My views

In this blog, I will be writing on the grand day 5, 6, and 7 as well as my return to Chennai. Day 5: As a reward for our hard work in the past four days, Shaheen Mistry and the other teachers let us have a free day. This free day was unique as it was embedded with lot of learning. For the first half of the day, we could do whatever we wanted in the hotel. Around four in the evening, we set off to an auditorium in Bandra. On reaching the auditorium, we got to know that there are many NGOs, which just like Teach For India, strive to end educational inequality in India. The KER team and the heads of the NGOs collaborated together for a mind-blowing experience for us students. All hundred of us were thrilled when we heard that the children of the schools run by the NGOs were going to perform for us. We were given two superb KER t-shirts, one black and one white. I quickly wore the black KER t-shirt and went and sat in the auditorium. It was three hours of amazement as the perform...

  In this post, I will be blogging on day three and four of the KER week. Day 3: We started with some energizing and fun activities. Now all set for the day, we were given a task. Each of us were given a cardboard box. For ten minutes, we could play with the box in however way we wanted. Then we had to imagine that we have each founded a school. Thinking the school to be the cardboard box, we had to design it the way we wanted our school to be. This was not a vague concept for me as I had played with the box for a long time and now had the feeling that it has been my possession for a long time.  I immediately started working on the cardboard box, thinking of it as my school. I painted it with blue and black(which are my favourite colours) and painted the layout of my school as well. I wanted my school to have lots of sports facilities and highly trained and kind teachers. Based on this I designed my school. The purpose of this activity was for us to learn to not re...

In this post, I will be blogging on the first two days of the KER week.  Day 1 We were given a fantastic welcome by the teachers as they formed a bridge by standing in two adjacent long rows and linking their hands together. We ran under the 'bridge' which led to our classroom and entered the classroom. Incidentally, I was the first one to enter the classroom hence, I was on cloud 9. We then met Shaheen Mistry, the founder of Teach For India. She explained to us what KER is all about and its goals. I was amazed by the passion and confidence with which she spoke. Then, we formed groups of ten students each. Each group along with two teachers, sat  separately in a circle. In the group, each person had to speak about a personal experience that had an effect on their life. This was an activity to get to know about each other and become friends. Personally, it was nice to know about each person's life experience and how their thought process worked. I narrated my s...

In this post, I will be blogging on my companions from Chennai, the journey to Mumbai, and my thoughts on the city. Out of the hundred kids chosen to attend the Kids Education Revolution happening in Mumbai for one week, five of us(including me) were from Chennai. One student was from my school and we already knew each other so we became friends immediately. The other three students were from schools in which Teach For India taught. But there was no difficulty in breaking the initial bonds as we found that our topics of interest were the same and could break the ice easily. Prior to travelling to Mumbai, I also met the head for Teach For India in Chennai. She, along with a teacher from my school, as well as a teacher from the other school, were going to travel with us.   Finally, the day of February 5th 2018 arrived!! I could not sleep the night leading to KER. My mind was full of thoughts and expectations on how KER would turn out for me. Though I had some negative th...

 Towards the end of January in 2018, my school gave students from grade 6 to 9, a chance to participate in an initiative called KER . KER, which is the short form for K ids E ducational R evolution, is the brain child of Shaheen Mistry . Shaheen Mistry is the founder of Teach For India (TFI), an organization which strives to eliminate educational inequality in India. Teach for India, which works in seven cities across India, recruits college graduates and working professionals to serve as full time teachers for two years. These highly qualified teachers are placed in low income schools, which do not have the funds to provide the study material to the children. The teachers use their own money for the betterment of the school and use their ingenuine and fun methods to teach the children. Kids Education Revolution is a very unique initiative where 100 kids selected across the country come together to come up with new teaching methods. This was the first time that students...