Fulbright Alumni Grant Activity 2016

Suresh's Alumni Grant Activity 2016: 

A workshop, Exploring Learning through Experiential Designing using Games & Models, and

A Lecture Presentation 

When: December 18 – 19’ 20016.

 Where: At Dr. D.D. Pant Memorial Children's Science Exploratory and Government Girls Inter College, Berinag (Uttarakhand), India.

For Whom: Students, teachers (from four different schools) and community members from a highly underserved population in and around a small town Berinag, Uttrakhand, India.

Summary of the proposed project: - I have utilized my alumni grant 2016 to educate students, teachers and community members from a highly underserved population in and around a small town Berinag, Uttrakhand, India through a workshop and a lecture presentation during December 18-19’ 2016. Workshop and lecture presentation were based on my alumni grant activities in the past and my Fulbright Distinguished Awards in Teaching Program experience in the United States. Proposed workshop was a first-hand experience to the students and teachers by involving them into hand-on activities using low cost pedagogical tools based on games and models. Moreover, it helped them to expose to the experiential learning opportunities. 

The workshop helped me to promote involvement of girls in educational activities in such rural areas as it comprized 60% girls and 40% boys, along with the teachers, from different schools in Berinag. 

The lecture presentation was a dissemination of my Fulbright capstone project, described outcomes of the current workshop and helped propagating outcomes of all alumni grant activities that I have organized till now.

The objectives of the activity: -

The four-fold purpose of my alumni grant is

(i)              To draw the attention of the students, teachers and community members from the rural areas towards the use and popularization of games and models as low cost pedagogical tools in teaching by disseminating my capstone project and related activities,

(ii)            To educate students, teachers and community from a highly underserved population through experiential 

            learning opportunities by exposing 

            them to ‘learning by doing’ activities

            using games and model first hand,

           (iii)          to bring girls into the forefront of educational activities in the community by ensuring higher involvement of girls through the grant activity, and to motivate educational leaders to invest (not for profit) in such educational activities within and outside the community. 

 Descriptions of the proposed activity:

A description of the need for the project and any activities I have already implemented to address this need: - The students in the demographics such as Berinag, Uttrakhand, India, particularly those from Government schools (target population of my alumni grant), does not have resources such as funds, tools and other supporting learning material.

These schools and students are segregated by most of the profit based corporations and organizations as the students in these schools are not capable of affording expensive tools and models. The willing non-profit organizations hardly able to reach to such rural areas, which automatically deprives these students from the new and differentiated learning opportunities available. 

There is a strong need to educate students, teachers and the community in such areas about alternative resources of developing low cost teaching-learning tools by using surrounding material. This project will encourage them to use low cost models and games, available in their surroundings, for teaching -learning purposes and thereby will make them self-resourced. 

Workshop and lecture of the project would also help them to make their knowledge concrete and experience based.

My alumni grant activities organized in the past (2013, 2015) were focused on training the trainers (teachers) from Delhi and NCR (National capital Regions), which were highly successful. Teachers benefitted from those activities use models and lesson plans, that they were able to develop during these alumni grant activities, in their schools. 

Acknowledgements: The U.S. Department of State & EPSO, Texas A&M University.