Hari om parents!!!!
We had a GREAT LAST class of the year 2015!!!!! Children came well prepared, ready to learn and lots of enthusiasm.
As always we started our class with:
3 Om's
Ganesha Shloka---"Vakratunda mahakaya...."
Saraswati Shloka----"Saraswati namastubyam..."
We brainstormed about what we talked about last class. We started with G is for God but couldn't finish it as they said because they were not focused. Continued asking questions what can God do? What does he give us? Where is God?
God can make impossible things possible. Like how a brown cow can eat green grass yet we get white milk. It is a miracle by God. God gives me many gifts some we don't even account for, for eg. Air, eyes to see, nose to smell, ears to hear, etc etc. God also gives us many other gifts. We discussed some of the things that we are really thankful for. Home, clothes, toys, family, and food. We did a project where we glued God's gift in the center of the page and glued all gifts we thought we think are gifts and we need to be thankful for that. Please check your children's folder to see their work.
We all agreed that God gives us many gifts and we need to thank Him for that. How do we thank God? We thank Him by saying Shlokas and doing prayers. How do we perform prayers? We discussed that in detail on how to bathe God and how to dress God. And how we do aarti on special days and shloka everyday. Taught them the ingredients that goes into making God's soap so we can bathe Him. Panchamrat----Milk, Yogurt, honey, sugar and ghee!
Steps:
Take God's clothes off (by removing flowers, actual clothes etc.)
Pour water on
Put panchamrat on
Rinse
Put kum-kum/sandlewood, and flowers
Pop quiz time----Give me the 5 ingredients that goes in the panchamrat? Taalin earned the "Rock star sticker" as he answered the question correctly...:-)
Next week yet again they will get a chance to earn Rock star sticker but this time I am giving them ALL a chance to do so. I told them whoever recites ALL 3 shlokas learned so far correctly will earn the ROCK star sticker next class.
Sloka #1
"Asota ma sadgamaya
Tamaso ma jyotir gamaya
Mrytyor ma amrutam gamaya"
Shloka#2
"Shri Ram ram rameti
rame rame manorame
sahastranama tattulyam
rama nama varanane"
Shloka #3
"Ekdantam Mahakayam
Lambodaragajananam
Vignanashakaram devam
Herambam pranamamya-aham"
Have a GREAT holiday break!!!! No classes for the next two Sundays.
Next class is on January 10th. Arjun's family is signed up for snacks for that class.
See you in 2016!!!!! Be blessed!
Meena Arvind
Sunday, December 20, 2015
Monday, December 14, 2015
December 13th 2015----Class 10!!!!
Hari om parents!!!!
We had a very warm day to begin with. ALL kids complained about being warm (did I mention myself too?) so we opened few windows to cool things down.
So as I have been reaching out to few of you parents if your child happens to be a shy one or the one with special need to bring them early so I can work with them to open up a bit (if they are shy) and I can understand your child (if they have special need/s). Thank you for working with me as a team and we have made some progress with some children but that's NOT where it stops. So lets continue to do so, so they get acclimated to the teacher/s, balvihar (if they are new to balvihar), etc.
So to enhance the same concept, today we asked our special friend to do 3 Oms. We also gave an option to do the 3 oms, or say pass and the next friend can take the lead. Our friend didn't do the 3 Oms, so I gave another option to touch my finger, 1 being I will do the 3 Oms, 2 being I pass. Finally it was PASSED. So I passed it to another friend who also chose not to do the 3 Oms. I passed it to another friend (Arjun Ambat) who is also very quiet in the class and he turned out to be the ROCK"STAR" and lead us to do the 3 Oms. I gave him a STAR sticker to be the brave and lead the 3 Oms.
Yes, we did spend a lot of time doing this "exercise" but its worth every effort to make our children comfortable while learning in any environment.
We did Ganesha shloka, "Vakratunda mahakay....",
Saraswati shloka "Saraswati Namastubyam..."
By this time kids were still complaining about being warm (it really was not, anymore), wanted to go the bathroom, eat snack etc etc. They were just distracted today. So we talked about how we focus in school, we must do the same here in balvihar. Gave some examples where we follow the rules like we don't talk loud in library, why? They said the librarian would ask me to leave. I said why? Cause that's the library rule, you cant talk loud.
So we decided to do that BUT we brainstormed the G is for God and that's all we were able to accomplish. I held off the craft and the coloring cause I am a big believer that craft is to enhance the learning and didn't want it to be just an activity.
So we learned Ganesha Shloka:
"Ekdantam Mahakayam
Lambodaragajananam
Vignanashakaram devam
Herambam pranamamya-aham"
1st shloka: "Asota ma sadgamaya..."
2nd shloka: "Shri rama rameti...."
This is our 3rd Shloka for the year, so please practice with your children so we can keep moving forward with other planned shlokas for the year.
We plan to go over some important stuff next week so please don't miss it unless you are going to India or have travel plans.
Our next class is on December 20th and Anurag has signed up for snacks for the class. See you all then!!!!
Meena Arvind
We had a very warm day to begin with. ALL kids complained about being warm (did I mention myself too?) so we opened few windows to cool things down.
So as I have been reaching out to few of you parents if your child happens to be a shy one or the one with special need to bring them early so I can work with them to open up a bit (if they are shy) and I can understand your child (if they have special need/s). Thank you for working with me as a team and we have made some progress with some children but that's NOT where it stops. So lets continue to do so, so they get acclimated to the teacher/s, balvihar (if they are new to balvihar), etc.
So to enhance the same concept, today we asked our special friend to do 3 Oms. We also gave an option to do the 3 oms, or say pass and the next friend can take the lead. Our friend didn't do the 3 Oms, so I gave another option to touch my finger, 1 being I will do the 3 Oms, 2 being I pass. Finally it was PASSED. So I passed it to another friend who also chose not to do the 3 Oms. I passed it to another friend (Arjun Ambat) who is also very quiet in the class and he turned out to be the ROCK"STAR" and lead us to do the 3 Oms. I gave him a STAR sticker to be the brave and lead the 3 Oms.
Yes, we did spend a lot of time doing this "exercise" but its worth every effort to make our children comfortable while learning in any environment.
We did Ganesha shloka, "Vakratunda mahakay....",
Saraswati shloka "Saraswati Namastubyam..."
By this time kids were still complaining about being warm (it really was not, anymore), wanted to go the bathroom, eat snack etc etc. They were just distracted today. So we talked about how we focus in school, we must do the same here in balvihar. Gave some examples where we follow the rules like we don't talk loud in library, why? They said the librarian would ask me to leave. I said why? Cause that's the library rule, you cant talk loud.
So we decided to do that BUT we brainstormed the G is for God and that's all we were able to accomplish. I held off the craft and the coloring cause I am a big believer that craft is to enhance the learning and didn't want it to be just an activity.
So we learned Ganesha Shloka:
"Ekdantam Mahakayam
Lambodaragajananam
Vignanashakaram devam
Herambam pranamamya-aham"
1st shloka: "Asota ma sadgamaya..."
2nd shloka: "Shri rama rameti...."
This is our 3rd Shloka for the year, so please practice with your children so we can keep moving forward with other planned shlokas for the year.
We plan to go over some important stuff next week so please don't miss it unless you are going to India or have travel plans.
Our next class is on December 20th and Anurag has signed up for snacks for the class. See you all then!!!!
Meena Arvind
Sunday, December 6, 2015
December 6th, 2015---Class 9!!!!
Hari Om parents!!!
We had the "smallest" class today, with 9 children. But they were very enthusiastic about being at BalVihar despite of some having cough, etc.
As always,
we started our class with
* 3 Oms
* "Vakratunda mahakaya....."
* "Saraswati Namastubyam...."
We revised our learned shloka so far:
* "Asato maa...."
* "Ram ram rameti....."
We quickly revised our alphabets:
A is for Aspiration
B is for Brotherhood
C is for Cleanliness
D is for Daddy
E is for Enthusiasm:
What is enthusiasm?
Lots of answers----being happy was the most common one!!!
Enthusiasm is to experience joy and excitement while striving for a goal
How do we cultivate enthusiasm?
By loving everything we do
What are the times do you feel enthusiasm??
When you get invited to a birthday party? When you come to Balvihar? Having a playdate?
They all answered they are super excited and enthusiastic about all of the above questions.
Did an exercise to show them how to tell if someone is being enthusiastic.
Had Aakash and Arjun line up in two separate rows. I asked Aakash to run as fast as he can and back. Asked Arjun to walk as slow as he can. On my count 1,2 and 3 off they go. Aakash ran as fast he could and Arjun was trying to walk but he couldn't because he didn't want to walk. He wanted to run with his friend and see he goes fastest. So he wasn't enjoying the walk. Was Arjun enthusiastic??? NO!!!!
Had Navyashri gallop and Anushri twirl in separate rows. Navyashri took off galloping while Anushri was nice and slow and a little nervous. Why? It was both fun activities then why was Anushri nervous? While twirling she was nervous so that she don't bump into the chairs hence she wasn't enthusiastic about twirling.
They all shared the activities and things that they are enthusiastic about and love to do. I talked about the push and the pull. How things we love will pull us and give us the joy and things we don't love so much will have the push feeling and we push it out if we can.
F is for Friendship:
What is friendship?
They said someone you have a playdate with, someone you play soccer with, etc etc
Friendship is a mutual feeling of love and respect.
Explained to them how one of those ingredient cant be missing in friendship. You can love someone but if you don't respect them, you are not being a good friend. You love a friend, ask them to come over for a playdate but don't share a toy with them, instead you fight with them and hurt them, respect is missing here and that is not being a good friend.
Asked them if friendship has to be among people with same age, they looked at me confused. So without adding much confusion I asked I am not your age but am I your friend? They all said yes and agreed that we don't someone of our age to be our friend.
Further asked them if that friend needs to be a human? They glared at me with little more confusion. I asked if someone has a pet like cat, dog, hamster but yet they call them their best friend, so friends don't need to be humans.
We all took bathroom break at this point, came back had gold fish for snack.
We watched a video of Krishna and Sudama to reinforce the learning of Friendship and how friends help each other. Here is the link to the video if your children missed the class https://youtu.be/1iX0xeiyJxA
Next class is on December 13th and Navraysri's family has signed up for snacks for the next class. NO JUICE, please!!!!
Have an awesome week,
Meena Arvind
We had the "smallest" class today, with 9 children. But they were very enthusiastic about being at BalVihar despite of some having cough, etc.
As always,
we started our class with
* 3 Oms
* "Vakratunda mahakaya....."
* "Saraswati Namastubyam...."
We revised our learned shloka so far:
* "Asato maa...."
* "Ram ram rameti....."
We quickly revised our alphabets:
A is for Aspiration
B is for Brotherhood
C is for Cleanliness
D is for Daddy
E is for Enthusiasm:
What is enthusiasm?
Lots of answers----being happy was the most common one!!!
Enthusiasm is to experience joy and excitement while striving for a goal
How do we cultivate enthusiasm?
By loving everything we do
What are the times do you feel enthusiasm??
When you get invited to a birthday party? When you come to Balvihar? Having a playdate?
They all answered they are super excited and enthusiastic about all of the above questions.
Did an exercise to show them how to tell if someone is being enthusiastic.
Had Aakash and Arjun line up in two separate rows. I asked Aakash to run as fast as he can and back. Asked Arjun to walk as slow as he can. On my count 1,2 and 3 off they go. Aakash ran as fast he could and Arjun was trying to walk but he couldn't because he didn't want to walk. He wanted to run with his friend and see he goes fastest. So he wasn't enjoying the walk. Was Arjun enthusiastic??? NO!!!!
Had Navyashri gallop and Anushri twirl in separate rows. Navyashri took off galloping while Anushri was nice and slow and a little nervous. Why? It was both fun activities then why was Anushri nervous? While twirling she was nervous so that she don't bump into the chairs hence she wasn't enthusiastic about twirling.
They all shared the activities and things that they are enthusiastic about and love to do. I talked about the push and the pull. How things we love will pull us and give us the joy and things we don't love so much will have the push feeling and we push it out if we can.
F is for Friendship:
What is friendship?
They said someone you have a playdate with, someone you play soccer with, etc etc
Friendship is a mutual feeling of love and respect.
Explained to them how one of those ingredient cant be missing in friendship. You can love someone but if you don't respect them, you are not being a good friend. You love a friend, ask them to come over for a playdate but don't share a toy with them, instead you fight with them and hurt them, respect is missing here and that is not being a good friend.
Asked them if friendship has to be among people with same age, they looked at me confused. So without adding much confusion I asked I am not your age but am I your friend? They all said yes and agreed that we don't someone of our age to be our friend.
Further asked them if that friend needs to be a human? They glared at me with little more confusion. I asked if someone has a pet like cat, dog, hamster but yet they call them their best friend, so friends don't need to be humans.
We all took bathroom break at this point, came back had gold fish for snack.
We watched a video of Krishna and Sudama to reinforce the learning of Friendship and how friends help each other. Here is the link to the video if your children missed the class https://youtu.be/1iX0xeiyJxA
Next class is on December 13th and Navraysri's family has signed up for snacks for the next class. NO JUICE, please!!!!
Have an awesome week,
Meena Arvind
Monday, November 23, 2015
October 4th----Class 3!!!!!
We ALWAYS start our class with 3 Oms
Did our opening prayer "Om Sahana vavatu...."
We welcomed our new friends (Abhigna and Taalin)
Took
attendance in a little unique way: Harish uncle would call the
attendance for the person and another friend will say whether or not
that person is present. This exercise was to help them know each other
and remember their names. After all our classes name is Premam and you
cant love someone without knowing them. (This is how I said to them so
they understand and make effort to know their friends)
We
talked about Ganesh Chaturthi that was couple of weeks ago....and the
children said they didnt know what it was or when it was. Not celebrated
at home.
Told
them the story of how Parvati mata created him from sandalwood, how
Shiva unaware of his son cuts his head off, how the soldiers were asked
to go and get the head of the first persons head. i explained why hes a
special God and why we worship him before praying to any other God.
Talked about his favorite food being laddoo and modak, hoping they would
remember eating that atleast, but no! Not much luck! So for future
reference even if you cant make any laddoos at home, please buy for
celebrations that will reinforce the importance for children.
We
talked about Gandhi ji---hes called the father of our nation! He was
born in Porbandar, Gujarat. He was one of the freedom fighter who helped
India become free from the britishers. (Not sure how much they
understood or remembers but as they grow, we need to expose them to
material that might not click right away but it does get registered in
their knowledge.
We
ate snacks--popcorn, went to bathroom and did coloring of 2 images
(Gandhi ji AND Ganesha) so we could talk to parents without being
distracted.
Things to pack for their backpack for next class (10/11):
Pencil/s
2 sided Folder
crayons
water bottle
class books
Snack (if they have allergies of any sorts)
We will start our curriculum starting this Sunday, lets have a GREAT year together!!!!!!
Meena Arvind
Sunday, November 22, 2015
November 22nd--- Class 8!!!!!!
Hari om parents!!
See no evil
Hear no evil
Speak no evil
Next topic D is for: Daddy!!
After several typical answers for D is for, Aakash said D is for dad. Right on! We had barely 20 minutes left for this topic but I felt I wanted to focus more on keeping minds clean.
"To hug their father and say "Thank You" for taking care of the family"
NO class next Sunday, Next class is on December 6th!!!
Vikram's family has signed up for snacks for next class-please let us know if you cant make it to the class.
See you then,
Prem and Om
Meena Arvind
We started the class with 3 Oms,
Chanted "Om Sahana vavatu...."
Chanted "Om Sahana vavatu...."
Chanted "Vakratunda mahakaya...."
Chanted "Saraswati namastubyam....."
We did our attendance little different today. Took us few extra minutes to this but yet AGAIN this was the effort to help children become more comfortable and open up in class with their friends. Our class name is Premam and need to keep the love in the air in the class among the children and teachers!!!
We had each child going around the class and wishing each child "Hari om" with their name. For example--Hari om Meena-aunty if they wished me.
Topic C is for: Cleanliness
Topic C is for: Cleanliness
I asked them about their feelings after this experience to lead them into the next topic of our learning for the day. They said they were ALL very happy at the end of this exercise. I asked how many feelings are there? They listed:
Angry, sad, silly, funny, happy, surprised, etc. We talked about how each feeling makes us feel. For example--We may be angry but ultimately what "feeling" does it give? It makes us sad. Surprised is mostly happy feeling, etc.
Asked many open ended questions such as (still leading upto the topic):
- What is clean? (they said when you clean your room its clean :-))
- What is dirty? (they said that has mud, dust, dirt, etc)
- How do we keep your body clean?
- They said by:
- Taking shower
- Combing hair
- Putting new clothes on
- Putting lotion on
- How do we keep our environment clean?
- They said by:
- Putting chocolate wrapper in the trash
- By putting empty bottles in the recycle
- By cleaning your room
- By cleaning up your toys in the room
- How do we keep our mind/s clean? (Finally getting to the REAL question)
- They said:
- By taking shower?? NO
- By cleaning our room?? NO
- So I said:
- By saying NO bad words
- By seeing NO violent TV shows
- By hearing NO bad words
- Being nice to others
- By NOT fighting
- Loving everyone
- Going back to our "feelings" I re-emphasized that every feeling that makes us happy is clean, and the feelings that makes us sad/angry are dirty. So just like how we keep our bodies, surroundings clean, we MUST our minds clean. If we are happy, everyone around us are happy!!!
See no evil
Hear no evil
Speak no evil
Next topic D is for: Daddy!!
After several typical answers for D is for, Aakash said D is for dad. Right on! We had barely 20 minutes left for this topic but I felt I wanted to focus more on keeping minds clean.
- Who is Daddy?
- Daddy is the head of the family who takes care of the family.
- What does Daddy do?
- Daddy protects the family just like the Lord Vishnu is the protector of the world.
- When we celebrate Father's day, what special things we do for our Daddy?
- Some said:
- Give presents
- Make him happy
- I asked if they knew why we celebrate Father's day? They all look confused like there needs to be a reason to celebrate Father's day?
- There was a girl named Sonora, lived in Washington
- She was raised by her father as she didn't have a mother. (didn't use the word mother was dead--didn't want to give them sad feeling)
- After Sonora grew up, she realized it was a lot of hard work and sacrifice to raise children.
- She wanted to honor her dad for all the hard work so she chose June 19th--her fathers birthday to honor all fathers.
- 60 years later, President Johnson declared Fathers day on the 3rd Sunday of the month of June.
"To hug their father and say "Thank You" for taking care of the family"
NO class next Sunday, Next class is on December 6th!!!
Vikram's family has signed up for snacks for next class-please let us know if you cant make it to the class.
See you then,
Prem and Om
Meena Arvind
November 15th---Class 7!!!
Hari om parents,
Due to the short class today, instead of doing a BLOG I am writing email to wrap up the class details.
We started the class with 3 Oms,
Chanted "Vakratunda mahakaya...."
Chanted "Saraswati namastubyam....."
Took
attendance and rewarded 4 children (1 was missing) with stickers for
having a perfect attendance since the beginning of Bal vihar. I counted 5
classes deducting the back to bal vihar and open house.
The children that received the perfect attendance rewards are:
Anushri
Vibhu
Sahana
Roshan (missed the class today)
I
gave everyone their respective roles and dialogues and went through the
sequence twice to make sure they understood the sequential order of
their roles and dialogues.
Gave
them snack to give that extra boost and I think they did GREAT at the
play given the fact that there was NO practice, very little prompting
and being in front of SO many parents.
A BIG thanks to Soumya
for saving the day. She made the 10 heads of Ravana on such a short
notice. Parents, please check emails for updates so you dont miss any
important reminders.
After all you left, we had 10 minutes to sum up the story from Friday and learned a new shloka:
"Shri Rama rama rameti,
Rame raame manorame
Sahastranama tattulyam
rama nama varanane"
We
will have our regular class next Sunday, November 22nd. We will be
celebrating Diwali/Thankgiving (gratitude) with our Balvihar family next
Sunday. Please sign up to bring a dish at the below link:
Details for the Diwali/Thanksgiving Lunch:
When: November 22nd 2015
Where: BRHS Cafeteria
What time: 12:30 - 2 pm
Why: To celebrate Diwali/Thanksgiving with our Balvihar family
Have a great week ahead and see you next Sunday!!!!
Meena Arvind
p.s.
Please share pictures/videos so I can compile it ALL and put it on
Picasa so parents that werent able to make it can still be part of our
play. Thank you!!!
Sunday, November 1, 2015
November 1st 2015...Class 6!!!!!
Hari om parents!!!!
We had rather a small class today but very eventful and lots of learning took place. As you can tell that KG's curriculum is definitely a bit more than our Pre-K last year. So every class we need to stay tuned to be able to finish the curriculum. We may miss few days because of snow etc and we also try to spend some time for festivals, etc to incorporate it well in their learning. So please, don't miss any class so they can have good continuity and so that they don't miss out on whole bunch when they are out.
Please read below for our class details:
We started our class with 3Oms
-Opening prayer--"Om Sahanavavatu...."
-Called on Ganesha to take away our distractions:
(Some of us were in Poconos and wished we were still there, few were hoping to be playing soccer, others were tired from getting an extra hour of sleep due to day light savings time ended, etc etc.)
Recited: "Vakratunda mahakay....."
Now as we were ready to learn we called upon Saraswati mata who gives us knowledge.
Recited: "Saraswati namastubhyam......"
The ENTIRE class we talked about Ramayana!!!! With Diwali coming up, we wanted to make sure children knew what's the story behind Diwali and why we celebrate it.
As always I talked/told the story first and then showed the video that replicates the same story. We have different children who learns differently. Some are auditoria and others are visual. So I try to reach to both audience by giving a little of both. I broke the story and the video into 6-8 minute so they can concentrate on each part without losing interest. At the end of the video (I would recite the story first) I would ask them questions on what happened to see if they remembered. We split the group in two teams. Team Rama and Team Krishna---both Avatars of Vishnu!
First part
King of Ayodhya--Dashratha
He had 3 queens: Kaushalya, Sumitra and Kaikeyi
He couldn't have children so the sages' advised him to do the yagya. Upon completion of the yagna, he had 4 boys:
Kaushalya mata gave birth to Rama
Sumitra mata gave birth to Lakshmana and Shatrugana
Kaikeyi mata gave birth to Bharata
As they were growing up, they learned how to be a good archer, horse rides, respect their elders and gurus/teachers, etc.etc.
Second part:
Sage Vishwamitra and the prince Rama along with Lakshmana went to the city of Mithila. King Janaka was marrying his daughter Sita, (didn't go into details about Svayamvar) Instead said that King Janaka had a condition that whoever can break the special bow can marry his daughter Sita. Also mentioned that someday when they are ready for marriage, their mommies and daddy will want to make sure that the boy/girl is Indian, from a good family, is good by nature, etc.etc. Rama broke the bow and he marries Sita.
Third part:
Dashratha was getting old and wanted to renounce Rama to be new king who can take care of the kingdom and all his duties. Everyone were overjoyed by this news except one person. Kaikeyi's maid Manthara heard that and instigated Kaikeyi that if Rama becomes the king then her son Bharata will be a servant to his brother and will not become the king. Kaikeyi asked Dashratha that Rama should be send to the forest for 14 years. Rama, Sita and Lakshmana goes to the forest.
Below is the link to the video that we watched in the class, if the children who missed wants to get caught up.
You Tube Video: Ramayana story
We ate animal crackers for snack and took our bathroom break.
We did coloring to a picture of Shravan.
Hes known to be the most obedient son. His parents were blind and Shravan would carry them like a see saw on his shoulder. One time the parents were thirsty and asked Shravan to get water. He let them down from his shoulder while he went to get water. A king was near that river and upon hearing the sound by the river, he thought it was an animal and shoots him with his arrow. When he goes near to see, it was Shravan. Shravan tells the king about his parents and requests to take water for them as they are thirsty and waiting for water. The king takes water to Shravan's parents but also is honest and tells them what happened and that their son is not coming back. Both parents gets very sad but also angry at the same time. They "cursed" the king that you shall also suffer for your son the same way. Any guesses who the king was? It was King Dashratha and yes he does suffer for his son when Rama goes away to the jungle.
Talked about Karma--What goes around, comes around (from the story of Shravan) Also another way to say it is "What you give is what you get" If you are nice to others, others will be nice to you. But if you aren't nice to someone, someone or the other will not be nice to you. So its very important to be nice and make nice choices in life.
Ending shloka:"Om Purnamada, purnamidam......"
Aakash is signed up for snacks for the next class, let me know if you cant be there and I can move the next person up the queue.
NO class next week, next class is on November 15th!!!
Meena Arvind
We had rather a small class today but very eventful and lots of learning took place. As you can tell that KG's curriculum is definitely a bit more than our Pre-K last year. So every class we need to stay tuned to be able to finish the curriculum. We may miss few days because of snow etc and we also try to spend some time for festivals, etc to incorporate it well in their learning. So please, don't miss any class so they can have good continuity and so that they don't miss out on whole bunch when they are out.
Please read below for our class details:
We started our class with 3Oms
-Opening prayer--"Om Sahanavavatu...."
-Called on Ganesha to take away our distractions:
(Some of us were in Poconos and wished we were still there, few were hoping to be playing soccer, others were tired from getting an extra hour of sleep due to day light savings time ended, etc etc.)
Recited: "Vakratunda mahakay....."
Now as we were ready to learn we called upon Saraswati mata who gives us knowledge.
Recited: "Saraswati namastubhyam......"
The ENTIRE class we talked about Ramayana!!!! With Diwali coming up, we wanted to make sure children knew what's the story behind Diwali and why we celebrate it.
As always I talked/told the story first and then showed the video that replicates the same story. We have different children who learns differently. Some are auditoria and others are visual. So I try to reach to both audience by giving a little of both. I broke the story and the video into 6-8 minute so they can concentrate on each part without losing interest. At the end of the video (I would recite the story first) I would ask them questions on what happened to see if they remembered. We split the group in two teams. Team Rama and Team Krishna---both Avatars of Vishnu!
First part
King of Ayodhya--Dashratha
He had 3 queens: Kaushalya, Sumitra and Kaikeyi
He couldn't have children so the sages' advised him to do the yagya. Upon completion of the yagna, he had 4 boys:
Kaushalya mata gave birth to Rama
Sumitra mata gave birth to Lakshmana and Shatrugana
Kaikeyi mata gave birth to Bharata
As they were growing up, they learned how to be a good archer, horse rides, respect their elders and gurus/teachers, etc.etc.
Second part:
Sage Vishwamitra and the prince Rama along with Lakshmana went to the city of Mithila. King Janaka was marrying his daughter Sita, (didn't go into details about Svayamvar) Instead said that King Janaka had a condition that whoever can break the special bow can marry his daughter Sita. Also mentioned that someday when they are ready for marriage, their mommies and daddy will want to make sure that the boy/girl is Indian, from a good family, is good by nature, etc.etc. Rama broke the bow and he marries Sita.
Third part:
Dashratha was getting old and wanted to renounce Rama to be new king who can take care of the kingdom and all his duties. Everyone were overjoyed by this news except one person. Kaikeyi's maid Manthara heard that and instigated Kaikeyi that if Rama becomes the king then her son Bharata will be a servant to his brother and will not become the king. Kaikeyi asked Dashratha that Rama should be send to the forest for 14 years. Rama, Sita and Lakshmana goes to the forest.
Below is the link to the video that we watched in the class, if the children who missed wants to get caught up.
You Tube Video: Ramayana story
We ate animal crackers for snack and took our bathroom break.
We did coloring to a picture of Shravan.
Hes known to be the most obedient son. His parents were blind and Shravan would carry them like a see saw on his shoulder. One time the parents were thirsty and asked Shravan to get water. He let them down from his shoulder while he went to get water. A king was near that river and upon hearing the sound by the river, he thought it was an animal and shoots him with his arrow. When he goes near to see, it was Shravan. Shravan tells the king about his parents and requests to take water for them as they are thirsty and waiting for water. The king takes water to Shravan's parents but also is honest and tells them what happened and that their son is not coming back. Both parents gets very sad but also angry at the same time. They "cursed" the king that you shall also suffer for your son the same way. Any guesses who the king was? It was King Dashratha and yes he does suffer for his son when Rama goes away to the jungle.
Talked about Karma--What goes around, comes around (from the story of Shravan) Also another way to say it is "What you give is what you get" If you are nice to others, others will be nice to you. But if you aren't nice to someone, someone or the other will not be nice to you. So its very important to be nice and make nice choices in life.
Ending shloka:"Om Purnamada, purnamidam......"
Aakash is signed up for snacks for the next class, let me know if you cant be there and I can move the next person up the queue.
NO class next week, next class is on November 15th!!!
Meena Arvind
Sunday, October 25, 2015
October 25th--Class 5!!!!!!
Hari Om parents:
We had another great day at Bal vihar Premam class today!!!!! We missed few of our friends but more importantly they missed ALOT today. We talked about a lot today and was a busy day in our class. Below is more details about our class.
Started our class with 3 Oms as always
Chanted "Saraswati Namastubyam......"
Chanted "Asato ma sadgamaya...."
Revision from our class last week:
Who is God?
Where is God?
What does God do?
How do you see God?
Some of them remembered the answers others I had to do jumping jacks with them in the class to wake them up, before we moved into new material.
A is for?
Everyone answered A for Apple, Aligator, Ape, Astronaut, ant etc. etc. We introduced another word that A stands for. That is Aspiration. What is Aspiration?? "A strong determination to achieve our goal" Gave them an example "If you want to have a playdate with your friend, you whine, cry do whatever it takes to make it happen, because you really want that" Similar way, if you set a goal in life you will achieve that with a strong will/determination.
Told them the story of Dronacharya:
B is for?
Again got many different answers. B is for ball, bear, bee, etc. etc. Being the alphabet safari curriculum introduced B is for brotherhood. What is brotherhood? It is the sense of belonging and togetherness among members of a family, neighborhood, organization and the world.
Talked about how they belong in our Premam class, how they belong in their school, their neighborhood, soccer team, dance class, world, everywhere. Its all part of brotherhood.
The whole world is our family and our home is EARTH!!!
Told them the story of box of crayons. How they belong together but didn't get along:
"While walking in a toy store, the day before today I overheard a crayon box with many things to say !I don't like red,! said yellow. And Green said, !Nor do I. And no one here like orange, but no one knows just why.!
We are a box of crayons that doesn't get along,! said Blue to all the others, Something here is wrong.!
Well I bought that box of crayons and took it home with me. And laid out all the crayons so the crayons so the crayons could all see—
They watched me as I colored—with Red and Blue and Green And Black and White and Orange, and every color in between.
They watched as Green became the grass and Blue became the sky. The Yellow sun was shining bright—on White clouds drifting by.
Colors changing as they touched, becoming something new. They watched me as I colored, they watched 'til I was through.
And when I'd finally finished, I began to walk away. And as I did the crayon box had something more to say...
I do like Red,! said Yellow. And Green said, !So do I! And Blue, you were terrific so high up in the sky.!
We are a box of crayons, each one of us unique, but when we get together, the picture is complete.! "
We talked about Navratri - 9 nights
Talked about Dussera, some calls it Vijayadashami. Most said we don't celebrate that. I plan to talk about Ramayana story in great detail in next 2 classes leading up to Diwali.
We did Shlokas for all 3 Goddess that we worship to during Navratri:
Saraswati--She gives us knowledge."Ya devi sarvabhetusu vidya rupen sansthitha, namastasyai namastasyai namastasyai namo namah"
Durga--She gives us strength. Ya devi sarvabhetusu Shakti rupen sansthitha, namastasyai namastasyai namastasyai namo namah"
Lakshmi--She gives us coins/wealth. Ya devi sarvabhetusu Lakshmi rupen sansthitha, namastasyai namastasyai namastasyai namo namah"
We ate snacks today and had our scheduled bathroom break.
Coloring project:
To reinforce the learning, I divided the children in 2 groups. Gave them their coloring sheet/s, gave them each ONE crayon. Coloring sheet was a beach scene with clouds, sailboat, tree, water, sun, sandcastle, etc. Now they had to work in their "brotherhood" to work together. After they were done coloring with their crayon, they had to work with their "team/brotherhood" to request by using magic words to get next crayon to accomplish/color the next item. They worked very well together and understood that you can belong but just like the crayon story, you need to work together to truly belong and get along.
Talked about touching our parents feet to take their blessings every morning as part of their homework. Reinforcing this as homework for now while it becomes their routine going forward. One child was in tears that her mom doesn't let her touch her feet. Talked to her about how every place has its own culture/tradition hence her mother preferred she just bowed down with her hands folded and not in her feet. If you have any traditions or beliefs that goes against what I discuss with children, please feel free to discuss that with me. It is team work after all.
Did our closing prayer "Om purnamidah....."
Next class on November 1st!!!! See you then!!!!
Meena Arvind
We had another great day at Bal vihar Premam class today!!!!! We missed few of our friends but more importantly they missed ALOT today. We talked about a lot today and was a busy day in our class. Below is more details about our class.
Started our class with 3 Oms as always
Chanted "Saraswati Namastubyam......"
Chanted "Asato ma sadgamaya...."
Revision from our class last week:
Who is God?
Where is God?
What does God do?
How do you see God?
Some of them remembered the answers others I had to do jumping jacks with them in the class to wake them up, before we moved into new material.
A is for?
Everyone answered A for Apple, Aligator, Ape, Astronaut, ant etc. etc. We introduced another word that A stands for. That is Aspiration. What is Aspiration?? "A strong determination to achieve our goal" Gave them an example "If you want to have a playdate with your friend, you whine, cry do whatever it takes to make it happen, because you really want that" Similar way, if you set a goal in life you will achieve that with a strong will/determination.
Told them the story of Dronacharya:
Dronacharya addressed all the
students and said, “Young princes, you have learnt most of the skills
necessary for a warrior, and it is time you take a test and show me your
abilities. Right now, I want you to show me your skill in archery. There, on
that tree is a wooden bird with a painted eye. You have to aim for, and hit that
eye.”
The first one to be
called was Yudhishtra. Dronacharya asked him to aim at the bird, but
wait for him to say the word before letting the arrow loose. When Yudhishtra was
ready, Dronacharya asked, “Yudhishtra, please tell me what you can
see.”
Yudhishtra
replied, “I can see the bird, the tree, the fruits on the tree and more
birds.” Dronacharya replied, “All right. Leave your bow and arrow and go.”
Yudhishtra was surprised, but obeyed his guru and did as he was
told.
Next was the turn of
Duryodhana. Asked the same question, he replied, “Gurudev, I can see the
bird, the tree, the leaves, the fruits, another bird…” But before he could
complete, Dronacharya said, “You can go!” Duryodhana was wild, and he flung the
bow and arrow to the ground before he stood aside.
Next was the turn of
Bhima. Again, he was asked the same question by Dronacharya, and he
replied, “Gurudev, I too can see the bird, the tree, the fruits……” he too was
interrupted and made to stand aside.
Next was the turn of
the twins, one by one. When posed the same question, Nakula said, “I can
see the people, the trees and the bird” and Sahadeva said, “I can see the bird,
the fruits and the tree.” They too were turned away.
Finally, it was the
turn of Arjuna. As soon as Arjuna was ready, Dronacharya asked, “Arjuna,
what can you see?” Arjuna replied, “Gurudev, I can see only the eye of the bird,
and nothing else.” With a smile on his face, Dronacharya said, “Fire!” and
Arjuna let loose the arrow which found its mark.
With his strong determination he became is known as the best archer.
B is for?
Again got many different answers. B is for ball, bear, bee, etc. etc. Being the alphabet safari curriculum introduced B is for brotherhood. What is brotherhood? It is the sense of belonging and togetherness among members of a family, neighborhood, organization and the world.
Talked about how they belong in our Premam class, how they belong in their school, their neighborhood, soccer team, dance class, world, everywhere. Its all part of brotherhood.
The whole world is our family and our home is EARTH!!!
Told them the story of box of crayons. How they belong together but didn't get along:
"While walking in a toy store, the day before today I overheard a crayon box with many things to say !I don't like red,! said yellow. And Green said, !Nor do I. And no one here like orange, but no one knows just why.!
We are a box of crayons that doesn't get along,! said Blue to all the others, Something here is wrong.!
Well I bought that box of crayons and took it home with me. And laid out all the crayons so the crayons so the crayons could all see—
They watched me as I colored—with Red and Blue and Green And Black and White and Orange, and every color in between.
They watched as Green became the grass and Blue became the sky. The Yellow sun was shining bright—on White clouds drifting by.
Colors changing as they touched, becoming something new. They watched me as I colored, they watched 'til I was through.
And when I'd finally finished, I began to walk away. And as I did the crayon box had something more to say...
I do like Red,! said Yellow. And Green said, !So do I! And Blue, you were terrific so high up in the sky.!
We are a box of crayons, each one of us unique, but when we get together, the picture is complete.! "
We talked about Navratri - 9 nights
Talked about Dussera, some calls it Vijayadashami. Most said we don't celebrate that. I plan to talk about Ramayana story in great detail in next 2 classes leading up to Diwali.
We did Shlokas for all 3 Goddess that we worship to during Navratri:
Saraswati--She gives us knowledge."Ya devi sarvabhetusu vidya rupen sansthitha, namastasyai namastasyai namastasyai namo namah"
Durga--She gives us strength. Ya devi sarvabhetusu Shakti rupen sansthitha, namastasyai namastasyai namastasyai namo namah"
Lakshmi--She gives us coins/wealth. Ya devi sarvabhetusu Lakshmi rupen sansthitha, namastasyai namastasyai namastasyai namo namah"
We ate snacks today and had our scheduled bathroom break.
Coloring project:
To reinforce the learning, I divided the children in 2 groups. Gave them their coloring sheet/s, gave them each ONE crayon. Coloring sheet was a beach scene with clouds, sailboat, tree, water, sun, sandcastle, etc. Now they had to work in their "brotherhood" to work together. After they were done coloring with their crayon, they had to work with their "team/brotherhood" to request by using magic words to get next crayon to accomplish/color the next item. They worked very well together and understood that you can belong but just like the crayon story, you need to work together to truly belong and get along.
Talked about touching our parents feet to take their blessings every morning as part of their homework. Reinforcing this as homework for now while it becomes their routine going forward. One child was in tears that her mom doesn't let her touch her feet. Talked to her about how every place has its own culture/tradition hence her mother preferred she just bowed down with her hands folded and not in her feet. If you have any traditions or beliefs that goes against what I discuss with children, please feel free to discuss that with me. It is team work after all.
Did our closing prayer "Om purnamidah....."
Next class on November 1st!!!! See you then!!!!
Meena Arvind
Monday, October 12, 2015
October 11th 2015---Class 4!!!!!!
Hari om parents:
Welcome to our class Premam-KG BLOG spot!!!! If this is your first time, save the link so you can check it out regularly for class details and class updates.
I am amazed at how willingly our children are walking in the classroom and being comfortable being at Balvihar. We do have few new friends and I hope to make them just as comfortable so coming to Balvihar is a routine NOT a chore!
I walked up to each child wishing them Good morning/Hari om to give them their undivided attention and get them to Balvihar learning mode.
As always started the class with:
3 Oms
"Asato ma sadgamaya,
Tamaso ma jyotirgamaya
mrtyorma amrtam gamaya"
Also explained the meaning of the shloka (as they are growing, we are attempting to teach them the meaning of shlokas too, starting this year) Dear God, lead us from untruth to the truth, from darkness to light, from death to immortality.
Took quick attendance, the children would say Hari om instead of saying "Here" or "present". Also randomly I would ask a child to say whether or not the person(child's) being called out is present or not. This will help them remember their class mates and learn their names.
Took a quick bathroom break as I needed them to focus for the next 20 minutes. (In future, please take them to the bathroom before class so they don't have to take breaks during class time)
I got everyone on the floor in a circle, very informal manner for story time. They were SUPER charged and excited. Here is a quick synopsis of the story so that helps you have a conversation with them about it:
Briefly also talked about RESPECT, as Bridgewater school celebrated their week of respect this past week.
We colored the alphabet safari page and glued that on their folders. Alphabet safari is our curriculum this year. I plan on incorporating more words than in the syllabus to give them more knowledge.
Their HOMEWORK:
Asked them the rule of gravity. Some knew others guessed, which is great. Told them what goes up, ALWAYS comes down. Whatever knowledge we have in our mind, brain, it also comes down in our feet. That's why we touch our elders feet to gain their knowledge, experience, etc. So they should be touching your feet EVERYDAY to give respect and get blessings. IF they haven't done already, please ask them if they have homework, gentle reminder!!!!!!!!
We did the closing prayer:
"Om purnamadah, purnamidam......." (page 29 in the handbook)
Few reminders:
NO Class next week, we will see you on Oct 25th!!!!!
Have a great week ahead!!!!
Meena Arvind
Welcome to our class Premam-KG BLOG spot!!!! If this is your first time, save the link so you can check it out regularly for class details and class updates.
I am amazed at how willingly our children are walking in the classroom and being comfortable being at Balvihar. We do have few new friends and I hope to make them just as comfortable so coming to Balvihar is a routine NOT a chore!
I walked up to each child wishing them Good morning/Hari om to give them their undivided attention and get them to Balvihar learning mode.
As always started the class with:
3 Oms
- Opening prayer:
- "Om Sahana vavatu----" (page 8 in the handbook)
- "Vakratunda Mahakay....."(page 8 in the handbook)
- Asking Ganesha to take away our distractions (vigna) and watch over us as we begin our class time in Premam class.
- "Saraswati Namastubyam.."(page 8 in the handbook)
- Once Ganesha took away our distractions, we were ready to learn hence called upon the Goddess of knowledge--Saraswati to help us learn.
"Asato ma sadgamaya,
Tamaso ma jyotirgamaya
mrtyorma amrtam gamaya"
Also explained the meaning of the shloka (as they are growing, we are attempting to teach them the meaning of shlokas too, starting this year) Dear God, lead us from untruth to the truth, from darkness to light, from death to immortality.
Took quick attendance, the children would say Hari om instead of saying "Here" or "present". Also randomly I would ask a child to say whether or not the person(child's) being called out is present or not. This will help them remember their class mates and learn their names.
Took a quick bathroom break as I needed them to focus for the next 20 minutes. (In future, please take them to the bathroom before class so they don't have to take breaks during class time)
I got everyone on the floor in a circle, very informal manner for story time. They were SUPER charged and excited. Here is a quick synopsis of the story so that helps you have a conversation with them about it:
- There was a king who had 3 princes. Minister was their teacher and was training the princes and building their future to be a great king. Eldest prince were very curious about a lot of "things" but he were asked to focus on the"studies". One day the king died and the eldest prince became the king now. He thought it was the perfect chance/opportunity to get his questions answered that has been put off for a while. He calls the minister and asks his 3 questions:
- Who is God?
- Where is he?
- What does he do?
- Minister should already have known answers to his questions but he gets nervous. He asks the king to give him 41 days to find answers to his questions. The king agreed and gave him 41 days. The minister now went to jungle, mountains, everywhere in quest of finding the answers to the King's questions. He went round and around but didn't have any luck with finding answers to above questions. He returned to the palace really tired and even more nervous, the cook gave him milk and the minister went to sleep. Cook went to the minister next day to ask him to go to the "assembly" to the king to answer his questions, but he finds the minister sleeping and wouldn't wake up. So the cook decided to represent the minister and went to the assembly.
- The cook asked the king that since you are the student seeking answers, you need to be sitting on the floor and I am the one who has all answers to your questions, I should be sitting at your throne/royal chair. So king did go sit on the floor like we all were sitting in our class and learning about God.
- Who is God? The cook says, "He is the one who can do what no one else can" King asks him to explain in more detail, cook being a cook was thinking about food. So he answers, how does a brown cow, eats green grass and still gives/produces white milk?
- Where is God? The cook says, "God is everywhere" Then he lit up a candle in a dark room and lifts his candle. He said like the light from a candle spreads everywhere, so does God. (Some children said God is in heaven, others said they are in us)
- By this time, the minister woke up and showed up to the assembly and sees the king on the floor and the cook on the throne. He thinks its all his fault so gets on the kings feet with apologies for not being able to find answers to his questions.
- What does God do? The cook says, "God makes impossible things, possible" He couldn't find an example for this one, so he goes, look is this even possible? The cook at the throne, king on the floor and the minister at kings feet?
- He was able to answer all the questions because his intentions were to help the minister and because of his sweet mind. Which leads us to kings next question.
- How to see God? And the answer to that question is through our sweet mind. Even though God is everywhere, we cannot see him. We need a sweet mind to see him and experience his presence. I also clarified by saying that sweet mind is nothing but having no clutter in our minds and our hearts, be loving, caring and we can experience God with our sweet mind.
Briefly also talked about RESPECT, as Bridgewater school celebrated their week of respect this past week.
We colored the alphabet safari page and glued that on their folders. Alphabet safari is our curriculum this year. I plan on incorporating more words than in the syllabus to give them more knowledge.
Their HOMEWORK:
Asked them the rule of gravity. Some knew others guessed, which is great. Told them what goes up, ALWAYS comes down. Whatever knowledge we have in our mind, brain, it also comes down in our feet. That's why we touch our elders feet to gain their knowledge, experience, etc. So they should be touching your feet EVERYDAY to give respect and get blessings. IF they haven't done already, please ask them if they have homework, gentle reminder!!!!!!!!
We did the closing prayer:
"Om purnamadah, purnamidam......." (page 29 in the handbook)
Few reminders:
- Please send a 2 pocket folder to keep their work safely. (I told them if they register for soccer, can they show up to the field without soccer ball or cleats??? They all said NO. I said Balvihar is no different. We need to come prepared)
- Crayons/pencil--leave an extra box in their backpack so they wont forget.
- Please continue to send snacks if your child has any allergies.
- Please send water bottle so they don't have to drink from the fountain.
- Send their books starting next week.
- Recite shlokas with them (opening, closing, ganesha, saraswati, any new shlokas)
- Prayer log--I will start emphasizing that starting next week.
NO Class next week, we will see you on Oct 25th!!!!!
Have a great week ahead!!!!
Meena Arvind
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)