Picture Day

We borrowed Didi's saris. She had fun wrapping us up!

Alliance for Global Education Pune- all students and staff

The weather is up to 106 degrees Fahrenheit but I'M DONE WITH THE SEMESTER! I just had my final presentation today about my internship with BAIF. I finished my internship last week. I really enjoyed the staff I worked with there; they were extremely helpful with my project and designing my module on biodiversity for the students at the village. I planned 3 activities- picture identification of the state tree, flower, animal and bird, create your own poster with pictures of the village and positive environmental awareness slogans, and a nature scavenger hunt. I was told that I would be working with 10 students from standard 8 at Village Tamhini, but this is India so I ended up working with 45 students ages 3-18 at Village Aadarvadi. Somehow it worked out! I didn't have my translator, I had two BAIF staff who said they would fulfill that role which made me a little bit nervous without my right hand (wo)man. My activity plan was detailed enough that the BAIF staff led the activities well, and although I couldn't understand what the students were saying or writing, they smiled and laughed at me a lot and said they enjoyed the session. I took a ton of pictures of them and I was sad to leave. I wish I would have had time to do more with them! We had an ethno botanist with us from BAIF who identified everything they collected on the scavenger hunt so that they could see the diversity of nature they collected in 15 minutes just by stepping outside the classroom. Before we left, I gave the teacher of the school a copy of the lesson plan translated into Marathi. The only thing I forgot was candy for them. Whoops.

Creating their poster

They were all such beautiful children!

Scavenger hunt collections

After we were done at the school, we had dinner in the village with the best daal I've ever had and bhakri which is a different kind of chapati. I watched Rajashree, the BAIF staff I've been working with since the beginning, run away from the cat who wanted some love and attention and felt the cool breeze that is nonexistent in Pune.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY SHOUT OUT TO AMANDA!