The Year that was..2009.

Hi Friends,
Last year was quite busy for most of the Volunteers. Thanks to Economy, most of the team was stretched. This also led to not so good Blog updates, but the key activities continued.

The last year we had focused on
1. Personality Development
2. Positive Mental Attitude
3. Lateral Thinking, 6 Thinking Hats
4. 7 Habits of Teens ( We actually bought couple of books, and tried to make our own lesson plans).
5. English. Thanks to Hrishikesh, we were able to get a decent urge in the children to focus on this.
6. Calligraphy. Mita Teacher was voted the most favourite volunteer, unanimously by the all the children. This was one thing the children actually wanted more and more of. we could sense that they actually get bored by lot of "Talks and Theory". This class used to have most enthusiasm.

More on this years plan, in some time..Post our Board meeting.

Starting the New Year @ Wipro Cares EOTO Mumbai.

Welcome back after the "Refreshing Summer Vaccation".

This year we will incorporate the learnings of the last year, and make this year's engagement even more better.

The Plan agreed by the WCM-EOTO Council, is as

A. Each of the Council Member will drive a focused initiative, and will be responsible for end to end Delivery of the "Theme".

B. We have 6 themes for this year. Each Theme will span over 3-5 weekends, and be Owned and driven by the Theme Owner.

1. Thinking & Creativity - Vijay
2. Arts & Craft - Deepanwita
3. Career Skills - Hrishikesh
4. Computers - Chakradhar
5. Self & Social Skills - Lini
6. Extra Curricular Activities - Mita

C. The objective of each theme owner is to own and drive end to end engagement for that theme. The engagement will cover
1. Initialization - Gauge the current levels of competency / understanding of the children.
2. Plan - Arange for pre-requisites/stationary. Plan for Volunteers. Lesson Plans.
3. Execute - Enable & Get the volunteers to deliver the lesson plan as per the Plan.
4. Closure & Analysis. Q&A & Competitions to gauge the effectiveness of each theme. This will also help us to understand the liking of the children for specific topics.

Calling volunteers for Get-Out-The-Vote drives!

Dear all,

One of the key goals of the Jaago-re One Billion Voters campaigns for the 2009 general elections is to ensure the higher voter turnout in the metros of India .
The get-out-the-vote (GOTV) efforts of the One Billion voters campaign are centered around mobilizing and facilitating citizen volunteer to conduct door to door drive in there polling booths (approx 200 houses) prior to election day, in a non partisan manner. These citizens’ volunteers are called Booth level volunteers or BLV’s.
The objective of a BLV is to ensure maximum voter turnout in his/her polling booth and to inform people about making informed voting decisions after evaluating all candidates.
It is not required for one to be a registered voter to become a BLV.
Calling volunteers for Get-Out-The-Vote drives! Be part of the training sessions to become a Booth Level Volunteer.Entry Free!
Date: 21st April 2009
Time: 7.00 p.m. to 9.00 p.m.
Venue: St Anne's High School Hall,
C/o Our Lady of Lourdes Church ,
Marve Road , Malad West
Mumbai - 400 064
---------------------------------------------------
Date: 22nd April 2009
Time: 7.00 p.m. to 9.00 p.m.
Venue: Salvation Hall
Portuguese Church , Dadar [W]
Mumbai - 400 028

---------------------------------------------------

Date: 24th April 2009
Time: 7.00 p.m. to 9.00 p.m.
Venue: Lake Castle Podium
Behind Lake Castle Building
Cliff Avenue , Near Reliance World
Hiranandani Garden Complex
Powai, Mumbai - 400 076

----------------------------------------------------

Date: 25th April 2009
Time: 6.00 to 8.00 p.m.
Venue: Mount Carmel Hall
Next to St Aloysius School , Opp Leelavati Hospital ,
Bandra Reclamation
Mumbai - 400 050
You may get in touch with self or Prashant for registering yourself as a volunteer. Prashant is from Janaagraha Centre for Citizenship & Democracy.

His contact details are as follows:
Prashant Nanaware & Asim SiddiquiOutreach Associate (west)

Jaago Re! One Billion Votes campaign Janaagraha Centre for Citizenship & Democracy

Mbl: 098929 42628Office: (91-22) 40009241Fax: (91-22) 66936496

Email ID: prashant@janaagraha.orgVisit on: www.janaagraha.org

Thanks & Best Regards
Abhishek Mulmule 9820538099

Trip to Nehru Planetarium & Science Centre.

Trip to Nehru Planetarium & Science Centre.

Wiprocares very first trip for children to Nehru Planetarium & Science centre (15th March 09) turned out to be really good. Our journey began at 10:15a.m from Tata Compound and we making merry, singing songs reached Nehru Science Centre at 11:00.

Children got the opportunity to see some tricks of chemistry, physics in a mini-show conducted by a representative of the Centre.

There were number of galleries in the centre, namely, Fun with Science, Sound, Light & Vision,Computers which we explored.
The visit to all the galleries proved to be fruitful as the information was showcased through different games,visuals etc. Information clubbed with fun always remains in memory.....Children had a blast there...

At around 12:45 we moved on to Nehru planetarium. The show was to start at 1:30p.m
Before the show, in the main hall, an AV about India’s endeavor in Astronomy was played.

We all then walked towards the Sky Theatre to enter into the amazing world of stars and the universe waiting to unfold its mystery.

The show was a visual treat with information on planets,constellations,galaxies etc. It lasted for about 45mins after which we started on our way back home.

The entire experience was indeed educational filled with fun and enjoyment. The smiling faces of children said all.We all will cherish the time spent with them and look forward to organize such events in future.
The Following were the Volunteers who came along on the Trip
1. Mita N
2. Glenn P
3. Deepanwita M
4. Shweta B
5. Nibha B
6. Vijay Khanna (Off-Line Support)

WCM & EOTO Update.

In view of the annual exams , session for the Sat, Feb 28 stand cancelled .
As per of our education initiative , a visit to the Nehru Planetarium is being planned.
Nehru Planetarium has shows on astronomy , these are designed to cater to children .
Tentative date should be a Sunday , between March & April .
All are invited !
Read this space for further update on the trip!

Updated 10 March 2009.

We have frozen 15th March- Sunday for the Field Trip. We are organizing for the Show at 1.30 pm in Marathi. Total number of students expected : 55.

We will be circulating an internal email to the Volunteers to decide on next steps. Do get in touch with us via Email.

Eco Tourism & Initiatives

Came across a good initiative which I realised while I was browsing through the internet on tree conservation . There is a site called www.ecomantra.com which gives an opportunity for individuals in different capacities , groups including corporates and students to explore the wonders of nature and be consicous towards it .
This is a wonderful concept which can be used by schools including the one we are focussing on to make students aware on the environment and enjoy it too ...
I suppose every school can create a charter of Eco awareness sessions through personal awareness by making the students visits places and understand the different flora and fauna .
A visit to a Planetorium , Aquarium , zoo , park or bird sanctuary can also be extensions to the same eco tourism concept .Its a small way in making people like it and then make them aware that if they want it , we need to preserve , conserve and support it .

WCM-EOTO: 28 Feb 09 : Reading & Comprehension...continues

Due to the upcoming examinations, children have a day off from the EOTO activities on 21st Feb 09.

Pre Activity Plan
The WCM-EOTO volunteers plan to spend the week as well focussing on reading and comprehension with reinforcement of certain concepts shared during the 14th Feb session. The outline of activities for the two hours is as follows:

1. Word Games - 20-30 mins (overall)
Word jumbles designed from the new words learnt by the students last week would be used for this game. Also match-the-columns --> words with their meanings. Finally 'find words within larger words' would be played. These games would be played at the start of the session and in between the session and time permitting towards the end of the session.

2. Reading Comprehension - 45 mins
The comprehension passage - African Elephant which is of a higher complexity of the passages used last week would be used.

3. Sentence Formation with focus on articles, vowels and consonants - 45 mins
Students would be given worksheets where they would need to fill the missing articles. Also introduction to vowels and consonants would be covered through such sentences.

4. Best outline story
The completed stories from the outline of 'The Tongue-cut Sparrow' would be collected and evaluated over the next weekend. The student coming up with the best effort would be given a prize during the next week's session.