Holiday Program IBM Pune Day 2

Now that the children knew what to expect from this program, the eagerness showed. The moment they entered the room they wanted this or that …. Specially “chai chai” (what that? – well that’s a surprise for Friday).




Day 2 began with the younger group finding the hidden birds with newspaper binoculars. The whole group was so exited with the search for hidden birds that even the elder group tried to come and join them to be a part of the fun. We then proceeded to make the paper cup bird puppets. It was nice to see even the youngest of the kids trying to trace out the wings and cut them. The kids enjoyed their bird puppets and we had a good time flying around with the bird puppets.




I have always believed that the moment we put the child in the middle of something – involve, get the child to make decisions – in fact literally let the child lead you – you get fantastic developmental opportunities. This happened with the dance. WE played the song, and invited children to come one by one and teach the rest of us one step each. As children collectively choreographed the song, the enthusiasm and energy was unmistakable. It became “my” dance.



The post lunch session began with all of us making puppets out of the leaves and flowers we had collected the previous day and some news paper, cotton, etc. the whole group seriously got involved in this activity. Even the youngest of them all made quite cute puppets with paper cups and cotton. The elder kids came up with detailed ones some of them putting even the pencil sharping to good use.



Making something out of nothing requires ingenuity, perseverance and gumption. Making a tower out of newspaper became an exciting challenge and children groped around for solutions to the problem of how to make the tower stand on its own with nothing to support it. While solutions were not very forthcoming, while “uncle I can’t” seem to reverberate in the hall, the children thinking was systematically stretched in many directions – which was the objective in nay case. Team work also showed through, accompanied by the frustrations when one’s team member does not support your ideas.




But I guess, the most fun children had when they got a hugely stimulating heap of junk and waste material to make their own puppets. One child came up with the idea that my puppet should have a railway station of his own! Diligence at its best was at display, with kids trying out many combinations for their puppets and enjoying the whole process of freely creating puppets without any prior objectives. What I call, creating for the joy of creating!
~ Ratnesh



This afternoon, I tried out what ratnesh had suggested and all of us got into making and playing with paper boats and paper planes. I was surprised to hear from the kids that they had never made paper planes before. The paper planes were a big hit and everyone got really tired after this. I tried out a small GV today with the kids and most of them said they felt better and fresh after that. During the reflection game, most of the kids said they enjoyed the meditation and the puppet making. It was a day full of fun for all of us.