( This Newsletter has been put together by Nikhil Iyer )
Tiruvannamalai Trip
The green grass of sittilingi has dried up into the colour of mud due to the soaring temperatures and lack of rains. The stream which the villagers had depended on for their daily water and agriculture has also dried down to a trickle. Forest fires are a common sight and the bamboos have also turned brown and dry. Despite such a climate, the farmers of this valley and neighboring villages have all sown their fields with sugarcane, a water intensive crop. Hence, many wells have been deepened with dynamite to reach the lowering water levels. The ones who have planted rice are few and traditional varieties of millets have disappeared from sight.
To be loaded !
This situation has led to another problem – no food for cows! Thulir cow Lakshmi is pregnant and expected to deliver anytime now and will need all the food she can get. A group of 4 – Sakthivel, Senthil, Annamalai the driver and Nikhil went as far as Tiruvannamalai to get hay, which we discovered is an increasingly valued commodity much fought for. Many itchy hours later, we discovered we were also involved in such a tussle but since we were already on our way home, there was nothing we could do about it.
Hair-do
In a few hours we were back in Thulir. The hay we unloaded onto the ground, built a platform with palm rafters and bamboo and loaded it onto the platform. It still stands there hardly reducing despite us taking generously from it to feed the cows morning and evening. Two tractor loads of hay till the rains come and save this drying up village. Lakshmi had better start praying. Or learning to moo in amritavarshini so it rains.
Well water
The Thulir well has almost dried up and the water levels are at about 5-6 feet deep. The floor can be seen quite clearly now and the secret lives of fish exposed for all to see. A few crabs that we had thrown into the well in better times can be seen scuttling about the floor or unmovingly waiting on a rock. The scarcity of water means that thulir will remain closed for the whole of may.
The temperatures have already touched 40 degrees Celsius and crossed it too. Farmers in the village are optimistically planting a fresh crop of sugarcane hoping the rains will deliver their crops from dying of thirst.
Solar Panels
These 1m by 1m sunshine harvesters have arrived at the right time. Four 250W panels have been added to the existing array with four 48V batteries, a charge regulator and a brand new UPS. To fit all this extra gear into a space which wasn’t built for a set up of this size was interesting work. The problem was solved without constructing support structures by shrewd calculations and a drive to figure out a solution without complicating things. This system now generates around 5 kWh a day, enough to comfortably run the computer lab and the electric motor to pump water too. What remains to be done is the setting up of a Raspberry Pi and a LAN system giving children access to all the contents of one Raspberry Pi computer on any laptop that is connected to the system. The laptops are all in the process of being cleaned up both hardware and software wise. By the start of the new “academic” year, the laptops should be up and running. We are all eagerly waiting to see how this new bit of technology will help us.
Science Camp
Syringe pump demo by Rajammal.
Lifting jack, a simple working model from Arvind Gupta
A two day event, the science camp was packed with fun and learning. The day started at ten in the morning with a short story about archimedes and soon moved into the experimenting part of it. There were six teachers, each ready with their own set of experiments. The kids divided into six groups and spent around 15-20 minutes with each presenter learning about the things they were presenting which included experiments showcasing properties of light, weight, air, water, magnetism and electricity.
Experiments with a “light” bulb
Diffraction
Watching a movie about bees, ecosystems and honey hunting after lunch was a welcome quiet time. Since all the groups couldn’t visit each presenter in the forenoon, there was time given after that for this activity to finish. In the evening, the kids were given ample time to shout, play, scream and do whatever they wanted to basically and get their own energy flowing. Soon, it was dark and all the dinner work was going on. The children were divided into three groups , one for chopping vegetables and preparing food, one for serving it and organizing the meals and one for cleaning up after. Each enthusiastically took up their work and served us all with broad smiles and extra portions of rice refusing to listen when we said we’d had enough. In the evening before dinner, we also had time to speak about all that we had seen and learnt during the day. The group gathered in the thulir grounds and since it was dark and a starry sky, the conversation naturally moved to stars, constellations and satellites. It was quite magical to lie on our backs and stare up at the night sky just looking at passing satellites and airplanes and let our minds wander freely with the twinkling lights..
There was a movie screening after skygazing much welcomed by the kids but some of us preferred to move away with our own projects and preparations for the next day.
Rice cooked in the solar cooker
A levitating pencil demonstrating magnetism
The next morning the children woke up early in the morning and played from 5.30 till 8 or so , at which time they went for a bath to their homes and returned fresh and eager for more. After a morning assembly and some singing, we dispersed into our respective groups and conducted one last experiment each. The kids went to the different teachers and learnt/tried out six new experiments and many new avenues have hopefully been opened inside their little heads. The day was supposed to end by afternoon.But the students wanted to put up a cultural programme for us. So after lunch they had some time to come up with a dance or drama or whatever it is they liked. Some of them watched while the others prepared and put up many dances and a few skits while the rest of us sat and watched their presentations.
Web of life! A game that shows how inter connected all life really is, and what will happen if one species were to die out.
Conductors, Resistors and other simple circuits
Teaching at the Government High School
It is common knowledge that the government high school (and the elementary school too, for that matter) is understaffed. The student-teacher ratio is something like 40 students to one teacher. One disinterested, overly strict and fear inspiring teacher, at that. Considering this, and out of curiosity, Anu and I had a conversation about spending time at the government school and that same evening, i decided i’d teach there for however long the management would have me. Since this report isn’t a critical analysis of the school, let it suffice to say that the school needs help.
It was, on the other hand, great to see so many excited faces every morning asking so many excited questions every morning. We had poetry readings, story telling, enactment of the different roles in the story, reading of the newspaper and discussion on some news items, and becasue the children themselves asked for it, and their exams were just around the corner, question and answer marking in their text books. The questions at the end of each lesson were simple to answer in tamil. With just a few more months work, I am sure more number of children would have been able to construct their answers well in English. The reality remains though, that effective teaching cannot happen for all 40 children at the same time.
All in all, it was most interesting to get to see the workings of the school from within it. For that, i thank the management for being open to an outsider like myself even if it meant i am doing their work for them.
Elections
Iyarkai munnetra kazhagam (I.M.K), Dravida Makkal Munnetra Kazhagam(D.M.M.K), Thulir Munnetra Kazhagam(T.M.K), going head to head in a heady dash to win the look sabha elections and become the ruling party ! Each promising its own reforms; who will you vote for?!
A. Karthik, a candidate from T.M.K
We decided to get the students practically familiar with the entire Lok sabha election process by holding a mock election in Thulir. The children formed themselves into 3 parties and we decided to have 5 sample constituencies. Each party was to field one candidate in each of the 5 constituencies (Dharmapuri, Kochi, Gandhinagar, Agartala and Leh respectively),draw up an election manifesto and file nomination papers complete with property details(number of pencils and pens in their posession etc.).
Minimum voting age : Two and a half
They also made public their views about local issues like communal riots in gujarat, POK in Leh, AFSPA in Agartala, TASMAC in Dharmapuri and the issue of high dowry in marriages in Kochi. Many said they would close down TASMAC (government alcohol) shops, enforce prohibition in the state and instead set up bangle shops and clothes shops(or even confiscate temple collections!) to make up for the lost revenue that TASMAC unfailingly generated. All parties were determined to disallow the mixing up of religion and politics and to pass laws against this if they came to power. One party even said they would allow Kashmir to decide on which country they want to join but not let them go if they chose Pakistan! Laughter all around.. And some others said they would reduce the dowry to a small sum which was not to exceed 1 lakh.. just 1 lakh! Laughter again.
Senthil and Sakthivel made an electronic voting machine that i have included a picture of. Fool proof and simple.
The vote registering machine monitored by Senthil and the speaker with battery connected to let the others in the booth know that the vote cast was a valid one.
Rajammal was the one to cast the voting ink on the nails of the children. Since there were five constituencies, voting had to happen in phases. The voter turnout peaked at 92–the highest number thulir has received this whole year. Once the voting was over, the counting of the votes was performed by Senthil, the one man election commission. Balaji,who had functioned as election observer,then declared the results. I.M.K. , a party with majority of the MPs still in class 2,3,4 and 5, beat the competition cleanly in 4 constituencies! The competition being class 7,8,9 and 10, it was quite an unexpected result. Now, the victorious party has also elected a prime minister amongst themselves – M.Karthik(12). IMK is just getting used to being in power and have not yet begun discharging their duties as they promised they would… Hmmm..
Inked!
Being tamil, malayali, gujarati, kashmiri and manipuri.
Maari Varum Sitling (Changing Sittilingi)
So the first phase of this project smoothly transitioned to the next phase of taking interviews, recording observations and filming the whole process with the idea of making a short video. So far, around 5 elders have been interviewed, and it has been a great journey throughout. The ability of the kids to question and extract information out of others has improved with every interview. Also the process of setting up the camera on it’s tripod and recording sound with a discreetly placed mic was completely new to them. (both the interviewer and the interviewee!). It is amazing to watch how fast a child can pick up something he/she is truly interested in and digest it to make it their own – an ability that i feel we as adults may not have paid much attention to and hence lost somewhere in the depths of ourselves….
Sports Day
Kho Kho
The second sports day of the year. Much to the squealing delight of all, the two days it lasted was too short. Kabaddi, football, hopping game (nondi in tamil), relays, running races, frog races, dodge ball, shotput, kho-kho and even an improvised javelin throw for the older group(or whoever was able to lift the “javelin”) and rugby too. It was also interesting to see the children create their own acrobatics after quickly finishing their lunch break inspired by the traveling circus which had recently been through Sittilingi.
Small and furious
Visitors
Swetha from Poorna School Bangalore volunteered at Thulir for a week in April. She is a talented artist and she helped us a great deal with all our flashcards inspiring many budding young artists while she was at it. She was involved in the science camp and also later conducted interesting teaching/ learning sessions for the teachers.
Sukanya Sivakumar from WriteIT solutions, Mumbai visited us in February along with her uncle who is a professor from Sweden. After observing all what was happening at Thulir both of them were very keen to be part of our team and support us.
Balaji from Asha, visited us in April. Since he visits us every now and then, he is able to observe and evaluate impartially from outside. We are grateful for his very valuable feedback.
Professor Ravindran and Vanajakka visited in April too and it was wonderful as always to have them.
As always the medical electives and guests who come to THI also visit Thulir and interact with students.. We had Devika from New york talking to the students about New york ; and Alberto and Camilla from Italy. Who would guess that being in a small village in the middle of nowhere we would meet so many different but wonderful people ?!
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