Candle Decoration

Decorating the candles.

Today I came to know from our CAS co-ordinator Vijayalaxmi ma’am, that it’s time to decorate the candles and sell them. I was really happy and excited because I was waiting for this day to come soon. And finally the day has arrived.

I was all ready for it. Decorating the candle is not easy. A person should put all of his ideas in and be focused while decorating the candle. As I have told before creativity lies within me, I had many ideas coming in my mind. Getting fresh ideas is the best thing. 

We had to decorate the candles using 3D outliners or acrylic paints. I choose 3D outliners. It had more colours and it was easy to decorate the candles with it. My plan was to be simple and sober while decorating the candles. Too much of designs on the candle does not look good. We did this activity approximately for 2hours. We did not do at one instance. Whenever we had free periods, we would go to Deepshri ma’am, our art teacher and supervisor of this activity. Ma’am always gave us a target to complete the decoration, so it’ll be fast to complete the decoration.

Packing them in plastic wrap.

Getting candles ready for fund raising sale.

It was a great experience for me, thought I didn't learn much. I simply learned to be more creative, I hope I’ll learn more in my next activity. Till then enjoy!

Educating tomorrow’s stars_5

Diwali is the Indian festival of lights. It is celebrated almost all over India. On this the lord Ram had returned back to his kingdom and the people of the whole kingdom had welcomed him by lighting diyas. Today also in every house Diya are lighted. The Diya represents the how the inner light of us protects us and fight from darkness.

As we could not take the classes for two week due to our exams, today we decided to take the last session. As it was the last session and in the last two weeks we could not take the classes, we could not continue with our old plan. All of us and Shaila ma’am decided and planned that we should make their last day fun and enjoyable. So as Diwali was near we decided that our theme would be Diwali. Our supervisor suggested that we should do a small diya making session for the kids.

All of us together decided that we would make paper lanterns and small paper baskets for the kids. And in the basket we would fill them with chocolate and give it away to the children. So all of us worked collaboratively and collected the material for making the lanterns and baskets. Our art teacher demonstrated us how to make the paper basket and we quickly started off with it.

 In the starting as my friend Shafqat was having in difficulties in making the basket I helped him out. Once we were done with the baskets and lanterns we kept them aside. The children arrived and they were really happy to see us again. All of us first sat together and asked them about Diwali and what is the importance of it. All of us explained one by one about Diwali and the importance of it. It was great to see the curiosity in them. As few of them did not understand the meaning of darkness, we had to replace the word with monster and explain them. My only goal or aim was to achieve the happiness of these children and make them happy before they leave. After discussing, we gathered outside and made  

a big circle. Asmita and Himanshu distributed glue, diyas and decorative material respectively. I realized that as I had become more confident with these children and was committed to them, I made few children understand and demonstrated how to decorate diya. And I told them once, they started to do on their own.  

It was great to see them to work on their own. I felt really good as a teacher, after the activity we made them see a short cartoon or animation which was based on Diwali. Poverty is one of the global issues which the world has been facing. And India comes under the list of most poverty in the world. The main cause of poverty is the lack of education. Education in India is not affordable for lower class of people, despite government subsidy. I felt that it is our ethical responsibility being a member of the society that we should help those members who cannot afford education. By teaching them I somewhere felt unfair. I am studying in the IB school,which one of the best curriculum and these children cannot even afford to go one simple school. I felt that this is unfair, since everybody has the right to education. So i felt that if i have privilege I should share it with them.  India is a developing country and it should contribute to this global issue and make the change in India. Even if we start from one place or city then slowly the poverty and illiteracy would disappear from the country. I realized that what I was doing in this activity is, I am contributing it globally. I understood how much education is important for a child. Due to this poverty and illiteracy the number of crimes have also increased. Throughout the activity, by staying committed, determined and by taking this new challenge helped me complete my goal. 

Gardening Activity

Weeding my allotted area.

I am not much of a sweat breaking person. Not that I don’t like it but I usually don’t intend to. Gardening is something of that type.  I understand the importance of planting trees and saving the environment and all that stuff, but when it is about digging soil under the sun, it’s a challenge. I mean, for me at least.

So we gathered near our school garden area. Vijayalaxmi ma’am divided the area so that each of us got a small part of the garden. I took the tools and started removing the waste plants, it’s called weeding. 

It was really difficult. But I didn’t know how to use all those things.  But I wanted to do this task anyhow and so I worked hard to learn and put all my power in doing it. I was removing all the weeds but didn’t be careful about what kind of plants they were. They were some wild itchy plants and the small spikes on them were all over my hands in no time! It really annoying and I don’t like it when such things happen…. it kills the fun... I washed my hands and but still the itching didn’t stop. My classmate suggested to ignore it but how could I? Duh! I decided I will do something else. So I collected the wild grass in the tub that we got out and kept it in the tub and threw it away.

Putting fertilizers and ploughing the soil surrounding the white rose shrub.

It was very tiring, muddy, sweaty and for me sadly itchy. But still I enjoyed all the time I spent there. I and my friends were making jokes which really eased up the mood for me.  So we did some more work for some time and then we were done for the day! Phew! I got really tired but I really enjoyed it!

Educating tomorrow’s stars_4

Every child is very much interested to go to school and learn ABCD. And it is true that at the first time itself they pronounce LMNOP as elemenopee. I now understand why my teachers and parents use to laugh when I use to say this. Today I, my classmates and Ms. Shaila planned that we would teach the children about the alphabet A. We worked collaboratively and took out some worksheets. We would also teach them simple words like apple and ant.

As we made the children settle down, the first thing which I wrote on the board was the alphabet A. Then I asked the children if they knew what it was. As they didn’t know, I told them that this is “A”. And A is for “apple”. It was getting a little difficult to tell them about apple, therefore my friend Himanshu drew an apple on the board and made them understand. He also called Ganesh and made him write “A” on the board. After this we made our groups and sat with each children which we were allotted by Shaila ma’am. For today’s session my student was Abhas. We distributed the worksheets and the stationary items also. As it was time to teach them how to write “A”, this was the real challenge for me. This activity did mean a lot to be because I was the teacher here. I always wanted to know how it feels to be a teacher. Children do have the capacity of capturing things quick but not so quick that they learn it at one go. I first told Abhas to try and write himself. As he couldn’t I used the usual way of teaching that is holding his hand and make him write. I made him write the first line of the worksheet by this method only. I was happy to see that the nest three line he was able to write on his own. Though it wasn’t accurate but he tried and did his best. And after all practice makes the man perfect. It was quite fun to see the children learn in an enjoyable mood. It was a really great experience for me. I realized how much education is important and how the teachings of the teachers are important. In the starting of the activity I myself didn’t know that I had this capability. I could discover my strengths in this activity. I developed the way of teaching these kids in a new and a fun manner. I learned to communicate with these kids more freely, in a friendly manner.   That’s all for today. Let’s see what happens in the next class.

Till the stay happy!