Bridging gap between urban stress and emotional well-being: What Mumbai can learn from France’s animal care curriculum

In France, learning how to care for animals is no longer restricted to pet-owning households or after-school clubs. Animal welfare and pet care have formally entered the school curriculum, marking a significant shift in how education systems understand emotional learning. 

Children are taught how animals experience stress, fear, comfort, and trust, lessons that, educators argue, are as critical as mathematics or language. The idea is simple: empathy is a life skill, and it can be taught early.

As Indian cities like Mumbai continue to struggle with conflicts around stray animals ranging from complaints and relocations to outright cruelty, the French model raises a timely question: Can structured animal care education change how urban children grow into adults who share space with animals?

In Mumbai, animal welfare education currently exists in fragments, occasional workshops, NGO-led sessions, or moral science chapters that touch lightly on compassion. But there is no sustained, age-appropriate academic framework that teaches children how to coexist with animals in a dense urban environment.

That gap is what city-based animal welfare groups are trying to bridge, one school at a time.

This Friday, Pawfriends, a Mumbai-based animal welfare collective, is set to interact with nearly 600 students at Guru Nanak Higher Secondary School and Junior College in Sion’s GTB Nagar. The session is designed not as a lecture, but as a conversation, one that begins with the emotional worlds of animals before moving to practical realities.

At the heart of the session is a 20-point module that introduces students to the basics of being responsible companions to the city’s strays. It includes guidance on approaching unfamiliar animals, first response in case of injuries, dos and don’ts of feeding, and why adoption is preferable to buying pets. But organisers insist the real lesson lies elsewhere.

Child psychologists and educators have long warned that children today are exposed to intense academic pressure and competitive stress at increasingly younger ages. Animal welfare educators argue that without emotional outlets, this stress can harden into indifference or worse, aggression towards vulnerable beings.

Introducing animal care into schools, they say, does not just benefit animals. It helps children recognise fear, distress, and dependence in others, skills that translate into healthier peer relationships and conflict resolution.

In many Indian households, animals, especially strays, are still framed as threats, nuisances, or sources of disease. That narrative, activists argue, is often absorbed uncritically by children. “Instead of seeing animals as co-inhabitants of the city, children are taught to see them as intruders,” says one educator involved in such programmes. “Schools are one of the few spaces where that narrative can be gently unlearned.”

School authorities who have hosted animal welfare sessions say the impact, though subtle, is tangible.

At Guru Nanak Higher Secondary School, principal Madhavi Naik reportedly recalled a recent incident where a stray dog wandered into the campus. Instead of panic or complaints, students and staff worked together to ensure the animal received care and was connected with a rescuer.

Naik believes this response did not emerge overnight. “Children study animals in textbooks every year, but they are rarely taught how to live alongside them,” she said. “These sessions fill that gap.”

France’s decision to institutionalise animal welfare education offers a roadmap. By embedding lessons into formal curricula—rather than treating them as extracurricular add-ons—schools send a clear message about societal values.

For Mumbai, such an intervention could be transformative. The city is home to lakhs of community animals, and conflicts often arise from misinformation about rabies, feeding, territorial behaviour, or animal body language. Teaching children these basics early could gradually reduce fear-driven responses and cruelty.

Experts suggest that even one structured module per academic year, tailored to age groups, could make a difference. Visual learning, interaction with trained handlers, and scenario-based discussions could replace rote moral instruction.

The French move is also backed by academic thinking. A 2024 paper by Aloïse Quesne, Associate Professor of Private Law at the University of Évry Paris-Saclay, argues that including respect for animals in the moral and civic education syllabus is far from symbolic. The shift, the paper notes, fundamentally redefines the idea of “living together” by extending it beyond human relationships to include animals and nature. 

By recognising animals as sentient beings with cognitive and emotional capacities, the curriculum encourages students to move naturally from understanding to care, and from care to protection. Quesne also stresses that for such learning to be effective, animal-related issues must cut across subjects and be supported by proper teacher training, ensuring that empathy towards animals is not an occasional lesson but a foundational value embedded throughout schooling.

Animal welfare education is not about turning every child into an activist or rescuer. It is about normalising kindness, responsibility, and coexistence in a city where humans and animals are forced into close proximity.

While France’s curriculum recognises this,  Mumbai’s grassroots efforts suggest the city is ready for a similar conversation. But whether policymakers choose to listen may determine the future of the city’s strays, and the emotional landscape of its next generation.