Week 3

Term4 , week 3, 2007-2008, March, Saturday. 11.45-1.15 pm
THEME FOR THE TERM: INCREDIBLE RACE
FOCUS FOR THE DAY: SUMO WRESTLING





SHARING:
The children start with sharing on the blocks about there favourite toy ,where after sharing their stories and ideas, as well as displaying good listening skills and sensitivity to each other they quickly go on to the warm ups.

WARM UPS:
Here they make a transport to take them to Japan by writing as well as experiencing a moving and speaking rhyme about a transport. We divide our selves in two groups where each one was making a transport. Jenny and me acted as facilitators and motivators while the children constructed their own rhyme. The rhyme that my group wrote went like this.

It is a yellow seat train,
It has six buttons,
One goes to London, One goes to Egypt.
One goes to Australia and one goes to America.
One comes back to India.
It goes chock chock chock and
stops in the station.
The driver is Shivam & Aditya
A good usage of language and excellent team work.

DRAMA:
As all of us reached Japan, I quickly turned into a Japanese Hostess and greeted them with konishiwa (hello) while Jenny put on a Sumo wrestlers costume. The children were in splits on hearing my Japanese accent. They all tried imitating me thus displaying a very flexible range of vocal expression. The rikishi (sumo wrestler) took them to doya (wrestling ring) and showed them the sumo moves. They got extremely engaged in the martial arts and its rules, thus , displaying a strong intellect and concentration along with good age appropriate physical awareness.

JOURNAL:
The very engaging class got over with a moving and speaking rhyme on sumo wrestling, where the children used dynamic words like stomp, push, hold, strong and fall, having experienced them in the drama.
I felt having fun during the drama allowed them to extend their experience into good language skills. It was heartening to see how even the young Aryan was at ease with writing a rhyme all by his own.

week 2

Term4, week2, 2007-2008 (March) , Saturday, 11.45-1.15pm,teacher-Jenny


THEME OF THE TERM:THE INCREDIBLE RACE

FOCUS FOR THE DAY : PREPERATION FOR THE RACE



MY FIRST CLASS:
Here I was, walking towards my first class with jittery steps, unsure of what was to greet me. As I entered the class, an exuberant hi! from Jenny put me a little bit at ease in terms of my body language and mental state.
The prodding eyes of the children (inquisitive) made me blurt out a little some thing, about my self and the smile on their faces assured me that I was understood .

SHARING:
OBSERVATIONS AND REFLECTIONS:
The sharing made me relate to and understand a little bit of each of the child's personality and attitude. A sudden burst of sensitivity, understanding and cooperation was created.
Liba: came across as confident with good inter personal skills when she shared her pen & did so enthusiastically, answering all the queries quite comfortably.
Aryan: the youngest in the group was reluctant to share an object, was however contributing to sharing by asking questions, by listening, concentrating, thinking and being inquisitive.
Sambhav :came across as imaginative, despite not bringing an object for sharing , but by putting forth interesting questions.
Shivam :shared his book with enough gusto and brought forth the fact that he was confident with good articulation.
Isha shared her bag with good articulation, strong vocabulary and ease of expression conveying that she has a strong command over the language.
Abhinav, Aditya, Debangshi & konkana did not show up for the first class.

WARM UP:
The physical warm up : was hop on a leg , which loosened up all of us in general and having found a physical freedom we were more receptive towards the activities that were to follow.
The voice warm up: was resonators and Shivam showed how loud and clear a voice he has.
Speech warm up: were the poems on the block.

DRAMA:
Now, we were team India, freshly recruited against teams from other countries for the incredible race all around Asia , starting our journey from New Delhi.
Each one of us took out the magic box from the cupboard and wore the costume of our favourite character and did our little antics and movements as the particular character. Each child came out to be quite imaginative & could put on the appropriate facial expressions and the wonderful gestures of the characters like superman, spiderman, princess, Jerry & witch. I joined in wielding my magic as a wizard. Our good use of space, imagination, engagement as a group and confidence won team India a place in the incredible race.


JOURNAL:
Having reached back the reality zone post drama, the children sat down to describe themselves & their costumes, where Isha, Aryan and Shivam came across as quite creative, Liba as neat and meticulous & Sambhav as imaginative.

MY REFLECTIONS ON THE TEACHER AND THE CLASS:

This class showed me a key feature on part of the caring model "the teacher" where she was celebrating each child's effort as an achievement. The atmosphere was free from pressure, stimulating and motivating. I wondered, and then acknowledged the atmosphere, as being quite close to an ideal learning environment.