6 October, 2023

Dear Parents,

Here’s a list of the remaining sessions that we are taking this semester. While I was summarising all this, there are other things that I have yet not mentioned and was wondering how much do we do in LC. Pleasantly surprised by it!

Thinking and talking- Psychology

We started this session with Neuroscience and different branches of Psychology. This includes understanding parts of brain and its functions. We touched upon how human beings are social animals and how different behaviours stem from the idea. How peculiar behaviours are found in certain people and the reasons for such behaviours. What are different feelings and what are the needs associated with them. What are people’s expectation form us? Also we took verbal and non verbal communication within which we discussed about body language. We spoke about non violent communication, anger management and emotional abuse. How to resist if someone is emotionally blackmailing you?

World War I

World War I is one of the key geopolitical moment in the world. Since we had already taken WW II, it seemed incomplete to not take a session on WWI. We started the session with talking about the dynasties of Russia, Austria-Hungary, Serbia and Ottoman. We talked about the politics of those times. We took an entire session on the pivotal moment of the assassination of the Archduke Ferdinand. We also spoke about the Russian Revolution and different warfare technics, like Trench warfare and use of machines.

Flexi-session

This is session is with the Pups on wednesdays. During this session we explore drama, dumb charades and origami. We also visited the Post office, the nearby HDFC bank and the market. Kids also read books and presented the synopsis. We opened those books which are never opened by anyone, like the World books and Encyclopedias.

Learning about Money

Mukhil is taking a session on money and investment. This just started last week and it includes in understanding different kinds of investments and for the finale actually putting in some money in share markets and learning how trading works.

Sessions for Blossoms

This semester we have made a time table for Blossoms. Play and learning activities were interlaced in the schedule. The time table had playing with clay, reading, writing, painting, drama, etc. Few activities were also to get them to step out of LC, where they go to the garden or go shopping some vegetables. What we have observed is that sometimes planning works sometimes it doesn’t. We make an effort to play particular board game with them, but find no takers or they drift away to something else. So being fluid in our approach has really helped.

But in general they all love playing board games, dancing, doing worksheets, painting, enacting words, solving Jigsaw Puzzles, cutting fruits and veggies, serving everyone water during Individual time, mopping, swinging from the rope ladder, skating, playing hide-n-seek, (there’s more but…), etc.

Science

We have covered the concepts of Sound, Light, Heat and temperature. The general approach has been to do experiments or demonstrations to understand the material. We have made an attempt to cover 2 grades worth the material by going in depth for the adolescents, since many are doing Science workbooks by themselves.

Games

This is a session where we play group games. Some of these games involve running around LC, while some of them are sit down games. Here’s a list of few things we play Kho-kho, Dog and the bone, Chor-police, Dodge ball, Kingdom, Mafia, Message, मोगैम्बो खुश हुआ, Capture the castle and Flag game.

Guests

We had a team from Frappe Technologies who visited us on friday. They run their company that had a lot of similarities with LC. Children gave them a tour of LC and we had a circle time with them. They asked children a lot of questions, how do you know what is best for you? Is it okay to not attend sessions? Children also asked them a lot of questions to them, do you have to listen to your boss? what if you take salary but don’t do any work? what if your money runs out? what if someone wants to sleep in the office?

IDEC Presentation

We want to know if there’s anyone from the parents group who wants to give a presentation about their experiences with alternative education and their journey. This could be in the format of a video or slides.

Friday Mela

This mela started with an idea of encouraging our children to start doing business. So all the kids who participated in the Entrepreneurship session and a few others had their stalls. On the menu there were Chocolate pancakes, Walnut fudge, Mumra ladoos, Pizza, Hot boiled corn and once we had lemonade. We have this program on alternate fridays. Kids are learning to do accounting, but before that they are learning how to cook and organise their resources.

Public Speaking

We have wrapped up our Public speaking session on Saturdays. All who attend are interested in continuing with the session next semester also. We plan to expand the domain of this session including talking about careers, conflict resolutions and negotiations. Hopefully few others will join next semester.

Book Club

If you are reading this newsletter I would strongly recommend you to come and join us for the Book club, which now includes books, movies and topics. I am taking this as an opportunity to learn from all of you. Listening to different perspectives and hearing all of you talking passionately is enriching and also entertaining. So for those of you who have not come yet, just come for the sake coffee.

That's all for today...

Until next time!