Category: Blogs

We had live station after the workshop on “designing kitchen and dining area with the architecture student who came to O-campus”. One said “I want to come, but I am feeling shy with strangers”.One said “I want to come, but I also want to play sports, so not coming”. Hmmmmmmm they can think and take…

We were expressing what does destination does to me? (self assessment at the end of each session on HOW i did?) One said “it pumps the air in me and I become bigger with learning. One said it is like a self chatter box for – I see back and talk to myself HOW I…

We have been exploring “what does Journey means to me?” Journey is the process, child document at the beginning if every session to decide, the goal, how to d etc. Today we were doing reflection of what journey does to me – we did a visualization of process so feting of ice-cream. At the end…

At O – Campus children are fighting, praising, pampering, critisizing, pushing, scolding, helping, ENJOYING. Each element is coming. I am enjoying my journey as a facilitator.

One child was not interested in writing destination. I said: “I am available for help”. I clarified: “option of not writing destination is not available”. With resistance she started writing. I started interacting with her and insisted to understand the question, think and then answer. As we moved ahead she started asking questions. At the…

I was making notes of my workshop “sex education”.One child asked why parents need this workshop?Another said “so they know what to tell to their kids”. They continued…“It is not so much in India, but in US it is too much…..I have seen in movies, they kiss anywhere, anytime, In india also it is coming,…

We have very funny and enlightening first aid leader at O-campus. She is 7yrs old. One child got hurt, she looked at the hurt and declared “this is too small a hurt, go by youself and put the baindaid”. The child wanted sympathy, she refused to give. She did not panic when a child fell…

We were doing destination. I was discussing one question with a child “When others were not like me I accepted others”. One child shared “I used to think I am better than them, they are worsen than me. But today I told myself, however you are you are better. Noone is better or worsen”.

We were exploring the contents of culture workshop. We were sharing our thoughts on Architecture. One child said “I can take Architecture; this will also help me to explore structure of my Café in project”.

One child was constantly talking about trains, I told him “I can no more listen about train” After some time he came to me and said “I will not talk to you about train, I will tell you about Kareena”. This led to gossip about Kareena during snacks time – her love affair with Saif,…

Our search for O-campus continued during morning walk. Today we climbed bigger and rocky mountains (as kids described). Three kids were leading the walk, I was 99% sure, it is not the path. But as per my religion and oath I followed the leaders. And WE FOUND our land – we could see from the…

During discussion of why and what of sports one child spoke about being healthy. He started talking about heart and blood etc and another child was not listening soimmediatelyhe said I will take your heart switch it off and after Ifinishtalking I will switch it on. Thistriggeredan entire discussion on how the heart functions and…

While writing about what sports does to us onechildwanted spelling of weight. I assumed wait and I wrote wait. She said not this wait theotherweight and with actions showed me what she wanted.On interaction on how she knew that Wait was not what she wanted – she responded I know the spelling of this WAIT.…

Today at Aarohi we all together did “contact point for faculty”. We made groups of twp and did the same process we do for kids………….And I realize this was purely “self assessment” for me “how I am working?”. Looking forward to my reflection during contact point with faculty Looking forward to my journey with kids…

We were making checklist at O-campus – we realized If we make and give to kids then how are kids going get involve – this becomes more of a rule and without understanding the kids ask “can I bring this, can I do this?…..”. Well, we diced to also make three kinds of checklist Me…

Last week the kids did not get up in the morning – we had to wake them up. We consistently followed the schedule without any other strings – no threat, no bribe, no gyan or even no expectations. Kids were tired we woke them and went for morning walk at 6:55 (scheduled time 6:303) Kids…

Food team at O-campus continue to supply us fresh food with their love and care. Yesterday they also came up three tags in food arrangement “Proteins, Carbohydtares, Vitamins & minerals”. During breakfast we were saying “pass me carbohydrate” (we had poha for breakfast).

Morning walk objective at O-campus is to find cycle path to O-campus from guest house. Well, last Tuesday we followed electric poles, as they also cross our land. Today mountain was the anchor – we have one mountain on the other side of the campus, so all mountains had out site on the other side….well…

I was with kids on O-campus making shelter. Day 2, one team was ready with their tools, other team was not ready. Both teams were fighting, I felt this was unjust – I interacted and talked about behaviour, did reflection activity on behaviour – what I got “kids who got aware of them thru their…

The reflection of the session was let us mark in the graph how much we listened to others today. Children got into thinking and were counting the different times theylistenedto others. Few shared I listened toXYZbut did not listen to ABC so Ilistenedless etc. After marking they wanted to share also.Astheywere ready to mark,they went…

I put one week leave with intention to contribute my bit to o-campus construction acitivities, along with my farm development. Here is my journey (journal?)! Some what longer post… Saturday (19-05-2012) It was my first over night stay at pink house, Bodichipalli. After Vishal and others returned from drum event, we were chatting till around…

The shelter team was all excited to go to market to buy material. Well, while reversing the car, the entire bumper cover came out…………..first thought in my mind “send it for repair, call a mechanic”. Sriram and Venkatappa were around……………Venkattapp anyway pitty me “your husband work, you alone work here”. Well, both just started fixing…

We introduced making of graph while we were making codes “how many people like this and not like” I was working with one child on schedule. She said “I will do a survey and then analyze who needs how much for each activity”. She started with bar graph, ended up with one survey cahrt and…

One of the child came to me and said “aunty we need to tell process to each child of hygine” I said “we have been telling to kids, will our telling will make them think”. The child immediately said “then we can ask each child make own process and share how will he/she likes work?”…

We went to buy bamboos and leaves for our shelter at O-campus. Coming back we stopped at basket vendor. I was excited and I thought “let us just finish all buying of baskets”. Our is stationary leader was thinking and thinking and finally picked up 6 small baskets and one big basket. My list was…

We began with exploring “what is O-campus” One child said “our campus” One said “open” another added “outdoor”

Yeah, we began with loads of stories of eatingaamto meeting cousin, playing with cousins. We shared what all we did in our holidays. Many were excited to share their thoughts, few were listening and asking questions about what happened. Few shared new games and we played new games. One child was missing his old gang…