* ॐ सहनाववतु - Om sahanaavavatu (My prayers, pg. 6)
* वक्रतुण्ड महाकाया - vakratuNDa mahaakaayaa
* सरस्वति नमस्तुभ्यम् - saraswati namastubhayam (My prayers, pg. 44)
* गुरुर्ब्रह्मा - gururbrahmaa (My prayers, pg. 9, 3rd shloka of 'gurustotram')
Meditation: 1 minute
Geeta Chanting: Chapter 11, shloka 1, 2
Story: ayodhyaa; putrakaameShTi yaaga
Words of the week: maharShI vaalmIki; ayodhyaa; dashratha; vasiShTha
Activity: Coloring raama, sItaa, lakShmaNa and hanumaan picture
Game time: 4 Corners
End of class:
- ॐ पूर्णमदः - Om poornamadaH.
Comments:
Rashmi aunty and Kusuma aunty:
Do we have an awesome group of 1st graders or what! We have such wonderful listeners and very smart ones too. They were very attentive, listened very well and participated very actively! We are very excited to see their interest.
Today, we did some beginning prayers. Most of them know the shlokas pretty well! Looks like they have been attending balavihar for a while :). During the meditation time, they kept still and concentrated for a whole minute, on their favorite deity. We learnt the words to the first two geeta shlokas. They could get the first verse well, but found the words to the second one a little hard. Parents please practice with them regularly. The script can be found in the handout books that were given to you.
During story time, we will be learning the story of raamaayaNa through out the year. They listened to the description of ayodhyaa, how it was different from the cities today, how they commuted from place to place, how they valued different art forms like music and playing instruments, etc. They also learnt that the city was called 'ayodhyaa' as the city was peaceful and nobody fought with each other. Then the whole city of ayodhyaa got ready for the putrakaameShTi yaaga. We have stopped the story at that.
Then it was time for our coloring project. They colored a picture of raama, sIta, lakshmaNa and hanumaan. We truly have some wonderful artists! They were very creative in the color combinations they used.
We played the game of 4 corners where we named each corner with the 4 words of the week. They were good listeners. When the aunties tried to trick them with 'sIta', they wouldn't budge :). They waited till the right name of the corner was told.
We finished the class with ending prayers.
Parents, please remember to dress them in some warm clothes as one of our room tends to be cooler. Also, do not forget to send their bag with the supplies listed above. We expect to have a lot of fun learning the raamaayaNa. See you all next week.
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Ruchi aunty and Meera aunty:
Today was an exciting day as it was the first day of the class. Although there was some confusion regarding which section the kids were supposed be but overall it was a smooth sailing. We all started with some deep breathing and yoga stretches followed by short meditation. Kids did very well. Each week we plan to increase the time by one minute until we reach two or three minutes. It's hard but we can do it.
The rest of the activities included Geeta Chanting (chapter 11 Ist shloka), story time, coloring and game (Four Corners). We did not have time to do likhit japa this time but we will do it next time. The class ended with Aarti and pledge.Kids enjoyed listening to the story about "putrakammeshti yagna". Coloring was a favorite activity but four corners was a lot of fun.
We all look forward to have a fun and enjoyable learning experience this year!
Hari OM!
