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10 Principals in STEM Land

About 22 principals of various schools from mind mingle had come to Auroville to visit schools in and around Auroville. They were split into two groups and one of the groups came to STEM land. They were about 10 principals. We gave a broader picture of what we do and how children learn in STEM land.

      

Then they went around STEM land and interacted with children. They saw the weekly puzzle, weekly plan. Children showed them how they fill their plan using the software, Hariharan solved Rubiks cube, on the other side Viknesh and kabilan were demonstrating their Makey Makey project in which they made a mouse using a rubber chapel.

They looked at the Montessori materials. At the next room children were printing a fidget spinner in 3D printer, some of them were working on Alice and scratch.

The principals were happy to see children printing 3D models and sat along with the children to learn how it works. Children showed their projects which they made in Scratch, Geogebra and Alice. Children gave the principals some cast puzzles and asked them to solve it. Some of them played games along with the children.

It was interesting to see children sharing their learnings with the principals from various states without any hierarchies. Each one of the teachers learnt something from the children and were happy to be STEM land. At the end they wrote about how they felt being in STEM land. They said STEM land is a nice learning environment with freedom. One of the principals said that she was touched with what we do and wanted to implement it by herself.

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My first experience in stem land as volunteer

Jan 22 is my first day as volunteer in STEM land. On that day, we attended the stewardship workshop along with the children in Udavi. The first session was on sourcing inner power where I was able to process my stand and fear. I noticed that my stand  supports me, when I face failure and losing something. I have also got an answer of why I am in STEM land.

The next day at isai ambalam school, i figured out that i want to learn more about who i am and what makes me complete being. In afternoon, we had a meeting with heidi regarding regarding the research papers based on what is done in STEM land. During the session she taught us  how we could conduct an effective survey with the children. Then i learned to display names using 7-segment LED displays and to blink them using astable multi-vibrator.

On Jan 24th and 25th we went to Indira Gandhi higher secondary school for Learning festival. I felt really happy when i was helping children to display their names using 7-segment LED displays. Initially  some children didn’t understand english and were not interested in it. I guided them step by step in their mother tongue. Then they showed lot of interest and become familiar with me. At end of each session, all childrens are able to display their names using 7-segment LED displays and also understand, why human get stock when they touch power cable in their house but not with TV remote battery. They learned how resistor controls current in circuit with analogy of rubber shoe while working with power line. Finally they became expert in displaying their name in LEDs and they became teachers for their teachers.

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Vipassana

At STEM land -AAD our tag line is learn, grow, work, teach. We work in various ways on our growth. I recently participate in a Vipassana course. I found it useful in various ways.
I am noting my understanding of the technique of Vipassana based on my experience, the evening discourses and from the conversations about it later.

1) What is taught at Vipassana is Sila, Samadhi and Panna.
a)Sila is the morality.
* Do not kill any living being
* Do not tell lie
* Do not steal
* Do not take any type of drugs
* No sexual misconduct
Why?
When we break Sila it needs a strong volition of the mind. This is the volition we are trying to dissolve through Vipassana.

b) Samadhi is concentration of the mind
Anna-panna helps us to concentrate by concentrating on breath. We choose breath to concentrate because it is the universal Truth and everyone can experience it.
It also links with breath which changes with emotions and allows to notice ourselves.
This is Samma-Samadhi the right kind of Samadhi.
It can also teach equanimity by not having attachment to breath that comes in or goes out.
It also helps us to understand the law of nature that is impermanence (Anicha) that is ‘constantly changing’.

c)Panna is wisdom
Suthamaya panna – wisdom I get when I listen to someone I respect or have faith in
Chintamaya panna – wisdom from thinking about something and understanding intellectually
Bhavanamaya panna – wisdom gained from the Truth experienced by me
Vipasana focusses on Bhavanamaya panna
We notice that mind and matter are related

2) We have 6 sense doors – 5 external (see, hear, smell, taste, touch) and the mind that brings a thought.
Phassa – contact with 6 sense doors results in
vinnana- recognition
tanha – identify or gives decision
vedhana- sensation
sankara – craving and aversion. The subconscious mind reacts to the sensation in this way.
Phassa leads to vinyana leads to tanaha leads to vedhana leads to sankara
Vipassana gives us access to change the habit pattern of our subconscious mind of craving and aversion.
We are aware of only 2% of our thoughts, this gives us access to train the 98% of our thoughts.

3) The two important wheels of Vipassana are awareness of sensations and equanimity. Without awareness of sensations we cannot get to the subconscious mind. Without equanimity we cannot change its habit pattern of reaction.

4) Metta – share my unconditional peace, love and happiness with others and care for all living beings.
Please visit dhamma.org

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epiSTEME 7 Conference

Homi Bhabha Centre
– Pratap

We attended a conference and also presented a poster at  epiSTEME7 conference in HBCSE (Homi Bhabha Centre for Science Education) at Mumbai. It was an international conference held from  Jan 5th to 8th 2018. Many people from different countries had come and presented their research and review papers at the conference. The conference was about research on Science, TEchnology and Mathematics Education. We wrote a paper on “Fostering Responsibility in Learning in Rural Schools”. Our paper was selected for a poster presentation. Five of us from STEM land – Aura Auro Design Arun, Poovizhi, Pratap, Sanjeev and Sundar went for the conference.

 

  

IIT Bombay

On Jan 5th we attended the conference and in the evening we went to IIT Bombay. There we met students from Educational Technology department. We met Prof. Chandan who is with the Educational Technologies group. Two years back the group had interacted with them and we wanted to re-establish a research relationsip with them. Chandan had recently joined the fledging department and had volunteered with Sanjeev with Asha and was interested in our research. We presented our work to the department PhD students and professors. Sanjeev started the presentation with 2 videos of STEM land talking about how we started and then the four of us presented our epiSTEME7 poster to them. We also shared about our research topics which we have been working on. Arun’s research topic is “Deep learning of Mathematics through materials and real life projects”, Sundar’s topic is “Developing leadership via STEMLand” and Poovizhi and my topic is “Altering Factors Influencing Student’s Attitude Towards Thinking Mathematically”.

       
We got a very positive response about our work and some of the students were interested in helping us refine our research to make it relevant to upcoming conferences.

TISS (Tata Institute of Social Sciences)

On the second day we went to TISS to present our work with some students. There were about 25 students and 4 teachers. They were inspired about what we do. After the presentation students asked many question and we answered those question. Some of the questions were about scaling STEM land. We showed the news letter and got all their email address in order to send a soft copy of the newsletter. Some of the youth wanted to visit STEM land. One of the youth remarked that her entire perspective on education had been rattled and it was still sinking in that children can be responsible for their own learning.

   

The 3rd day we were in the conference the whole day. Every day they start with a review talk which lasts for about 45 minutes. We had breaks after every 2 – 3 papers were presented. During the break time we interacted with as many participants. During the conversations we exchanged information about what we do and our research. We were the youngest participants in the that conference and rest of them were older than us. One of the participants a dean from South Africa made a video about us to show in her country. We had a buffet system during dinner. We met a person who was making puzzles with binding wire. We all took some puzzles from him for the children in STEM land and his contact and have invited him to visit us a teach us wire art.

Then on the 4th day we attended sessions till the afternoon and Sanjeev also chaired a session.

Later in the evening we again went to TISS this time to present to the professors of the school of Social Work. Their perspectives were very different and probing and it helped us understand our own work differently. When they realized that at Isai Ambalam most of the children we work with are Dalits they were very interested in the relevance of this work to children with difficult backgrounds in homes, institutions and on the street. After the presentation the teachers were willing to help in our research paper especially the surveys. They asked us to create a program package that can be offered to other school teachers as a workshop.

     

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Sanketh’s visit

Sankith from Asha (One of our funder) visited STEM land. He visited both centres Isaiambalam and Udavi. Children were very excited to show what they have learnt in STEM land. They also showed their projects.

Children showing bamboo torch
4th graders showing the honey bee model
Punithavl showing his MIT app
Mindstorms..
Mindstorms

Sanketh’s Reflections on visiting STEM Land

1245_Site_visit_2017

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EBD project Animals house

In Isai Ambalam school started doing a EBD (Education by design) on birds and animals house. Children from 1st and 2nd standard got the materials from Pondy. They saw some videos in Internet about the animals house. How do animals live in forest and in village. Sakthi and Vasanthrani helped children to create a house for each animals . They have used thermo col, cardboard and ice sticks they started building the house. They have built a small village using plastic dolls of tree, domestic animal, and plastic grass. They have completed the cow shed. Children were excited in  building a cow shed. They were concentrating in doing their work.

 

 

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Basic Hands-On Electronics Course:

The two weeks short course on basic hands-on electronic course(From Dec. 7th till 21st ) has been started.

Ragu Prasanth and Siva who are professors by profession. Ragu Prasanth is now volunteering in STEMLand and Siva  is working in Isai Ambalam School. They both feel that practical learning is missing nowadays. So, they are offering this course.

For the class we had participants from the previous electronics course and we also had children,youth and adult from and around Auroville.

On the first day of the course we saw the difference between Electrical and Electronics. How to find the faulty breadboard. I also learned how to use the oscilloscope and add two signals. The class was new and interesting.

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Patterns with 2nd standard

In Isai Ambalam school 2nd graders had a difficulty in finding the pattern. When I use Dienes blocks and jodo cubes to identify the patterns. I asked the children to arrange the cubes in different orders that they have seen it in real life. I split  them into two groups and asked them to arrange th cubes in patterns. They started doing that and then shared how they arranged the numbers from 1 – 10.  When I used the Dienes block it was difficult for them to tell how many blocks are used visually. Then I used Jodo blocks it was big and they were in different colors. Children were able to tell the different patterns. They were able to see it visually and they were able to draw it on a paper.  They helped each other to identify the pattern. They were able to tell the different patterns that they saw in their house.

 

 

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9th and 10th activity class

On Tuesday 9th and 10th had activity class. Children from 10th wanted to make a magnifying glass. They took a plastic bottle and carefully cut out two circles. They joined those two circles at the edge using glue gun and left a small gap. They dip it into a glass of water and filled it. But they found that the water was leaking. They tried it again using Fevistick. Their exploration creative ideas were really inspiring. With the remaining parts of the water bottle that was been cut were been joined together and formed a mini water bottle.They put some mud inside the bottle and kept a flower and few grass and made it as a flower vase.

 

On the other hand a 9th student had a mobile phone which was not working. He found that the battery was not charging properly.One of the wire that goes to the battery was broken. He soldered it and charged the battery and turned it on. It was great to see that the mobile gave and sound and turned on. He called everyone who were there in the room and showed them that he made it to work. He was so happy to see that it was working.