Aarohi Bal Sansar - School Farm Project

At the very initial stage of project ‘Contextualising Education with Farming and Ecology’, an activity was conducted with Upper Primary students wherein with the help of Inquiry-based approach, students were encouraged to think and ask questions on certain themes from their immediate environment. This list of questions was compiled and shared with team members. Some of the outcomes of the activity were developing thinking skills, framing of questions from their surroundings and understanding of a concept. Most importantly we got to know exactly what kids wanted to know or learn. The approach is an active form of learning where a learner can identify a gap, or a problem by himself and pose an inquiry around a theme.

An assortment of questions asked by the students asked are given as follows:

1. why do we feel warm in light?
2. The moon also produces light without any human efforts why can't we use that light?
3. how are we able to see when light is on?
4. why can't we catch hold of light?
5. who made Jungle?
6. who coined the term jungle?
7. how do plants grow on their own in a Jungle?
8. why don't stars sparkle on earth?
9. why are stars so far?
10. why do we feel hungry?
11. why do people have a favourite food item?
12. why is sky blue?
13. why don't we live in the sky?
14. who named different seasons?
15. why do we see different birds in different seasons?
16. how is a mountain made?
17. where does water come from?
18. what is soil made of?
19. why are there stones in soil?
20. why doesn’t plastic decay?
21. how are you able to smell with your nose?
22. why do we have two holes in our nose?
23. why do we have two eyes?
24. why is our tongue of pink colour only?
25. why can we not see air?

 These questions and more are one of the many aspects that will form the base of our content development exercise in our ‘School Farm Project’.

The students of Aarohi Bal Sansar (‘ABS’), before breaking for their summer holidays, participated in a fun activity. The students from classes 5-8 were introduced to the concept of ‘Sustainability’ and ‘Natural Farming’. On the first day, kids were shown a movie ’The story of stuff’. It was a short-animated documentary about the lifecycle of material goods. The documentary is critical of excessive consumerism and promotes sustainability. The challenges faced by community about weather, such as forest fires, scarcity of water, untimely rains in this season were also talked about, eventually leading the children to understand the importance of tree plantation/re-building our forests. Students were introduced to a Japanese farmer- Masanobu Fukuoka’s model of natural farming using ‘Seed Bombs’. The native seeds of Kumaon that have a possibility to germinate during monsoons were shortlisted. The list was shared with the students and they were asked to bring whichever seeds were available in or around their home.

On the second day, the kids came together to create seed balls using soil and water. These native organic seeds were embedded in a ball of moist mud and put to dry. Students from four classes managed to create more than 500 seed balls!

On the final day, students were guided on bombing the seed balls in school premises and in the Van panchayat area adjoining school. Students were asked to make a small cup-shaped hole in the ground and gently place the ball so that it was partly in the ground and partly above. With rain, the plants will start germinating and growing into trees.

 The children sowed the seeds of hope of a better future!