School in Kadambur Village

After spending the New Year in urban Chennai at a leisurely pace, I returned to Kadambur to visit their elementary school.  This is a schoolhouse that teaches all grades in one classroom.  In this school, there are 10 girls and 9 boys (a few aren't pictured here).

Awkward moment: I blurted out "say cheese!" when I was taking this photo and they had NO IDEA what that even meant.  Hence their expressions. (oops)

Their school day starts at 9:15 am.  Many of them walk very long distances to get to class, so it starts relatively late.  Once they get to class, they remove their shoes before entering the house and start with a group yoga session, followed by prayer and recitations.  The older students then do some mental warm-ups with basic multiplication tables.

The smallest girl with the flowers in her hair - my favorite.  She was the cutest little thing!

The classroom depends on natural lighting through the windows, so it was a bit dim for proper photos.  It was January, but the warm breeze flowed into through the windows and gently blew some papers around.  With the bright, azure sky, verdant tall grasses, and birds chirping in the distance, I found it amazing that these kids could concentrate at all! 

Note the yellow and blue trays: they hold giant flashcards with pictures and words.  Each tray contains concepts in an iterative pattern - the children rely on a pictorial method of activity based learning, like Rosetta Stone.

The students must clear certain milestones to determine grade levels.  There is "cross pollination" of education: children of differing levels are paired together, with the older student gaining solidifying concepts by explaining them to younger students, and younger students absorbing these explanations rather than going to the teacher for every question.

Students going over their courses: English, Tamil, Science/Health, Maths, Social Studies

This one kid was a riot: I asked the students what their favorite foods were, and as I wrote them down, ("spinach!" "potato!"), I heard him shout "carkkarai!" and his teacher was cracking up and replied in English, "boy, that is not even a proper food!" Carkkarai is "sugar" in Tamil.

So I gave him a candy bar.  No worries, I brought candy bars for the whole class - everyone wins!