It was a beautiful day and we were with 25 beautiful girls.
They are the inmates of Niveditha Nikethan or Anbu Illam (literally translates to Home of Affection) that the orphanage is called. These girls are all 6 to 16 years old. This was an initiative of the Alumni association of my school. There were six of us - five engineers and one teacher by profession. Sunday was our first day at this wonderful home. We went there with the aim of teaching kids to use computers. But Sunday was just an introductory/ice-breaking session. So we sat down with these girls and told some stories, put some puzzles to them, joked and basically got them comfortable with us. It was no trouble at all. They were a happy and friendly bunch and it was basically us who had to loosen up!
Throughout the session however we were constantly being surprised and preconceptions were being broken. We all agreed later that the kids had been very attentive, responsive and intelligent.
These were the major things we observed about them:
They are the inmates of Niveditha Nikethan or Anbu Illam (literally translates to Home of Affection) that the orphanage is called. These girls are all 6 to 16 years old. This was an initiative of the Alumni association of my school. There were six of us - five engineers and one teacher by profession. Sunday was our first day at this wonderful home. We went there with the aim of teaching kids to use computers. But Sunday was just an introductory/ice-breaking session. So we sat down with these girls and told some stories, put some puzzles to them, joked and basically got them comfortable with us. It was no trouble at all. They were a happy and friendly bunch and it was basically us who had to loosen up!
Throughout the session however we were constantly being surprised and preconceptions were being broken. We all agreed later that the kids had been very attentive, responsive and intelligent.
These were the major things we observed about them:
- Total absence of TV influence: They were more comfortable with Tenali Rama stories than othre kids their age (with the influence of Jetix and Cartoon Network) are.
- They were open to learning new things
- They competed with each other - partly to be better than each other and also to gain our favour more than the others
- They were witty, wise and intelligent. (Far from the dull and tired bunch that we had expected at the back of our minds I confess.)
2 comments:
That sounds good! What sort of agenda you have planned for the the next meet up?
Very valuable piece
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