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2.5: "India jan 2003" - Page 12-12   |
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Message 10 Dear EQ Europe networkers, Follow-up of the "Warm regards from India-report". After 12 hours in train from Hyderabad we are in Bangalore. Bangalore is a big, big city with 20 million citizens... Bangalore is developing quickly. Everywhere new buildings. Bangalore modern. There are very rich families in this town and also poor people. The cows who are walking trough the streets of Bangalore are most black and white, like the cows in Denmark and the Netherlands. The traffic here is a real problem. Everywhere is dust and smog. Only the big parks in the centre of Bangalore are little paradises in the middle of the traffic. The town has several areas. Some poor other rich. The are big companies and banks and also beautiful historical buildings. We visit schools in several areas. The biggest school of Bangalore is Bisschop Cottons Girl High School. We visit this school and did tree EQ, MQ workshops with children at the first primary level. These workshops had the purpose to create a learning experience in the real situation in the classroom for the teachers. (This we call a 'clinic'). Most of these children come to school with school-busses from other rich or middleclass areas. The school educational system follows the state curriculum. It is an old fashions English private school. Original Christian. The population of the school are Islamitic, Hindu and Christian children. The are no lessons in religion. Children can learn music, arts, sports and ballet. We visit the MAYA school in a poor area of Bangalore the same day: This child development centre is one of the recourse centres of MAYA in low income area's. These schools provide a space where children are be able to explore there through interest, cultural activities, education and games, sharing experience with each other. This school has 3 working places for handcraft, mooring and motor techniques. There is also a shop and a little school building all in the same small street. The founder behind this project is an NGO. The third school is the city school in Nagasandra, the industry area of Bangalore: A smoggy and dusty environment where big and small companies are working in open buildings. Everywhere is heavy traffic. Between the companies and huts build from plastics and rubbish are little markets for fruits, greens and other materials. Everywhere cows, dogs and ponies. The schools approach is health and creating a dust free environment for children. This school with 900 pupils is an experiment of a motivated man. In the lower classes the developed an approach based in ideas of Forbes and Montessori. They learn by playing with water, sand, blocks and computer plays. The school is not rich. With an amazing creativity the teachers of this school try to develop an educational system that is multiple intelligent. The shot training Dhyan gives to all the teachers and the management of this school will have a follow-up in December. The school asked for help by the development of multiple intelligent education and a strong learning environment for the second primary level and for teachers training. They like to build a learning school organisation. All teachers are woman from the area. Because that it is also a project to empower woman. An other job we did was a consultation to the MNC's Call centre Dial M in the office area of Bangalore. They asked Dhyan to do training for the employees of this centre: Question: How can we learn to manage our stress and be good leaders? In December 2003 Dhyan will give a training for this organization. This is one of the possibilities to earn money for school improvement in poor areas. There are other possibilities for training in big companies we like to work out. The second client is HP computers. This is in very short lines what we did in Bangalore, perhaps more later... If you have questions, if you are interested in our work, Email to: dhyan@xs4all.nl or busidyn@lycos.com Warm regards from India. Dhyan Vermeulen and Usha Gowri. Hello friends, Glad to know Dhyan reached back home safely. We had a wonderful time with her exchanging ideas and getting to know more things. She is innovative no doubt. Though she was new it was as if me, usha and dhyan knew each other and about each other since ages. We learnt from each other a lot. We plan to make things going together soon from now. While at the ashram, we interacted and planned pretty well, how to go about. It was a blessing in disguise should I say, to go over to the ashram, which was never expected. We saw how things work there and how the villagers get to know things and work fine implementing their own ideas. Given a little attention and motivation, We sure hope things will brighten up their lives. The so-called "SMILE", on their faces, when we interacted with them, gave a ray of hope to each one there. Yes we need to make lives happy and simple. Each one should realise his/her responsibilities and then there can be nothing which can stop us. I could not make it to go be with Usha and dhyan at Bangalore. But then I hope they have done a wonderful job. Good Luck! Regards, Jyotsna Srinivasan, Hyderabad (India) It was great to read all the reports from Gowri, Dhyan and Jyotsna! It sounds like you were able to provide many exceptional learning experiences and brought love and excitement to the people you met. In the US we have a story of "Johnny Appleseed" who went around the country planting apple trees (some people say he was popular because he planted the kind of apple tree that is used to make alcohol!) Anyway, the folk tale is popular because of the metaphor of someone reaching out, over and over, giving a gift of life. It seems to me that the EQ advocates in our network have that kind of commitment -- to keep sharing and spreading the essence of life. Can you imagine, just for a moment, if every classroom in the world could have just a little more caring, a little more joy, and little more excitement for learning? If every manager, and every parent, had just a little more skill at supporting the people in their care to do and be their best? Congratulations to the team and the network for taking more steps toward such a world-changing vision. Joshua Freedman Follow up discussion where at our E-group. As a result, we published an article by John leese: Is human rights literacy relevant to us? (section 'Literature, articles) 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 European Network on Emotional Quality © 2002-2008 |