Every Opportunity is a Learning Experience in the event.
The Learning Mela Event where other school children conducting sessions for us was another experience to experience breaking the barrier of learning of language, working with all age groups and learning from anyone to anyone interested irrespective of different space and people. It was amazing to see children coming out of their comfort zones, freely singing, dancing, sharing, teaching yoga. Children experienced overcrowding in a few stalls and no crowd in a few stalls. The conductors of stall were not perturbed, they were doing their work, and as and when children visited their stalls, they accommodated them. The whole journey of preparation and conducting was an experience to exhibit their confidence, opening up all their inhibitions of different space, the joyfulness of teaching their lovable skills with passion.
Experience as conductor of the stalls :
Children shared it was “joyful to teach”, “I was happy to teach to elders”, “It was fun to play”, “I liked to teach”, “I like to share what i know” ” I enjoyed experience of teaching”, I love to teach dance, yoga”.
Experience as a learner in the stalls:
Children shared “It was joyful to play”, It was fun learning Kunfoo, cartwheeling”, “It was good and challenging to play Kabaddi”, “Good to dance and I love dancing ” , “I love symmetry , I made butterfly”, “I like drawing with them”, “Kumfoo stall conductors were very flexible, KAbaddi team were very quick players, Paper cutting stall was very well conducted.. My Wow moments for cartwheel and Kunfoo.
Experience as an observer – What did not go well in the event:
Boys were teasing girls and also children who were conducting. It was not a nice feeling when boys were commenting randomly in Tamil.
People who were part of organizing events wanted to visit other stalls, but there were no alternative people to take care of stall needs.
Surprising to see Boys were shy to interact with girls, In REflection boys, as well as girls, were really shy to talk to each other.
Few stalls conductors were not prepared and didn’t know how to conduct, what to talk.
Few children decided to conduct at the last minute and few dropped conducting at the last minute.
more than 4 people conducting, Confused what and how to give commands when people visit their stall, even decision making was chaos on what drawing to teach.
Experience as an observer – What went well in the event:
They were calm and were working without touching things.
For a few conducting was the first time experience, they did come out of comfort zone and break the barrier of language, space, gender, age and it was awesome to see everyone’s participation.
Children Being part of organizers in the event What went well :
- The opening circle game was planned and well-conducted good.
- Children expressed – “I was happy. I feel good about conducting, they all enjoyed”.
- Resources were well planned., Time management we were able to manage.
Children Being part of organizers in the event and their challenges:
- Talking, explaining was difficult. English few could not understand.
- Language and apprehension how to talk, One child shared ” I was feeling happy but shy to talk”
- One child shared, Boys sharing ” feeling shy to talk with me” was not good for me
- Uncomfortable to talk to them, as they were laughing and teasing and talking randomly and was not good.
- One child shared “No one listened to me especially boys. Girls were listening good”
- One child shared “Totally I was confused, I did not know how to get to organizing stalls”. Children who want to conduct were confused about which stall to keep and on the spot sharing, changing was challenging to handle
- In the closing circle we got confused, we planned something and did something else. On the spot, we did forget what we planned.
Children shared about what we can do better next time :
- We need to work on mental preparation
- Do more preparation., Implement what we prepare, Not Forgetting what we planned
- Be bold in a big crowd, Come out of shy and language barrier, When teased, how to handle
- Put efforts to talk to unknown groups
As a mentor:
The entire event was an amazing journey for just being an observer. Everyone is a learner in the entire event. It was so amazing and fun to work with children who were completely involved in preparing for the event, how to conduct? what to say? what questions to ask in the reflection? what game or song can we do in an opening circle? what if they don’t understand what we say? They were all open to put extra efforts in conducting, discussion, planning and not only that they also gave feedback for themselves what we could have done better. Such amazing learning to see the awareness in children who could think for the event and also outside the event and also understand their struggles and emotions in this journey.
As a team we all were co-operative to each other, helping and supporting.
On the other end, Govt School Children’s journey included learning to plan, prepare, to hold the space of conducting the sessions, preparation for resources, plan for the stalls what to conduct, Signup for registering their names, formation of teams of 2-4, co-ordination, co-operation, breaking self barriers, beliefs the list is long…….
A big thank you for the Principal and the teachers, supporting for this event and also being supportive for children in conducting the stalls.
Last but not but the least, one of the mentors , being part of the entire preparation stage was finally unable to be part of this event. This was an added twist to the event. Every twist brought a learning opportunity and Children beautifully managed the event with very little support here and there.