AID Delhi Chapter - AID India, Delhi Chapter

The updates of the activities that took place at Aashayein for the month of April are :

1) Kids have been divided in to two groups.One part of group of children was taught English by Neeru(Volunteer) and the other half was taught Hindi by Tuhina (volunteer).
There are a minimum of 3 volunteers who come on every weekend.
The focus right now is to bring the kids at the basic level of understanding,writing and reading hindi and english with ease.

2) Side by side if the kids have any other doubts regarding their academics or any other issue then that is also taken care of.

3) A health camp was organised on April 20 where the kids were asked to come with their guardians. There was a doctor arranged for the complete Medical-Check Up of the children. According to their weight and height children who were underweight were given vitamin capsules and syrups, according to their ages. Also De-Worming syrups were distributed to almost all the children under the proper guidance of the doctor present.

4) Apart from academics, children were also given some dancing tips at the end of the class for some refreshment.

Tuhina 

AID Aashayein

Aashaayein (Timarpur)

Most children had their final exams in the first two weeks of March. Therefore, we helped them with their regular school studies. During the week that followed after their exams we involved children with activities like antrakchari, story telling, play and dance because they were in no mood to study just after their exams. From this week (last week of March), we have started with the teaching of basic English and Hindi because the teaching of these subjects is based on rote memorization in their school and most students don't have any idea about fundamental sentence structure. We divided the children in small groups of 5-6 based on their knowledge and taught them basic grammar. This is in tune with the broader objective of our project, to make all the students thorough with basic reading and writing skills and arithmetic.

We are also in the process of planning an outing for the students, sometime during the middle of April.

This month has been a milestone for Aashayein. We celebrated our first event on 17th February after a month of preparations.  

We started our preparations with segregation of our volunteers into various sub teams for activities like Dance, Fancy dress & skit. All teams visualized their goals keeping in mind the interest & caliber of the children, & then followed them with equal efforts & commitment.  

Event started with an opening word by Vijay bhaiya, he shared his manifold experiences with kids. He emphasized the need of understanding children's mentality by their parents & not to bring them to do something with no will. 

Thereafter our skit team showcased a finely designed & directed play whose inspiration had been derived from a special child in community itself. Title of the play was "Ek Saadharan Sikke ki Asaadharan Kahaani (an extraordinary story of an ordinary coin)". Just as the title itself demystify, it was a story of a so called "disabled" girl who proved herself to be ablest of all at the end of the story. Main aim of the play was to create awareness among people & stress the need to be sensitive towards a person who possesses a distinct character & needs.  

Then came some beautiful young girls with a laudable performance on "Dil hai chota sa, choti si aasha". Everybody cheered them up with applaud & appreciation. Innocence of these lovely young girls was followed by a sheer different image of a woman & then stepped onto the stage with thunder in her voice- Jhasi ki rani Laxmi Bai, epitome of courage & strength. Later one by one all children from fancy dress team came, dressed as great Indian men & women like Subhash Chandra bose, Indira Gandhi, Sania mirza etc,  they emanated immense confidence & hope.   

To add a pinch of pure entertainment came our dance team with a spell bound performance on "Mauza hi Mauza & Das bahaane". This team won the hearts of everyone with their impeccable moves & confidence. The best part was the surprise entry made by kavita, the inspiration of our skit team. From the initial stage of this event we wanted her to be a part of this event but we couldn't. But nobody would have ever thought the way she came onto stage amidst the dance team's performance & surprised everyone. It was an inexplicable movement for all of us who have seen her expressing herself in her very own ways.

To conclude, without labeling individual efforts I would only say that behind a successful event there is a determine team. I hope we would continue to keep the spark on.  

As we all keep the best for last, so we chose to end this event by expressing our gratitude towards some people who has always been very supportive & concerned for us. & we ended this event till another beginning… (In choir) Jan gan man….. Jai hind!  

Thanks & Regards

Dolly Sharma

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Ankita Khemka:

Ankita joined us in beginning of this year, she is an MBA aspirant. In a very short time span she has proved herself to be one of those committed persons, who not only dream but follow their dreams with required vision & actions. Though her presence in Aashayein was for very less time, as she had to go to her hometown but we know she will keep the good work going wherever her path would take her.

Nitin Gupta:

Nitin has done B.Tech, currently he is working with ST Microelectronics. He likes to focus on health care activities & hygiene. Solving children doubts on various subjects and telling them small stories are some of his main interests.

Kalindi:

Kalindi is a student of final yr Msc in Anthropology.  She trains kids in various embroideries, she teaches these children to colour their paper & their life. She owns a strong personality which reflects in her dealing with various issues. Presently she is on a break due to her examination but she is actively participating in the various discussions influencing project activities. Her future plans include teaching art of candle making, fashioning decorative items which are saleable, etc

Kavita:

Kavita is pursuing Economics hons. from IP University. She is one volunteer who have always kept in touch with the project despite her busy schedule. She always has an extremely humble & polite approach towards children. She likes to involve children in various extracurricular activities.

Pramod

Pramod is an MBA aspirant; he follows the friendly approach, as friendly as the community children have started calling him 'Harry porter bhaiya'. Currently he is training kids in dance for the upcoming event.

Gaurav

Gaurav is an MBA aspirant too. He is very patient with the kids, listens them with a wide smile & interest. Presently he is preparing the kids for dialogue delivery on stage.

Nishant

Nishant is pursuing B. tech. from DCE. Being one of the volunteers who lay the foundation of Aashayein he knows most of the kids very well. Resuming the project after a long break too doesn't seem to have much effect on his bond with the kids. At present he is working on the skit performance for the upcoming event.

Rahul

Rahul has joined Aashayein last week only. As most of the project's volunteers he is a student too. We look forward to see some laudable efforts from his side.

Akshita

Akshita is pursuing graduation from DU. She likes to help children in their studies. She mixes up with the kids really well, all credit goes to her cheerful nature & her pleasing personality. Presently she has taken up the task to train the kids in dance moves.

Dolly

Dolly is pursuing Masters in English & PG in Instructional design. She is learning a great deal from the children. She likes to listen & understand these lovely young minds. A specialist in child psychology and would be a huge asset for us in developing the children’s personality.

Neha, Ankita Tondon, Tanya mohan, Rahul are some other volunteers, who had been associated with Aashayein, they are not active in the project's activities presently but we expect their presence & support in future.

This New Year has brought a new life to Aashayein. Kavita & Akshita resumed project's activities once again. An MBA aspirant, Ankita approached us in beginning of this month & later she was accompanied by two of her friends, Gaurav & Pramod. All of them have shown their sincere interest & effort in the project.

        Nishant, one of the oldest volunteers who shouldered Aashayein in its birth year has also been regained.

        Apart from Aashayein volunteers, we are getting a good support from Arun (from Prayas) & Selva who have been sharing their ideas & experiences with us regularly. 

As we all discussed the impediments in the growth of the project, Ankita came up with an idea of organizing an event aiming at building up a strong rapport between volunteers & community children. All of us agreed at once as this was a great opportunity to explore the untapped talent of these kids.

        So this month our main targets were: - to strengthen the bond between volunteers & kids, regularity in classes, taking maximum utilization of the time we spend with the kids by making prior preparation for the classes & to prepare the kids for the planned event-

So now Aashayein is organizing a fancy dress, dance & skit event on 17 February, segregation of children have been done keeping in my their abilities & interests. Some volunteers have taken up the onus of training the kids in various areas like dance steps, learning dialogues, clarity/ loudness of speech whereas others are taking care of other preparations like arranging costumes or props for the performances for the D-day.

        Presently, all our efforts are directed toward this upcoming event, Aashayein team wants to put its best foot forward. Not only we want to grow but we want to sustain this growth.

        We are looking forward to attain the above mentioned targets soon & setting much more difficult & big targets to achieve thereafter.

-          Dolly Sharma

-          Project Coordinator,

-          Aashayen

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Aashayen

Aashayen is in a all time worst situation and needs your help in re-building it. There are a few new committed volunteers who have joined us. We are forming a team to lead the re-construction. The major problem being we are not able to gather all the children during the class. A very few students turn up to the class and among them too a very few are showing interest in studying. We find it hard to have continuity in the class or in the teaching because of this.

          In the last week meeting we’ve decided to conduct a fancy dress competition for children on Jan 26^th. This event will help us to bring in the parents in touch with us. Also we are looking for the help of old volunteers of Aashayen who were teaching them to come back to the project for a few days and spend some time with the children to bring them back the charisma.

          Also we request volunteers to come forward to take the responsibility for organizing the Republic Day event.

Selva,

AID Aashayen