Pujya Gurudev

Pujya Gurudev
Next Class: April 27th


Opening Prayers

Om Sahanavavatu


Shlokas

Saraswati Namastubyam
Gurur Brahma Gurur Vishnu
Ekadantam Mahakayam
Mookam Karoti Vaachalam
Manojavam maruta tulya
Apadama Pahattaram



Gita Chanting

Chapter 14 verse 1, 2 and 3, 4


Activities

Concentration Time : Shell game

Letter of the day : W for Work

Story : Ant and the Grasshopper
Ant and the Grasshopper were good friends. The ant was hard working but the grasshopper only wanted to play. As the winter approached, the ant started collecting food for his survival in winter but the grasshopper spent his time playing and making fun of the ant for working hard instead of enjoying the nice weather. When winter came ant was very comfortable in his warm cave and plenty of food but the grasshopper was shivering and had nothing to eat.Finally he decided to go to the ant and beg for food and shelter.Even though the grasshopper had made fun of him while he was working,the ant graciously decided to let the grasshopper join him in the cave.
Moral: We must work hard in order to play and enjoy.

Activity :Doing origami cups

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Section A :  Ruchi Vyas and Reshma Arun
 
We all met after a long break today and had a gala time catching up on everything and learning lots of fun stuff. As always we started with three loud Oms followed by morning shlokas and quiet time. After the quiet time we all chanted the five shlokas of Bhagwat geeta and talked to the participants who already finished the preliminary rounds of the competition. We then did some yoga stretches and revised all the letters of the alphabet safari we have done so far. What was the letter for today? Well it was 'W' for 'Work'. what is work? Work is effort directed to produce or accomplish something. Our students had interesting answers about what they thought work meant. Some of them said that in order to learn reading and writing we have to put an effort and that is what work is. Some said that in order to learn swimming we will have to work hard. Just sitting down and dreaming about swimming will not result in any kind of learning. In order to make friends we have to make an effort , we have to smile and be helpful in order to make friends. If we want beautiful flowers we have to plant the seeds and water the plant and take care of it. We just cannot enjoy beautiful flowers without putting in any effort. In conclusion if you want something, you have to make an effort. No one else can do it for you. Also,if you work, you feel good about yourself.

We also heard the story of "The Ant and The Grasshopper". We did a little activity to demonstrate working together,playing and enjoying. we made a little origami paper cup. Although some of us had difficulty following the directions, we all finished making it helping each other out and working together. At the end we all enjoyed looking at our cups and we thought about how we wanted to use the cups. Some students decided that they would keep their small toys in it. Some wanted to put their pens and pencils. We all learned that if we want something, we must work to get it.

The class ended with a cheerful happy Birthday song to one of our student who celebrated her birthday yesterday along with aarti and pledge. We look forward to see all of you in the next class. Till then enjoy the spring weather and keep working hard!!
 
Section B: Jacqueline Gaines and Meena Rajan
 
We started the day with 3 aums. This was followed by our opening prayer and shlokas.
We had some kids wearing their medals for participating in the bhagawat gita competition. It was great to hear the children chant gita with full energy and enthusiasm. We talked about Rama Navami and we introduced a rama shloka today. We also talked how it is important to pray to hanuman also on that day.
 
After the chanting it was time for our favorite quiet time and shell game. Now it has become a routine to see the kids have a quite time of 2 and half minutes. Parents you can follow through in the car or home too. It is a favorite in the class room and kids really love to do it. This also helps them concentrate. After our quiet time we did our shell game and to our surprise almost everyone got it correct.
 
After shell game was our favorite alphabet safari. This is the time we hear our children most enthusiastic. As they did all their letters we proceeded to the letter of the week W. Wisdom, World, work were very great suggestions they had. Ofcourse they thought of walrus but they were sure the balavihar word would be something different.  We heard the ant and grasshopper story which many friends already knew but as usual they loved to listen something they know to learn it better.
 
We had a special today we did origami craft. To convert a piece of paper into  cup in simple easy steps made the craft a very interesting one as many friends chose to make 2 or 3 cups.
 
Finally today we had Vanati's birthday. So we all sang happy birthday to vanathi before we did our closing prayers and pledge. Vanathi distributed cup cakes to all her friends and they passed their good wishes to her.