Excellent education for 175 kids in Hyderabad!!

Abhinaya, a Fellow with Teach For India finished one year of her Fellowship as a teacher in low income school in Hyderabad. Please read on to hear what Abhinaya has to say about the year gone by. 

Academic Growth

We started out this academic year as a first year intervention second grade class with 19 out of 20 students in pre-emergent levels in Reading Comprehension. Over the year we made tremendous growth as a class and have successfully moved all the students out of the pre-emergent level in our recently concluded end of the year exams.

Activities

• My vision for the classroom was to invest the kids in their learning and make them see a real-time purpose for everything that they learn.  Keeping this in mind, we started our own little class bank using class money that students earn for good behaviour and class work to understand the concept and purpose of banking. It helped them see real-time use and understanding of operational concepts such as addition and subtraction. Students were exposed to banking instruments such as deposit and withdrawal forms, application forms for opening bank accounts etc. We had a market day every Saturday when students could withdraw money and shop for things such as books, stationery etc.

• A field trip to Kidihou Museum was organised where the kids got to test ideas, explore a wide range of professions and discover that learning is fun. It was an opportunity to become an engineer, doctor, artist, chef, carpenter etc for a day and stretch their imagination to learn and practice new skills that would enrich their lives.

• Our grade 2 students organised a campaign to save electricity and maintain cleanliness in school campus. The students prepared charts, posters and slogans and went around all the classes in the school highlighting the importance of saving electricity and using dustbins.  They even proposed to the Principal to give away awards for clean and responsible classrooms.

Highlights

• My vision for the classroom was to create student led learning opportunities and motivate the students to take ownership of their own learning. We created study groups that would be led by different students who are confident in specific topics across different subjects including languages.  These student leaders would teach and help the other students study. This has built an encouraging classroom culture where learning is driven by teamwork and a sense of ownership.

Challenges

• While we have been successful in moving all the kids out of pre-emergent reading levels, it has been quite challenging to push the students from an emergent level to grade level 1.

• Some of the students come from a boys’ hostel where good food and nutrition is not being provided to the students. This has hampered the growth of the students as their concentration and participation in class is severely affected by lack of food and nutrition. 

Working on the challenges and getting geared up for the year ahead, Abhinaya and her children are getting geared up for the year ahead. Please join me in wishing them all the best. 

This project  needs another $ 4000. Request you to please contribute and share this amongst your networks. We would have to raise it before the next academic year starts for Abhinaya and her kids.