Education of a child is the foundation for a better future
Project Udaan began in 1997 with a handful of street & slum children. These children were wandering aimlessly and had not been exposed to any form of education.
The idea was to attract these children to come to our Udaan centre by way of games, story-telling using various educational media. We slowly created an interest in them to be educated & having understood the importance of education, the passion for being able to read & write was ignited in them.
These children come from extremely lower income groups and their parents are illiterate or have limited elementary education and are not able to guide them. The parents live with only one dream of giving a good education to their children so as to ensure a better future for them. Their expectations from their children are high because of the hard work they are putting in to provide an education for them.
In order to give the child a support system that they are lacking in their environment, SMILE launched the sponsorship programme in 1998 and extended support to the child by way of tuition classes, educational workshops, expert talks, dance, art and craft.
The sponsorship programme supports the child in all ways to overcome his socio-economic hurdles, making them into confident individuals. SMILE has touched the lives of 3500 children from urban and rural schools.
Throughout the year SMILE organises various educational, entertainment, competitions, programmes and festivals to give exposure to these children. Our children are good at dramatics, dance, organising cultural programmes themselves and comparing them too. So these children develop, leadership skills, communication skills and
self-confidence.
Udaan Programmes during 2016-2017
Throughout the year SMILE organized various educational, cultural and entertainment programs for the children and also encouraged them to participate in sports, competitions, educational programs and outings sponsored by various corporates and organizations.
This give them exposure and opportunity to develop their personality and build their confidence.
An Educational Workshop
Brain Power and Concentration by EduBay Team:
Representatives from EduBay team had come to SMILE for three consecutive Saturdays to deliver an educational workshop for our children. Each Saturday the topic and method differed from the other.
Week 1
For the first few weeks, the children were introduced to themselves in a very creative and a fun way. They were asked to trace the palm on the paper and represent each of the fingers as one of the promises they would make to themselves. Children came with promises like “I will study hard”, “I will always help my friends”, “and I will respect my parents” etc. Each child learnt a lesson and a way of improving for themselves. They were later on divided into teams and a game of dumb charades was played where the theme was career options. Children came using different props to demonstrate different careers. Each group came with innovative ways to display the career.
In the end, the groups were retained and children had to make a roadmap of what they wish to do in their academic path. They had to draw their goals and ways to achieve them. Besides, as a team what message does the entire team believe in. We had messages like helping poor, save water, save animals etc.
Week 2
The topic for this week was Team Building. The topic was beautifully taught through various mechanisms. One of them included dividing the group between girls and boys. Two girls had to get tangled and the rest had to entangle the circle without leaving the hands. Through this example and quoting the example of a car and its various parts, they were taught that the car can function only when all the parts come together. Individually the car cannot work by itself. Hence the lesson taught was that for effective team work: a) Co-ordination b) Unity c) Communication
d) Leadership.
Each of these was displayed individually through an activity. The children were divided in groups and each of them had to display each of the requirements for team building. Here the example of fresh lime water was taken. Except for the communication team, nobody was allowed to talk. Each of the team had to mime the ingredients of lime water. Most of them could do it effectively. It was later quoted that lime water cannot have any of its ingredients missing to make it a tasty one.
Week 3
The subject for this week was Concentration. To teach this, a small memory game was played where the student had to memorize the name of the fruits previously spoken by others and add one more to the chain. The last student has to repeat all the fruit names in the correct order. Later the crowd was divided into two teams. Members of one team were to work on a code language individually and the second team was asked to work on a code language collectively. Since the second team worked together they made a lot of noise. This did not affect the working of members of the first team. Through this activity the kids were later asked what they did to concentrate despite many disturbances. Some internal factors discussed were stress, subject interest, teacher, difficulty level etc. Some external factors included mobile, language, friends, television, games etc.
Before parting, the students were taught the concept of SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats) analysis of themselves and refer to them every time in a difficult situation.
Spelling Game
If you were to ask kids to name their most hated subject, most of them would say spelling, surprisingly not math. Many children struggle with their spelling words and often loose marks in examinations only for spelling mistakes.
Hence we thought; why not make this process a learning one. We organized a game for all our children where they were divided into four groups based on their standards. We distributed individual alphabets to each team and asked them to collect all the alphabets to make the spelling of the word announced. Children ran around with their alphabets to make the spelling correct. Surprisingly, most of the students were super excited about the game and got accurate spellings 9 out of 10 times.
Rakshabandhan and Janmashtami
Rakhi, as they say is sacred thread of protection embellished with the love and affection of a sister for her brother. To mark this bond, the entire nation celebrates Rakshabandhan with zest. Every year we continue to perform the rituals associated with the festival to bring out its importance. This year, after the rituals we had small role-plays depicting the brother-sister bond.
Janmashtami is one of the most vibrant festival and is celebrated in honour of the birth of one of the most loved deities; Lord Krishna. We spoke to the children about its importance followed by a fun depiction of the same through three role-plays.
Diwali
The festival of light that symbolizes victory of good over evil is celebrated at SMILE with the same happiness as it is in the entire nation. This program has always been a festival where the children and their parents enjoy together. We have games for parents, different ones for the children too. A light session of humor is kept to let loose all the tension. The children this year were given a gift box containing Dairy milk, Kitkat, Gems, Perk and butter cookies; and a Hygienic kit (chocolates, biscuits, Colgate, bandages, brush, comb, handkerchief, life boy soap, nail cutter, etc). The ladies received dry fruits and ration. As winners of games they took back jewelry, jewelry boxes and purse as prizes.
Stress Buster Party
As a yearly ritual to relieve our students of the exam stress, we organize a Stress buster party; this is organized by their parents. We had dance performance by our women and children. They also enacted a few skits and role-plays. An environment of smiles and giggles was created. At the end, books and bags were given to children and spices (half kg turmeric powder, one kg coriander powder, one and quarter kg hot mixture of spices) to all the women.
Childrens Day
Our professors this year decided that they would play a strong role in celebrating children’s day and hence came up with five stories on Chacha Nehru from his childhood to old age. These stories were the scripts for the role-plays children performed. The children depicted Nehru’s 1st birthday, his school life, his barrister days in London, how he met Gandhi, his contributions to the freedom struggle and how he got named Chacha Nehru.
Children indeed had a good time practicing for the
role-plays and performing the same. At the end of the program they were treated to wholesome food and refreshments.
A Childrens Day Outing
To make Children’s day even more special, we were called upon by the owner of Café Haqq se; Ms. Swapna Gupta for a scrumptious lunch treat. 34 of our children were given royal treatment at the tables of the restaurant. Two days prior to the treat, children were taught about not wasting food, keeping the decorum of the restaurant intact and maintain good discipline.
Each child displayed etiquette at the restaurant. Their tables were piled with a wide variety of food offerings from pizza, tandoori roti, paneer vegetable, cheese roll, gulab jamun, etc. Besides the food, the hospitality the staff and owner showed was impeccable. Since the restaurant had live music arrangement, all our children enjoyed singing along. It was a different and a heartwarming experience for all our kids.
Christmas Party and Fancy Dress Competition
A fancy dress is one of the most exciting things for young ones. This year we had a lot of children in town during Christmas so we decided to host a Fancy dress competition to entertain our children and women.
We had children dress up as different common people we meet in our day to day lives. We had little Father, Fisherman, Lawyer, Teacher, Christian, Krishna, Photographer, Foreigner, Paanwala and Bhajiwali. Each one had a small talk on who and why they chose to be the person they dressed as.
We had an amazing time that evening. The jokes and puzzles by women added to the festivities.
Dance for good
Shiamak Dawar’s Victory Art Foundation students performed a dance program with SMILE’s children and titled the event ‘Dance for Good’.
They came along with a team of instructor, special children, young students and senior citizens. They delivered various performances and made the environment a fun filled one. Once done, they taught SMILE students a few steps and then everybody danced merrily together. It was a cherishing moment for our student.
Back to School
This is a very special program where we distribute stationery, books, bag and other things required to start the new academic year with a lot of zeal. We generally begin with a small discussion on how each one spent their holidays, a small talk on the programs for the coming year and our regulations like attendance and discipline. This was followed by ice-breaking games so that everyone left with not just goodies, but with a smile on their face.
We also declared the results of our Udaan children and explained the role of parents in shaping their futures. SMILE insists on active participation from the parents as well for helping the child achieve his/her goals.
Warm Welcome to Mrs. Anaxi Shah
Anaxi ma’am had returned back to office after a long holiday and hence people at SMILE decided to give her a flashback of what happened at SMILE during her absence. Women came about and shared their experience of the programs they had in her absence. Children too shared the same. Besides keeping the crowd entertained, our ladies played drums and lezim on Mrs. Anaxi’s arrival followed by ‘slab of jokes’, ‘mute acting’ and ‘tu tu main main’ skit. This was our ladies first attempt at mute acting. All of them did exceptionally well. They also arranged two dance performances on the tunes of famous Bollywood songs.
Our children sang the Gayatri Mantra to welcome ma’am and they enacted acts from the illustrious Akbar-Birbal kathas. During the program; our guests Ms. Priya and Mr. Rajesh also shared details on Naturopathy and benefits of Tulsi drops.
Tak Dhina Dhin Dance Competition
Every year students from Rotary Club of H.R. College organize an Inter-NGO dance competition called
Tak Dhina Dhin. For this program, students from the club train and choreograph dance movements for each NGO that is allotted to them. In all there were five NGO’s that participated in this competition (Seva Sadan, Don Bosco, two teams of Salam Balak, Bal Mahila Kalyan and SMILE).
Our students secured the 3rd position for which they were rewarded. After the prize distribution ceremony the stage was set free for everybody present to come shake a leg. Everybody enjoyed the music and danced merrily.
Such exposures for our children have helped them fight stage fright and develop a sense of confidence in facing the real world.
Walsingham House School Exhibition
Walsingham House School invited SMILE’s children for their exhibition on “Facts of Mumbai” to their school. The exhibition covered everything from leaders, culture, technology, street food, festivals, peoples and many more. The exhibition also covered issues and the school’s involvement in ‘Swachhata Abhiyaan’.
Along with the live display; students also performed various programs. The entire event was organized very well and was totally nurtured by the students; right from comparing to enacting and the final delivery. Mumbai city’s facts were showcased through dance and visual effects. They also performed using U. V. light effect. Our children had a great experience and learned an immense amount from them.
Hockey India
(Dabbang Mumbai VS Punjab Warriors)
Udaan children were invited by Star Sports Hockey India to watch Hockey match between ‘Punjab Warriors’ and ‘Dabbang Mumbai’. This program was organized by Hockey Team under the title – Hockey Match Mumbai Ki Jaan.
After registration at the Mahindra Stadium, children and staff were treated with a light snack followed by fun filled activities like target game, shoot the balloon, tattoos, jumping on net, etc. They also played a mock hockey game.
Late evening by 6:45 PM children entered the pavilion and enjoyed the live hockey game, where they cheered for ‘Dabbang Mumbai Team’ which eventually won by two goals. Children enjoyed the live experience and the aura of being at a stadium and watching a live match.
“Yes to Life” – Street Play on Drugs
Children from all strata of society today are being exposed to a growing drug use culture and the harmful effects of drugs are not being properly communicated. Peer pressure is one of the most common reasons for children to try drugs and get addicted to them. Anisa Tapia and Aman Nathani from B.D. Somani and Dhirubhai International school respectively as a part of their CSR activity put together a script, directed and produced a street play ‘YES TO LIFE!’ – ‘Meri Zindagi Mere Haath’ (My Life is in My Hands) and our children from the age group of 10-16 years enacted the play.
The play was a huge success. We gathered a large audience of children and parents at the amphitheatre of a local public park in Mumbai. The play was in Hindi with some English. The play made a huge impact on the crowd and a few school administrators requested that this play be enacted on their premises for their students. The play was filmed with a vision to offer it to various schools and colleges along with a presentation and thereby communicating the message to many more students and youth.
