dreams on fire

i don't know y i named this post so ...probably because i have been listening to this song for the past half an hour or maybe because that is what i feel right now about D2R....i want it to soar higher and higher and truly make a difference , i have been rather lazy in updating the activities of D2R. Sorry 4 that. i really do not know how successful I'll be in translating what we did and felt to words but I'll try my level best... for the first time i actually feel "words would be insufficient".


We started on 26th of March, we made a set of cards with some simple questions on them so that we could check whether they are capable of answering them. Actually, we were all a bit nervous and did not want to go unprepared. It was a pretty daunting task trying to make questions - we were all trying to recall what each of us knew or studied in primary classes- "did we know meaning of the word favourite in 1st grade or was it the 2nd grade, what about the colours of the rainbow? was it the 3rd or 4th grade?" and so on - ultimately we managed to make a set of 30 questions for different age groups. In the process we turned out to be late by 15 minutes , i realised that one thing we can never teach the kids is punctuality because on all the days we have been late(including myself). Aku was punctual as usual and was waiting for us ..well that is aku, absolutely dedicated!!!there were 30 kids in total - most of them were sleeping they had to be literally dragged out of their beds...the little ones came rubbing their eyes to the study hall - a little kid(diana) went around announcing - teachermar vanitundu english padipikan! the kids were pretty excited - one of them told us she wanted to learn to speak like an Englishwoman. At first kids were pretty quiet, especially, when we asked them to introduce themselves in english - and i felt making them speak in english is going to be the most difficult job ...they were very reluctant to speak..they may write or read but we definitely need to make them think and speak in English...there were around 10 girls and 20 boys and by the end of the day they knew our entire biodata, thanks to rahi!(she became rather popular among the fellows) .

We made them read the questions on those cards and made them write the answers, taught the little ones to write their name, we basically tried to understand the extent to which they know the language. Earlier i had thought we could separate the kids into different batches based on their age groups but it is not a pragmatic solution since kids of the same age but studying in different medium schools have totally different levels of knowledge of the language. It was really painful to see kids in 4th grade struggling with the letters or the names of colours. We tend to take such things for granted,so it was a bit of a shock.
We realised that these kids needed to be taught from scratch. The last half an hour was spent in writing down all our names for the kids and bidding them adieu. It felt good to see they wanted us to come again. We had to promise the fellows we would bring them chetanmar next time and would also play cricket with them. (i seriously need some chetanmar volunteers)Among the girls there was a tiny cute one Keziah who kept whining and asked us to stay with them. On the whole it was a feel good experience.
on the first day our volunteers were aku, dhanya,disna, revathi, rahi and a special thanks to deepthi who made the cards for us.

BABY STEPS...

I feel at the top of the world today, the satisfaction in finally having started D2R, the excitement in receiving a positive response, the fact that our idea is going to be ultimately translated into action .....the very first institution we approached expessing an interest was by far the greatest stimulus for our endeavour.. we were not sure as to whether we should start off with teaching english, so we offered to help out with their studies and to our surprise, the authorites asked whether we could help the kids out with their communication skills... exactly what we had intended to do. Till now the baby steps we have taken have all been recieived favourably. The small size of the organisation would make the task easier for a group of amateurs like us. This Saturday, the 28th of march is going to be the first day of D2R.... and right now, i feel like a kid going to school for the first time .... excitement, happiness, appehension,doubt all clubbed together. Now we are to face the most daunting task of all - all this while we were concerned with how and where to start , now that we have a platform, we need to prove that our purpose is successfullyattained. we need to charter out a pedagogy, systematically divide the classes and distribute our work. We need to understand the needs of the kids and teach accordingly. So folks, put your thinking caps on and pool in your ideas as to how to make the classroom sessions more interactive

dream2reality - endeavour

i'm starting this blog as a symbol of our endeavour to do something - not a social service but a social responsibility. We are a bunch of final year engg students in trivandrum, a thought had been lurking around in our minds for a long time - for past 21 years v have been doing nothing but receiving education, y don't v reverse the process for a change. We daily come across several children who r not as blessed as us; being students the only tool v have now is knowledge, y dont v impart that vidya to those who might be really in need of it. We r at grassroot level now, just the seeds of thought have been sown , v need to flourish it into action. To start off, the issues r:
- who to address? where do v find the students?
- what to teach? our idea is to teach english as being able to communicate well in english would definitely put the kids at an advantage
- pooling in volunteers
i feel if the first two matters r sorted out the third wouldn't be a problem
friends any1 who can help us out in transforming our dream 2 reality, ur suggestions are welcome