LKG

I realise that all of my posts since coming to India have been about trips, functions and celebrations so I wanted to take this opportunity to tell you a little about some of the work that we do here at Devnar. Living and working in the same place means the the lines between what feels like work and what feels like fun and games feels very blurred. The kids will be up and knocking on our door expecting a chat (and sweet treats) from 7.30 am onwards and, as conversation is central to the students' learning of English, this means that this is the informal start of the working day. 

The real school day starts at 9.45 with an assembly followed by seven 45 minute long lessons with breaks for snacks and lunch. Classes end at around 4pm but, as most of the students live in the school, this is only half way though the day for us. The rest of the day is spent chatting to the kids, playing games, singing songs which is great fun (draining but fun) and often doesn't feel like working at all. 

I thought that in this post I would try and explain how Lottie and I teach LKG; the Kindergarden class of around 14 students aged between 4 and 7 years old. We take this class everyday at 11.30 for a class called 'Activities'- this entails getting the kids to complete a number of practical activities to improve their sensory and problem solving skills. Sometimes we sing songs or give the kids some toys (which is met with delighted cried of 'Bombalu!' (Toys!') from the students), but most of the time we will give each student a basket containing a sensory task for them to complete. These include a basket with beads that need to be fed onto a shoe lace, towers of shapes that need to be placed onto a central spike in size order, plastic shapes that slot into each other to create a chain as well as a big basket full of plastic animals that are felt and then identified. 

While these tasks may sound very simple, for the young visually impaired students, they can be a real challenge especially when the majority of the class members have very limited sight- if any. The difficulties levels of these activities are significantly heightened by the language barrier. Children do an awful lot of their learning by watching what their peers do and copying them especially when they see some kind of action rewarded, however, our students can't see what each other are doing. To someone with perfect vision who has also been watching their classmates complete basket after basket, it might seem instinctive to thread the beads onto the lace without having to be directly told to by the teacher, however, we will often find that a student doesn't know how to proceed when they are handed these activities. 

This means that these students need us to sit with them individually, take their hands and place the lace and beads in either one and then try and guide them into completing the task a few times before allowing them to attempt it independently. Sometimes this is enough for the student to understand what they have to do to complete the task, but often it is not. The LKG students are still developing their ability to perceive distance and force meaning that, even if they know that the lace is meant to go through the bead, they will often sit there jabbing the end of the lace into thin air as they struggle to co-ordinate their actions without sight or, alternatively, they will locate the hole in the bead but not understand the need to push the lace through. 

We have similar problems with the wooden shapes that slot onto a central spike. While nearly all of the students can place the blocks into the spike within a minute or so, only half of them understand that, for the activity to be complete, they need to go in size order. In an attempt to overcome this problem we will place the blocks in the order they should be then take the students hand and make them feel the completed shape before asking them to replicate it from the beginning. This has had a few successes, but the children's short attention spans and the fact they are used to doing it in another way has meant that this is quite a challenging task. 

As I mentioned, with limited language skills on both sides, it is difficult for us and the students to over come these hurdles but slowly and surely they make improvements each week. When one of the children who struggles with the wooden shape task shouts 'MAM FINISH' and we see that the shapes are in order there is an immense sense of pride for both us and the student once they sense our reaction. It takes an awful long time and requires more patience then I ever thought I could dedicate to wooden triangles but it's so rewarding. 

LKG waiting between exams 

This week has been an odd one in that there have been exams for all grades before the holidays that start on Monday. It has meant that Lottie and I have been 'off timetable' and therefore searching for ways to make ourselves useful around the school. LKG has been where we have found ourselves most days this week, helping Anna Teacher conduct their exams. 

As far as exams go, LKG's are pretty relaxed. One at at time the students - who sit quietly on their little chairs- are called up to the desk and then asked a series of questions (the subject of which vary depending on the day.) On Monday, Lottie and I took them for their Activities exam. A few weeks ago we had been asked to draft an exam paper which was then checked by the teacher and principle to make sure it was suitable. We had thought we had been quite kind with the paper, however the children found it more of a challenge than we had expected. The questions included asking the children to 'put eight beads on the string', 'slot five plastic shapes together and count them' and 'Which one is the elephant?' (after being giving 4 toy animals to examine). While most students could thread the beads, slot the shapes and identify the animals, most didn't understand that we asked their to be a certain number of beads or shapes.

Lottie conducting Sri Lehka's Activities Exam 

A problem we often encounter with LKG is that they learn primarily by repetition. This means that they only understand questions if they are posed in the exact same way they have been before and that, if you haven't been asking them to thread specific numbers of beads for the last month, they will just go ahead and thread them all like normal. This had been a complete oversight of ours which became more and more apparent as we attended the other LKG exams throughout the week. Each subject, be it Maths, English, or listing things had chanting and repetition as it's sound foundation. The children would come up one by one and shout the numbers 1-20, numbers 1-10 backwards, counting up in 10s, spelling numbers, the 1 times table and 2 times tables with such ease that, in some cases, we weren't even giving time to ask the students for the next question- they just answered automatically because that's the order they had been taught to chant in. 

One the one hand this is great because it shows a great ability to remember- the kids really can count to 100 if they have to, and spell the numbers and say them backwards- as well as a good grasp of basic numbers, but on the other hand it means that the students are rarely able to answer questions they aren't prepared for. 

Despite this and considering the age of the students, it is clear that these children are remarkable young people. Their ability to work out that questions can be asked in numerous ways will come with time as they progress through the school, as will their problem solving abilities. Their exam results were brilliant and I am sure that these students are as bright as any other LKG student who happened to have perfect vision. What I am also sure of is that these students are wonderfully happy and hilarious kids who will not let pesky beads, laces and wooden blocks get in the way of them having giggles and just being normal, fun-loving kids.