Help 30 first-generation learners begin school

The playgroup gang is now more than halfway through the school year, and it is quite evident that they will blossom next year in nursery school. 

The children love the 5 to 6 activity centres that the teachers lay out around the room, allowing them to explore areas of interest (puzzles, toys, art activities), and they also enjoy the storytelling sessions, complete with puppets or dramatic re-enactment. Warm-up exercises, circle time, literacy and numeracy activities, rhyme time and movement (dance, zumba, active games), and welcome/goodbye rituals round out the sessions to ensure that the children stay engaged and learn new things, and to encourage bonding with their caregivers.

Many of the mothers, who never had the opportunity to complete their own educations (and in most cases never attended school at all), enjoy the weekly opportunity to learn and grow in their own ways as well. Playgroup supervisor, Barnali, shares her observations about one of the mothers, Jyotikaur (name changed), who has twins enrolled in AIC's nursery program and brings her two year old daughter for the playgroup sessions every week. 

"The kids are super smart and bright and I can say the same for their mother. She is very smart, very enthusiastic, inquisitive, and an active learner. She demands more and more information, and answers most of the questions being put up in the class. She understands English and tries to answer in English whenever I communicate with her, which I do purposefully. She is self-motivated, and her efforts are very evident from her actions. I can sense the spark in her and how much she craves to learn - herself, as well as wanting her kids to learn." 

As the academic year begins to wind down, we are proud to watch the progress of the children and their mothers, especially the excitement and motivation that this playgroup program has cultivated, which will undoubtedly take them far as they begin their first formal school experience in June.