Stating the objective behind the summer workshop, Vittal Hegde of JustBooks Vidyaranyapura remarked “As part of our community-connect initiative, we thought of taking help from elderly population for their knowledge, wisdom and experience, as role models and mentors for children. As Diginity Foundation, has several resourceful and socially concerned senior citizens as its members, we contacted them for help. When the idea was proposed, Dignitarians at VDFCC readily agreed to support the initiative and came up with an excellent programme for the age group of 8 to 14 years”.

Mr. SR, Nagaraja, the coordinator at VDFCC mentioned, “The main reason for our acceptance was that here we got an opportunity to tell something what we learnt and experienced all these years from the society and the country and it is the right time to share our thoughts with the young minds who are going to be the future of India”.

The workshop was inaugurated by Lt. Gen (Retd)  Sampath Kumar, AVSM,PVSM, VSM with excellent information on greatness of our country and advice to participating children on ‘how to conduct themselves at home and society’. The simple but informative talk on ‘How to keep healthy and fit’ presented in a manner suitable to children by Prof. Ramanna, the power point presentations on “Greatness of our country and Scientific Video Shows’  by Mr. SR Nagaraj as ex-Sr. Scientist ISRO, the ‘Quiz Programme’ by Mr. DM Rao, ex-Sr. Scientist ISRO, ‘How to draw cartoons’ by Mr. Panduranga Rao, an internationally reputed cartoonist who holds several Guinness world records, ‘Fun Games’ taught and played with lots of fun by Mr. KSR Murthy, ex-Officer, BEL and finally the ‘Brain Storm’ session by Mr. Jayaprakash, ex-AGM, BEL were thoughtfully planned and presented to children in a friendly manner. In fact, all these presenters were Dignitarians and the residents of Vidyaranyapura.

After the workshop, Dignity Foundation’s coordinator Mr. SR Nagaraj wrote “In all it was a wonderful and unique experiment and experience for us to interact with a section of children where we had a glimpse of their brilliant, inquisitive, mercurial and  great thinking capacity. Thanks to JustBooks team for coming with the idea and for coordinating with us efficiently which in turn helped us to deliver a wonderful summer experience to children of Vidyaranyapura. All that we can say is knowledge enabling organisations like JustBooks should try to plan more such workshops/camps in future for the larger community of children to  infuse and inculcate knowledge and patriotism in them so that they can become valuable citizens resulting in greater contribution to our society and country. The beautiful venue of NICE /Dignity Foundation provided an additional advantage in terms of space and infrastructure, thanks to Dr Ramanna, Director NICE. Long Live Dignity Foundation and Long Live JustBooks.” With over 35 active participants, the workshop was a great success based on feedback received from both from children and their parents as stated below:

 1.       “All of you are friendly, loving and made us stay happy” – Siddhaanth, 5th Std.

2.      “This summer camp was very different – gained good knowledge, had lot of fun” – Vasupradha, 7th Std.

3.      “This was one of the best knowledge sessions that I had in a summer camp” – Abhishek, 4th Std.

4.      “Very different, comfortable, informative. Difficult things were explained very easily” – Ritika Agarwal, 7th Std.

5.      “We are lucky that our children are getting rich knowledge, values and skills from accomplished individuals who are so humble and friendly.” – a parent

6.      “We are grateful to Dignity Foundation and JustBooks for taking-up such a noble initiative and also for conducting such a valuable programme in a way which is so different from typical summer camps” – a parent

Some photos of the event:

More such photos at this URL

Homograms were conveyed in a fun filled way. Essentially, English usage as a language was learnt through activities. This was 4-day workshop. The children got home assignments, which they very happily completed. The children were assessed during the sessions. At the end of the sessions, the parents were given feedback about the children.

All in all, a very successful workshop by JustBooks, Nerul branch. Here are some pics of the event:

While work on the website is underway, we have used some of the pictures onto a new ad of ours. As you can we’ve taken some creative licence around the name as well.

Hope you like the way our libraries look. Our members do, for sure….:)

The session started with a story through pictures and then the children were taught to make puppets of the characters in the story. The children made the puppets by drawing and colouring them and finally sticking them on sticks. To conclude the session the children were made to enact the story with the puppets made by them.

3 such sessions were organised over as many days. In fact on the first day, the session had to be divided into 2 age groups. The older age group were told give alternate conclusions to the story and make a visual presentation of the entire story.

In all, the event was a total success and found a ready acceptance from members and the community of Nerul.

Here are some pics of the event.

Vidyaranyapura in Bangalore is blessed with two lakes and Narsipur Lake/Old boat club is one of them.  As part of the restoration exercise, the lake is being cleaned-up.  What was once covered with green vegetation (much of it weeds albeit) has now been dug up and what remains of this huge 5.9 hectare area is mud. In the process, however, it is doubtful whether they have considered it as a habitat for the birds which used to retreat there.

The Pancharatnas are a group of 5 young kids (age group 7-11 years) along with their mentor Ms. Jayalakshmi Chatterjee from BEL 2nd Block who have just started to take an interest in the avian life around them.  Understandably they are concerned about the fate of their feathered friends.  In order to spread awareness about the avian life around them and build a strong team of child crusaders in support of these birds, they made a presentation called “Birds of Narsipura Lake” at JustBooks, Vidyaranyapura.

Dr. Subbu Subramanya, the well-known ornithologist of the city was present to answer questions posed by the children who attended this session.  The exchange was very participative with the children asking several questions which Dr. Subramanya handled with his usual aplomb.  He laid particular stress on planting the right kind of trees in order to attract birds and insects. After the event, Dr. Subramanya commented, “I must say that I was very glad that I participated in the small meeting at JustBooks Vidyaranyapura, where the “Pancharatnas” made a wonderful presentation on ‘Birds of Narsipura Lake’. I was overwhelmed by the interest and enthusiasm shown by the children in trying to create awareness about their surroundings amongst other children, parents and the members of JustBooks. I was also pleased at the wonderful ambiance at JustBooks, which I found to be such a departure from other circulating libraries – in trying to be a hub of knowledge and learning by initiating such interactive meetings and providing its space for participatory learning. I sincerely hope that JustBooks would organize many more such interaction meetings with writers and other subject matter specialists to broaden the knowledge of children and people around, spread the joy of reading  and turn its facility into a centre of learning for the community at Vidyaranyapura”.

The presentation ended with all the children vowing to join the crusade for their feathered friends in one of the few remaining bastions of greenery in the city.

More pictures of the event at this URL.

You can expect more such programmes from all JustBooks branches now that Summer holidays are here.