Education for 100 street children in India

Last week, AIC students were fortunate to have very special storytelling sessions with Arati Phadke from Story Kingdom. In Arati's words, "stories do not just develop children’s literacy, they also convey values, beliefs, attitudes and social norms. Stories help the children to connect, relate, learn, experience and transform." We at AIC are always looking for fun, engaging methods to help our children experience the world in different ways while developing core literacy and communication skills, so this was completely up our alley!

Arati decided to run two different sessions to maximize the number of children who could participate, and at each session proceeded to deftly handle large groups of excited children brimming with anticipation. Her stories included a tale about the king of the jungle and a rain drop for the pre-primary students and a Japanese folk tale as well as a story about the origin of Holi rooted in Indian mythology for the older students. Each story entailed activities and props (puppets, origami) to capture the children's attention and reinforce the story's meaning and message.

Education Program Director, Bunty, raved about how "body language, voice modulation and use of props like puppets made the sessions very interesting" and was excited that the AIC teaching staff had also gained valuable skills and tips from the sessions that they will put to use in their classrooms on a daily basis. Pre-Primary section lead teacher, Barnali, also reiterated what a great learning experience the workshops were for the teaching staff, and how storytelling is a timeless method of allowing children to learn while having fun.  

What a fun day! Thank you, Arati, for the magical stories, and thank you to all of our supporters who help us keep the AIC Education Program running so that we can continue to facilitate amazing experiences like this for our little ones.