Sunday, 19 August 2012

Mixed Feelings


I was super busy for the last month of my India trip so I’m really sorry that I couldn’t give updates on time. But here’s what I had written but never got the time to post from July 8-20!

When I started YFS, 10 weeks seemed like such a long time. But they flew by crazy fast. These past 2 weeks have been so busy and fun and stressful and sad and unforgettable all at the same time. We’ve spent the past couple days going around to different vastis and said goodbye to all the karyakartas and kids from the abhyasikas that we had met and worked with. One of the funniest and most memorable stories was during the last week when we visited a vasti we ate far too much for dinner and had to get back to the hostel on time. There were 5 of us and 2 motorcycles. So I got to be sandwiched in between Rhucha and Bapu Dada (the coordinator of Samutkarsha). One of the most memorable and bonding motorcycle rides I’ve had this summer!

Along with this fun in the last 2 weeks of YFS the thing that was keeping me insanely busy was my project! I ended up working on designing a program which connects corporate volunteers with vastis every week for 40 minutes to teach science. They will use a handbook that I’ve designed based on the 7th-10th grade school syllabus, which guides them through an effective science lesson. The 40 minutes starts off with the volunteer clearing up all the basic science concepts for that day’s topics through discussion and interactive learning. After this, the student’s will apply this knowledge through a hands-on experiment which uses materials that are found in slums so that kids can see how science is all around them. The last section is an interactive discussion on science in everyday life based on inquiry-based learning. 




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