practices. In many communities, temples, mosques, churches, and gurdwaras are central to religious life. These institutions provide a space for collective worship and serve as centers for religious education. For example, in Sikhism, the gurdwara is not only a place of worship but also a community center where children learn about th

eir faith through classes and communal activities.

Festivals and communal celebrations also serve as important means of transmitting religious practices. Festivals like Eid, Christmas, Navratri, and Pongal bring together entire communities, providing a platform for the younger generation 

to learn and engage in religious traditions. These events are often marked by storytelling, music, dance, and other cultural expressions that convey religious teachings and values.

1.3. Educational System

Formal education also plays a role in the transmission of religious and spiritual practices. Many schools in India incorporate religious education into their curricula. For instance, in schools run by Christian missions, students might learn about Christianity alongside their regular subjects. Similarly, schools run by Hindu organizations often include teachings on Hindu scriptures and philosophy. These educational experiences provide a structured environment for the younger generation to learn about their religious heritage.

1.4. Oral Traditions and Storytelling

Oral traditions and storytelling are another vital means of passing down religious practices. Stories from religious texts such as the Ramayana, Mahabharata, Quran, Bible, and Guru Granth Sahib are narrated to children, often by elders in the family or community. These stories are rich with moral and spiritual lessons, and their repeated telling helps to ingrain religious values and principles in the minds of the young.

1.5. Media and Technology

In the contemporary era, media and technology have emerged as significant tools in the transmission of religious and spiritual practices. Television programs, movies, and online platforms offer religious content that is accessible to a broad audience. For instance, televised serials of the Ramayana and Mahabharata have played a significant role in familiarizing young Indians with these epic stories. Additionally, social media platforms and religious apps provide resources such as prayers, scriptures, and religious discourses, making it easier for individuals to engage with their faith.

•  Important Points

It is important to note that the transmission of religious and spiritual practices is not a static process. It evolves with changing social, economic, and cultural contexts. The younger generation often reinterprets and adapts traditional practices to fit contemporary lifestyles. This adaptability ensures that religious practices remain relevant and meaningful across generations.

In conclusion, the transmission of religious and spiritual practices in India is a multifaceted process involving familial teachings, community participation, formal education, oral traditions, and modern technology. This intricate web of influences ensures that India’s rich and diverse religious heritage continues to thrive, adapting to new contexts while maintaining its core essence. Through these channels, the spiritual legacy of India is passed down, nurturing a sense of identity, continuity, and community among successive generations.

Part 2

• The Task Indian parents of children 5 years old and older were asked the following question: “Do you engage in any spiritual practices like religious practices, meditation, mindfulness, or contentment? If yes, do you engage your children in those practices and how do you do this?”

Instructions for task:

Below are answers of multiple parents.

• Read them, analyze, discuss with your teammates (groups of 3-5 students).
• Outline 3-5 main themes.
• Find some examples tying religious/spiritual beliefs and practices to the family, community, educational system, and cultural values.
• Report your findings in a 10-minute group presentation.

Responses of Indian Parents:

“I’m Hindu. We have so many religious practices and so many festivals. I make sure that my children, along with my family, celebrate all the festivals. Whenever I’m going to a temple, I make sure I keep my children with me. So, they can ask questions about the religious practices, they learn, they understand, then they start believing. I love to give them answers regarding my religion. So, what is the meaning of prayer, why prayer, who is God, how it works. I love to teach.”

“I pray to god every day that I may pleasantly leave with everybody. I teach her to pray at bedtime and tell her again and again. She started at the age of 5 years and now she knows many prayers. Try to teach as much as you can before they start school because it is easier to remember. Also, parents’ behavior is important. Whatever the child sees his/her parents doing, that is how they will start behaving. Because if they see their parents talking rudely, then they too will think that is okay. But if they see that nobody raises their voice, everybody speaks respectfully, then they think that is the appropriate behavior. So, they internalize what they see their parents doing.”

“Yeah, after the age of five years, I make them realize about the existence of God, we start doing namaz together. They recite little verses of Quran, they learn their meanings. And they are practicing these things. They know what is acceptable behavior and what is not acceptable behavior in my religion. They know and they know others’ religions too. They are very compassionate about things. They send gratitude towards God, whatever you have, gratitude practicing. We just say, all praise to God, all the way to the Lord. We just say thank you to everyone. By watching me they also do the same things.”

 “I go to the temple and my children go with me. I do not force them. They ask questions, “Why are you doing this?” I gave them examples: in the morning, you bow to the sun, the sun gives us positive energy, which is very good for your body. I would also chant mantras with my children every morning. They give you a different aura, like meditation. Mantras connect you with the God, they also calm the mind and improve concentration.”

“I don’t practice a lot, but the basic thing is folding my hands in front of the deity offering small prayers. I don’t ask my son to do anything, but he sees me pray and understands that before the exam we should pray to the god so that we can do well in our exam. So, these days he also does that, like he folds his hands in front of the deity and asks the God will to guide him. And so automatically religious practices transfer through observing others. My mother-in-law is also there, so she does little bit of religious practices, like pujas, so by observing all this, he has picked it up. So, these days we see that when we pass in front of a temple, automatically he folds his hands and bows his head.”

 “Together with children, we go to the temple. In the beginning, they come with you to the temple because you go to the temple. But when they get older, they go out of their own relationship with God, because of their own understanding. Religion is not just about rituals and ceremonies; it is a way of life. It teaches children about morality, compassion, and respect for others. Through festivals, prayers, and religious stories, we pass on important life lessons to our children, teaching them the difference between right and wrong and instilling in them a sense of responsibility and community.”

“I don’t believe so much in rituals and practices (like place a tikka, do a puja), but I strongly believe in God. And I strongly believe in nature. So, nature is God for me. Work is God for me. So, these two things I always emphasize to my children. And I keep telling them, whenever you are in trouble, revisit nature, and you will find your solutions there. I am a firm believer of Shiva. But Shiva to me is doing good things to others. Shiva to me means wellbeing. Sometimes you feel like praying, you pray, but it should not become an exercise. But do good to others. Think about their well-being and visit nature. And don’t hurt nature or control it.”

“Not really, we do worship our gods and all that, but it is up to some limitation. Like we do not spend much in religious practices, we spend around 15 to 20 minutes a day, that is enough, yeah. From the age of 10 years, my kids were worshiping and learning some of the mantras and reciting them regularly, that is it.”

“In our home, we make sure to do religious and spiritual practices every day. Whether it’s lighting a diya in the evening, reciting prayers, or participating in community service, these activities help us bond as a family and teach our values to children. We also celebrate various festivals, they bring joy and unite people.”

“From the age of 2.5-3 years, children start learning to be a Hindu, go to a temple, and pray. Also, I do yoga and I teach my children yoga. I tell them every day, “If you have no time for yoga then do your house chores, this is yoga for you”. Yoga keeps your body strong and mind clear.”

“I do very little, but I do go to temples, I believe in God. God is always there. But it does not mean that God looks at us only when we pray. We do good things. That is prayer to God. We do our duties sincerely without corruption, without theft of duty. That is also a prayer to God. So, whether you go to a temple and pray or not, if you do good work, God is always there with you. We do go to temples, but we have less belief in the blind faiths. We do practice, but we don’t go into blind practices. All that we don’t believe because those people do only to grab some money on the practice. We believe in the good practices that are there. We believe in God.”

“My spouse is too much into this, so she used to give them that type of religious teachings. From the birth, when my daughter was two years, she would tell her, “You have to raise in the morning and before going to school, thank God, and at the end of the day, thank God – okay, my day today was so good, so thank you God.”

“We follow Hindu religion. Because every day we go to temples, so my small children also go with us from about the age of three. Religion helps us find peace and stay strong. It makes us look inside ourselves and become better people. For our children, it helps them stay calm and happy.”

“I used to do spiritual practices, but my son was hardly influenced by that. I used to do puja, but my son did not want to participate, said, “I don’t believe in it”. It was his own belief I never said that you do because we do. But after he married he started doing puja.”

“Yeah. I’m  Hindu, but my children go to a Catholic school. At home, before they go to school, they have to pray for half an hour every day to Hindu gods, then they go to school and pray to Catholic gods. At school, children also do yoga.”

“No, I am not doing any yoga. But we pray. Along with Muslim religion, we pray five times. My girls also learn Quran at school. They have a separate teacher for that. That’s what we call Islamic teacher. They get those classes almost every day. Every day, they learn one or two lines from Quran. We also teach them how to pray at home, and we are not happy if they do not pray. We just want to make sure children know right and wrong things. If they do the right things, then then their future will be better.”

 “Spirituality has been a very important part of my life. We all believe in something, but we don’t actually know, at least I don’t know for a fact. So what spirituality is to me at this point is being open to the fact that I don’t know, first of all, and then try to be conscious of, okay, what is it? And don’t just forget the fact that I don’t know. Now I know that I don’t know every single time. But try to be conscious of that and there is all I do in the mornings is like 10 or 15 minutes of just sitting down and just seeing what is happening inside. I don’t even call it meditation. It’s not because I’m not being meditative because it’s a very deep process that has to really, to feel to happen. But I just sit down and really see what is happening in my head. And in terms of conveying that to my kids, I am going to do that. I started introducing them to Indian deities and they have been seeing me doing a whole prayer or sitting down and meditating almost every day in the morning. They know that daddy does this and they’re curious. They just sit there and observe me. Some days, they feel like sitting down with me and doing what I’m doing. Of course, they don’t know what really I’m doing. But I think after a certain age they will understand. Don’t restrict them. Don’t tell them anything new that they don’t understand. But put them to some practice. Practice sitting down, doing something. It can be physical exercise for them. And that I think that’s something that I would like to convey – having a practice is very important. And once you settle yourself down and once you’re actually balanced enough that you don’t have to do any more practices, that’s great if you can get there.”

“We follow Hindu religion. We have a lot of Gods. We have a temple at home. So, every day, after he takes a shower, we ask him to come here, pray for two minutes and then go. And then whatever we do as a family, we make sure that he is there with us. We teach him the chants that we do in our religious things. So, he knows some of those. We also have him go through the rituals that we do. So, he is learning those. It starts even before they’re born, you know, when the mom is pregnant, there’s always praying to the God, for healthy child and healthy mother and all that. And then as soon as they’re brought into the world, there are certain things that happen at several stages of their life – some rituals. One is called a naming ceremony where we have an official ritual to name the baby. We have another ritual when they start eating the solid foods. And then we take them to a temple.”

“I do meditation and yoga. And one thing we do, is being like cultivating gratefulness. So, we do this thing every night before we go to bed that I ask them what was the best part of the day for them? For them it’s like thinking about the good parts of the day and going to bed with that instead of complaining. That is that gratefulness thing.”

“We do. I light a lamp in our house twice a day. In the mornings, before they leave the house, they’re supposed to go in front of the altar and get blessings. And, also, when I am doing pujas in the evening they come and sit with me and chant. We chant together whenever we have time. Especially during our Indian holidays, we all sit together and chant. And the meditation is in the form of chanting. So, kids do it three to four times a week when they are home. Let them get the blessings before they eat the dinner. Contentment comes from what they see within the family: how happy we are with what we do; that is the contentment. We don’t talk about the luxury. We talk about what we have today and how we can keep what we have today and improve upon it. We don’t talk about things that we cannot really afford.”

“I think meditation has lots of health benefits, but I do not have time for it now. In terms of religion, there celebrate certain festivals like Diwali, which is a festival of light, we prey to Lakshmi and Ganesh, and we do puja at home. First, my daughter just liked the little figurines of idols and the candles, but now she knows who Lakshmi is, what to do during the ceremony, and how to do it. She does it all. So those are small things that I pass on, which is not entirely is strictly religious, it’s more of a cultural thing. Going to the temple is also a great opportunity for a child to get involved with the community.”

 “We go together to the temples and we pray at home every day in the morning and again before going to sleep. We teach our kids to tell the God, “It’s a very beautiful day and thank you for giving me whenever I get the new thing like toys or something.”

“No, actually, although, our really official religion is Hinduism, but we’re not really a very orthodox kind. We do not feel the need to go to a temple. But there are some practical things that improve health. For example, meditation is good. It helps you concentrate. My son and I sometimes would sit together for two-three minutes and meditate. And sometimes, maybe to please me, he says it feels good, but I’m not really sure about honesty of his answer.”

“From the time children were very little, I would teach them to be centered, God-centered. Do not take this moment for granted. The new day is like a new birth. It’s a new opportunity. So, we start each morning with a short prayer. I tell them to do it, and they do. So, we pray in the morning: just sit, meditate, do some om mantra, just have a moment of silence before leaving the house. They sit for one minute, I stay longer. But the idea is that they have that connection. They do the Suriya Namaskar, which is 12 cycles of salutations to the sun. The mantras teach children to be friendly to everybody, do not discriminate, be radiant (radiate the smile), be active, remove ignorance, and become enlightened. The idea is, because the practice has been a part of their daily routine, one day they will think, yeah, this, this is powerful, this is really good. Then in the evening, we have a family prayer. And then after that, maybe we’ll read something from the spiritual texts together and just got to talk to, because the idea is to connect with each other as a family with God in the center. And then pray again, just one small prayer to say thank you for the gift of Shanti. Ask for forgiveness and reflect on mistakes you have made. All these practices help keep the grounding in a spiritual rather than material.”

 “We engage in all sorts of religious practices. There are Gods in our house, and we pray to the God. And every time before he goes for an exam or anything, we make sure he bows to the God and says, “Help me out here”. We don’t do any mindfulness at home, but my son does taekwondo at school and they meditate during the taekwondo sessions.”

“We’re not religious at all, so we don’t do anything religious at all. In fact, my son has never been to a temple. I do yoga since for 25 years I do classical dancing, t’s part of that. I don’t routinely sit down for 5 minutes to do it, but it’s a practice. Days when I get a chance, I do yoga more for 10 minutes. My son does taekwondo, it is a martial art and is very much about mindfulness. So, he’s exposed to that through his training. And there are times when he gets too emotional or he’s too invested in himself and I tell him, maybe you’re just focusing, looking at yourself, maybe look away from yourself and that helps. I would tell him, take a deep breath and just close your eyes and do whatever. Just look outside the window when we’re going in the car, just enjoy nature, that kind of stuff. So, I do take him for walks, I ask him to be mindful of plants and flowers. Now he is very aware of all of this.”

“Religious practices we do involve puja, my children do it with me and my husband. We go to the temples, we celebrate Diwali, celebrate Holy. My children participated in puja rituals from a very young age, like two years old. I didn’t send them to religious classes or anything like that, but whatever I did at home that’s what they followed.”

“Yes, very much. We do a morning and evening prayer at my house every day. I made the rule that before kids leave the house they will pray just to make sure everything is okay. They don’t have to follow my husband and me: we have all different beliefs for the gods, but they have to know the gods and certain mantras, this is part of our culture. When they were in middle school, in the evening we used to sit together once in a while and recite Hanuman, Chalisa, Gayatri mantra. Every day, I would ask them to think and forgive themselves for their mistakes. I do certain rituals where they are part of that: we do Prasad together with my husband and I take them to Gurudwara the Sikh temple together; they know how to follow the rules there and, being there they see me doing all the rituals, so they know the practices.”

1.3. Rubrics

Content (50 points):

Outline of the main themes (25 points);

Relevance of examples (25 points).

Organization and structure (20 points):

Clarity and flow (10 points);

Introduction and conclusion (10 points).

Delivery (20 points):

Presentation skills (10 points);

Engagement and enthusiasm (10 points).

Time Management (10 points).

Total: 100 points.