7 Jan 2021,

Dear Parents,

A very happy new year to all of you! Hopefully you all have come back rejuvenated after the break. (Or like some who have gotten sick:)) Anyhow, what a week! Sudden turn of events has governed the happenings of this week. The recent uptick in the number of cases has put us on our toes. The reality is also that we cannot escape this, how long will we avoid it? Hopefully this time will not be as dreadful as last year and soon we can resume LC in person.

Few updates of this week were…

New Year’s resolution

All of us gathered for a circle time on monday morning and did a 10 min meditation. During which we thought of a new year’s resolution we would like to keep and also remember it for this entire year. It will be a promise to ourselves, our friend for the rest of the year. It could be something we do for ourselves or for others. So we wrote it down on a nice small piece of paper and put it in a pouch. After that we wrote in another chit of paper, one thing that we want to rid ourselves of. After we collected this chit we buried it in our compost pile..:) Hoping all our bad worries or fears or habits will diminish and get composted in the soil. Somehow kids were very enthused to doing the second activity.

Ground Day

As usual, the children were pretty pumped up for the ground day. This time we saw various separate groups playing things on their own. Some are doing cartwheels and challenging each other at their gymnastics skills. Some were playing on the see-saw. Others were on the merry-go-around, howling and shouting and the rest were playing the virus game.

Workbooks

Some of them diligently finished the targeted pages from their respective workbooks. Few of them stayed up till night and finished. Few of them couldn’t since they were travelling and then there were a couple who forgot about it completely.

Workout Wednesdays

We assembled kids for a workout routine, where they had to push and pull some weights, jump the hurdles, crawl on elbows under the chairs and reach the end point in a specific time. We set the timer and put obstacles in their way. Everyone participated, even the youngest. Everyone was huffing and puffing at the end.

Sessions

With one of our facilitators down we didn’t know what to do for about half of our sessions. But every crisis is an opportunity, so we invented some word and puzzle games that mixed fun and learnings together.

Friday Food

Kids made tomato omelette very enthusiastically. They all chopped, mixed, cooked and ate it themselves. I was thinking maybe Friday food online is much better than offline. In LC hardly anyone comes (barring the usual suspects) forward to cooking and taking initiative. They don’t seem to find time for anything else than the monkey business and playing cricket. Maybe this is a point of discussion when we are back in LC.

NIOS

The preparation for NIOS exams is going on. They are very keenly interested in finishing the work. There was also a mock math test this time, next week they will be timed during the test so that they can get some flavour of real exams. Planning on giving the EVS test next time.

Hopefully, next week we will be in LC and the threat looming on us will be over. Or we will be stronger to face the challenge ahead. Whatever it is, let's hope for the best. Till then, take good care of yourself and others around you.