I see a sparkle in their eyes when I enter their room.
A tiny room which can seat 20 children at the most. The adjacent rooms are not separated with a wall. Rather, they are divided in a way that would give an impression of office cubicles.
But it is not any office space that I am describing.
It is the school which I visit every Thursday precisely at 11 '0 clock and leave exactly at 12.
It is an underprivileged school and has been adopted by an NGO that goes mobile carrying storybooks to selected schools in Hyderabad.

That sparkle in their eyes tell me that they have been waiting for another Story Reading session.
Probably, this may be their one hour of complete enjoyment for the whole week.
The noise that surrounds the place (coming from all the adjacent classrooms) do not bother them nor me. Of course, this makes my task a little difficult. I 'shout'  the story rather than 'read' it for them:)
At the end of each story, they eagerly wait for the fun- filled worksheets or activities.
Their enthusiasm never fades.

I have worked in an International School earlier and I cannot remember a single child who showed this kind of earnestness in the classroom. I was never happy in that job even though I was paid.
But here, I am just a volunteer working without any incentives and I am 'happy'.

Like and dislike

It has happened so many times that I liked few people without any particular reason and disliked a few without any evidence for doing so...
And those perceptions have changed vice versa a lot many times.

There is a boy (who is in Grade 4) in the apartment whom I encountered several times last year. He is a boy with special needs.
Being a remedial teacher and after knowing that he is kid with special needs I avoided talking either to him or to his mother.

It's difficult to understand what made me do so.

I presumed that he was a child with lot of behavioural issues (which he ought to have considering his condition). I even thought how would I handle such a kid if by any chance approached me for help.

But, lately I have been taking English remedial classes for this boy!

One fine day, his mother approached me for assistance for coping up with his English and attention difficulties and I did not find a reason to say NO.
So, I accepted.

Few days took me to understand him and his behaviour (it's more difficult as he is slightly autistic).

Now, we seem to be getting along very well with each other.

He doesn't miss a single class, gets upset if the class is suspended without any notice, speaks a few English sentences which he failed to do earlier, loves watching his favourite Brain gym video. What more, he even wishes me good evening and thank you while entering the class and walking out.

He even laughs which I thought he seldom did. Though he does that controlling himself (do not know why), but he looks very cute when he does.

Rhythm and Movement therapy

Attended a rejuvenating Dance therapy session today at our school which was demonstrated by Dr. Tripura Kashyap, a dance therapist.

As her colleague's body moved to the tunes of enchanting music most of our bodies too wanted to sway.

How well she explained the way body movements can be used in the classroom which, not only enhances learning but revitalises the creativity of each student and teacher.

Dance, which can be learned not for a performance but as a process, can be amalgamated in each subject a child is learning in class.

Simple usage of props such as balloons, sticks, stretching ropes can make a boring topic more interesting.

She imbibed Howard Gardner's concept of 'Multiple Intelligence' to express each child's unique ability too.

By far it was an amazing session, to conclude.

This incident happened just today in my class.

She is a second grade student- very cute, still filled with baby talk (as she cannot pronounce few letters) and very innocent too.
After she completed her work, I started chatting and pulling her leg saying that you always go down from higher classes the following year. So, I said "you will go to first grade next year".
She kept refusing and at the end she revealed something which made my heart sink. She said 'few of her classmates do ask her to go to first grade again as she does not know the spelling of words'.

This she said casually without any bad feeling which only reflects her innocence.

This is the kind of situation faced by many of the children who have a learning difficulty.
They are not completely accepted by the peers even though a lot of counselling is done by the class teachers.

These children are always looked down as someone who is slow in understanding and cannot match the speed of rest of the class.

This indifferent attitude of peers along with the frustration of not being able to learn brings down the confidence level of the child to a very great extent.

I wish these children could be understood better.

Teaching (or learning) Math

I have always been bad with numbers.
Except the basic operations of addition and multiplication all other calculations make me phobic.
Sometimes I even thought if I were dyscalculic (may be in some respect yes!!!).
Though, being with S I have learnt a great deal now.

When I started taking classes for my student 'N' I concentrated mainly on English.
But her mother explained that not only English but Math too was a great area of concern.
She wanted me to teach both the subjects.
Now, I couldn't admit to her that I was so bad in Math especially even at the third grade level.

I decided to give it a try, though I started it much later when she showed some improvement in English.
At present, to my amusement I am not just teaching her Math but I have learnt a great deal while being in that process. (I must thank S too here as he has given me lot of ideas).
I can easily connect one area to another related topic, can prepare a lesson plan and make it interseting.
As for N's mother is concerned, she is very happy that her daughter has shown changes (if not lot yet considerably)in her 'attitude' towards the subject. This attitude change can make a lot of difference. This who once hated the subject likes to learn the same numbers now!

And I am glad that I too changed my attitude from 'NOT teaching MATH' to 'YES I will teach MATH'.

A B C D

Majority of parents think of the learning process in terms of the letters of the alphabet that their child has learnt.

Just for example.,the other day i was speaking to a neighbour at my native place whose son is almost of my daughter's age. And i casually asked if he is attending school. She said 'he doesn't in class but cries all the time' and soon she added but 'he can recite ABCD very well and can count up to 10'.
There are parents who search for schools for their children where there is stress on teaching academics rather than anything else.

What these parents not want understand is to see if their child has the readiness to read and write. A child cannot read or write just because he has started schooling. It takes a lot of mental as well as physical preparation on the part of the child to formally start writing or reading.

I was amazed at one of my acquaintance's (whose son too is slow at learning) remark on a child who had learning difficulty.
She remarked "may be her parents doesn't shout at her and don't control her so she has the problem?" Even after telling her what the problem was she was not in a position to understand it.

Initially i thought the educated parents would understand such problems better but now it doesn't hold good. Because, even if some of the parents are educated and hold good jobs their attitude towards education and the problems related to educating the children remain to be age old.

Of course there are people who very sensitive their children's feelings and take very good care but still a majority of them whose mindset needs to be changed towards learning.

On handwriting...

I have been reading some material on 'Teaching Handwriting to Children' and i came across this beautiful note by someone called Brown:"What is stressed today is handwriting to be 'functional' i.e., stress is on legibility and speed.

...the primary goal in penmanship is to produce efficiently a free flow of ideas or easily read thoughts onto paper with a minimum of attention to the mechanics of the art."