Site visit Report by Srishti Sofat: Chetanaa

Visit Details:

I initially called Mrs. Sharda to set up a time to visit, however as she had family obligations in December she gave me Mrs. Handa's contacts. I was to meet Mrs. Handa at her place 16th morning and then we planned to go to Chetanaa from there.

The entrance to the community where Cheetna is located is quite dirty and there is no pukka road. It borders the Kurukshetra college . Mrs. Handa and I reached Chetanaa around 10 am. The classes were in progress. 

We then went to each individual class. There was a class with Pre- school  ( 3-4 yrs) children who were playing with toys. There was no teacher in that classroom - but the teacher in the adjoining class would come by once in a while. The kids seemed pretty happy playing.

I then went to the Hindi class for 2nd grade children. The class was pretty full . There was a Dari on which the children were sitting as it was cold . All children were dresses in Uniform and looked very neat and clean. I sat with the kids and checked out their notebooks , asked them to write their names .. quite a few wrote it very quickly. One of the children recited a poem.

I then visited class 7 where they were having an English class. I asked the kids to speak to me in English, they were very shy. Finally someone asked me my name in English. They wanted to tell me a poem. I said I wanted to listen to an English poem -  one girl recited an English Rhyme  .. but then they also wanted to recite a Hindi poem and recited it for me.  I asked for a note book - however no one had an English notebook with them in class. They had the Hindi exam that after noon so they had not got any English notebook.

I then went to a math class where the children were being taught algebra. As they had the math exam that day - they were clarifying doubts and asking the teacher to solve problems. I asked the kids to solve the next problem in the chapter which was very similar to the one that had been solved on the board for them. Some of the kids solved the problem correctly,  the others were still struggling. As I was waiting for the kids to solve the problem  the teacher asked  tone of the girls to recite a poem. It was a poem on women empowerment and that women can be police officers & work - After that I asked the girl what she wanted to become when she grew up and she was very quiet and did not answer. 

I finally went to the class 10th class where all of them were preparing for their exam. Mrs. Handa asked one of the girls Poonam to sing. She sang a beautiful bhajan - her voice is excellent.

The school has 2 sections , one portion is newly constructed with class rooms , toilet a  reading / computer room and a small playing area for kids with swings etc.

 In general, the teachers as well as the children were all very keen to recite poems.

Opinion

Positives

1) The place is neat and clean and well maintained

2) The students have a lot of self confidence in terms of reciting poems

3) Class participation is encouraged by the teachers

Areas of Improvement

1) Discussion with children on current affairs. Adding few Newspapers and Magazines to the library and discussing that might be one way of doing it.

2) Involvement of University of Kurukshetra students to volunteer for computer lessons 

3) In some instances I felt that even though the children were reciting poems talking about women empowerment etc - they did not quite yet know how to apply it to their day to day life.

4) Individual attention to particular weak students can be improved.

In general it was great fun to spend time with the children , see their enthusiasm and visit the school!