Professional Documents
Culture Documents
We founded the Home Learning Initiative two years ago. We aim to engage children from deprived areas in a creative, complex and enjoyable learning experience, as part of a meaningful preparation for their lives. In low-income families, children often have limited time with adults for developmental interaction. Parents have to work long hours and household tasks require greater time as they do not have facilities like 24hour water supply, electrical appliances and personal vehicles. Home Learning is additional to school hours for children who live with the least, giving them a regular chance to experience the best learning.
Engrossed: with a love for reading Understanding: pollination of flowers Cooperation: distributing breakfast
Six days a week, 16 children aged 4 to 15 years, arrive from 7:30am for 2-3 hours of learning additional to their school learning.
Sessions are structured around the cooperation of the group, individual learning needs and a shared expectation that we all will work hard to learn. Learning goals are clearly framed and specific feedback is given to guide progress. Small groups work with an adult to focus on Maths, Science or other subjects and will often present their learning back to the whole group. Daily, we have a group discussion with newspapers, magazines, queries and presentations. Children have freedom to converse and share information, ideas and views and ask and answer questions.
DECEMBER 2010 centres created amazing learning environments that were not based on textbooks,
discipline and a single approach for all children classed by age.
We began regular visits to the families to update them of their childrens learning and to gain credibility and to secure regular attendance which was tracked daily and reported. We gained the regular support of expert advisors in Gujarat, India and the UK. With professional advice we structured the learning sessions with more types of learning activities to suit the needs of the different children.
JANUARY 2012
Our aim is to strengthen our approach so that it becomes a replicable solution for children, who are otherwise expected to fail, to prepare them to progress and succeed in life
Initially the children did not have the concentration or motivation to read for even five minutes, or write out their own story. They were comfortable with copying out of a book, even if they did not understand the meaning. These days they are excited to arrive early each day and immediately pick up a book, ask a question or take guidance for their learning. Maintaining discipline through fear prevents children learning. We have built cooperation through reviewing the impact of disruptive behaviour and making shared agreements after clarifying our goals. We played a number of cooperative games which emphasise the power of working together to achieve a goal, as opposed to fighting for only ones own interests. It is not easy to motivate children to complete work that is difficult when they are not interested in the outcome. We have engaged the children in work that has a meaning for them. Instead of copying out text, they enjoy writing and decorating letters that are sent to people they know. They write with interest and work together to improve their communication The children speak a local dialect of Gujarati which is significantly different to the formal language used in the school curriculum. This difference in speech limited their confidence in talking to others. After practise and role plays, they now have excellent communication skills and use diagrams and speech to confidently convey their learning to people they have met for the first time.
GANDHINAGAR HOME LEARNING CENTRE VANSDA ORPHANAGE & HOME FOR GIRLS NAVSARI OBSERVATION HOME FOR BOYS KARADI VILLAGE CHILDREN
Future goals
Our aspiration is to develop our centre and create an active network which supports learning approaches that transform futures of disadvantaged children. We are formally registering the initiative and aim to establish more neighbourhood centres with other committed and caring adults, to create inspiring experiences for many more children.
To know more
If you are interested in knowing more about the initiative or if you want to share your ideas and support we would be very happy to hear from you. Please do email us: Krutika Patel: kruti10feb@yahoo.co.in Gautam Patel: gaukhnh@gmail.com Please click here to view an online album of images: http://www.flickr.com/photos/gautamjpatel/sets/72157628305481943/