Shikshantar Birthday Celebrations - Pre Primary School
Shikshantar celebrated its 22nd birthday on Saturday, 28th September ‘24.
This year, the birthday experiences were centered around the theme ‘Shabd Manch - A Festival of Letters’. There were words/shabd to be explored and played with in different contexts, styles, expressions through the corners set up for the day.
Stories and their narrating styles open up a world of experiencing words delightfully. A story narrated through puppets brings it alive for everybody. In the corner ‘ कठपुतलियों से कहानियों तक ’, children first made puppets by themselves and then narrated a story using them. There was abundant joy and vast creativity to be unfolded in the process. For the very first time, everyone listened to a story narrated in the Japanese form of ‘Kamishibai’. Shadow puppetry was another form of story narration that saw them empathize with the character of a ladybird in the story ‘The ladybird and the butterfly’.
When we sing or just hum along to the beats of a tabla, words are born organically. They may not have the form and sound of linguistic words and yet they convey our feelings of that moment. ‘Found sound’, ‘ गीतों के रंग शब्दों के संग ' , explorations with music, musical instruments, songs in a new language etc allowed expression of these along with kindling an urge to get on the feet and move creatively.
How do words lend themselves to ‘Oorja’? To jog the mind as well as the body, picture cues, riddles, word pictures were used. To bring focus after a bout of physical activity was the challenge of speaking a tongue-twister while walking on a straight line. Phew!
Do I tumble or do words tumble? What if both tumble and make a jumble! Word play can be intelligent, fun, tricky and captivating. And when parents experienced some of it, they went back to their school days of language learning but were refreshed with the fun element that they now experienced.
A few joyful songs, togetherness, the sun setting on our green lawn and hot beverages. All this accompanied a brief sharing by Minoti Didi on the journey of Shikshantar that began 22 years back. A perfect end to an evening that was celebratory and yet simple, invigorating and yet therapeutic, exploratory and yet immersive!
Happy Birthday to you, Shikshantar!