Literacy-based Summer Camp: Day 5

I had planned a variety of activities for the day, including a story about the Chipko Movement and brainstorming about the word confidence. However, most of our day went into making the mask. Children had expressed interest in craft-related activities in our earlier feedback sessions. The informal nature of the space and calling it a summer camp also means that children expect to participate in activities associated with this space, which are different from their regular school activities. A child who lives in the neighbourhood of some of the children attending the camp, but attends a different school, came with her parent to join the summer camp. The principal, initially hesitant, asked me if she could join the camp. I was very happy that the camp could allow children from other schools as well to join in. This means that the summer camp can become a space where children from all over the neighbourhood can come together to engage in literacy and other activities. I am hopeful that this will also give me the trust of the community and continue this informal engagement next year as well. 

Reading Corner

About four children were already in the classroom before 9 am when I entered the class. They were talking to each other. With their help, I displayed the books around the reading corner and asked them to use this time to read. Quite a few of the children picked up the books; however, many others did not want to read. Some of them just look at the pictures but do not read much of the text. I saw two girls reading the book together. I do not want to introduce new books while children have not read any new ones. Perhaps in the coming weeks, I need to introduce more reading-related activities and link them to our literacy-related activities (If you have any suggestions for such activities, do write them in the comments). I remember on day 3 when children made a map of their surroundings, I also read Sameer Ka Ghar (Tulika Books) book to them. The book is was intriguing to children, as it has the movie Inception (Christopher Nolan) like narrative. The book starts with Sameer’s house, its location in a neighbourhood, then moves to the city (all the while showcasing Sameer’s house and its changing scale in relation to the geography), location of Sameer’s house in Maharashtra, then the country India, continent of Asia, the world, on planet Earth, the Solar system and finally the galaxy. Although the book is designed for young readers, it was very interesting for children in the camp as well, who fall between the ages of 10 and 14 years. Given the difference in reading levels and limited general knowledge among these children, the short sentences and their visuals played an important role in revealing concepts of the state, continent, solar system, and galaxy. In addition, the changing size of Sameer’s house helped children understand the physical size of the concepts, as they continued to look for Sameer’s house in each visual. See some examples of visuals from the book below. 

Images from Sameer Ka Ghar (Tulika books)

Children continued to skim, read or talk to other children for the first 30 mins of the day. In the meantime, I asked Salim, who had his head on the table, to help me cut the chart paper into different sizes for our lion mask-making activity. 

Lion Mask Making

I had planned the activity to last 1 hour; however, most of our day was spent making this mask. This was mainly because of the limited number of scissors, which had to be shared among children. This was also a learning for me to have more material for children to avoid the wastage of time. While I showed children each step and helped others with each step of the mask, children like Sahil and a few other children finished their tasks and began playing or engaging in other activities at the back of the classroom. They began to push or nudge each other. I continued to remind them to help their peers, but also realised that this is not something they were used to. Especially Sahil. When I asked children to pick up any garbage they had produced from the mask-making activity, Sahil often hesitated and did not like to engage in things that required him to help or support anyone else. However, I want to continue to push him to do so. 

Children with their lion masks

Given the limited number of scissors, each step of the mask-making took time. Children also lost patience or found it difficult to make cuts, especially around the eyes of the mask. In some cases, children ran around or threw scissors at each other for the purpose of sharing. I had to pay attention to make sure no one was hurt in the process and often raised my voice to share these concerns. 

Once we finished making the masks, I gathered the children for a group photo, which produced some excitement. It was also exciting for me to see them with their finished masks. 

Planning of Short Story Performance 

Next, I got the previous day’s groups together to continue to plan their performances for the 23rd May exhibition. The group with Salim, Karthik, Shweta, Ruhi and other children immediately began to plan their scripts. They used their previous day’s notes to work further. The other group that included Sahil, Khwaja and other children continued to stay away, with Sahil showing no interest in the activity. They began planning Pokémon cards and other games. I asked them to stop this activity and plan the task they were assigned. However, instead, Sahil sat around and passed snarky comments on other children’s actions or efforts. I am constantly torn between letting him continue in the activity and asking him to leave the classroom. As he continues to disrupt and distract other children. Finally, I mentioned that if they did not make any effort to create a performance, only group 1 would perform on the final day. This rattled Sahil, and he said he would wait for Khwaja to come back and plan this with him. In the meantime, I group 1 to use children from group 2 and continue planning the performance. I also appointed Ruhi and Shweta as directors of the activity. I was going to support them, but they were now responsible for putting the act together. 

Fire in the Mountain Run Run Run

The running game has become the go-to game for children to relieve boredom and reset themselves. However, it is also where I get to see children’s peer relations. Since the game requires children to form groups, only children who are able to create a sense of camaraderie between peers get to find the game. Nevertheless, given the hesitation between girls and boys towards physical touch of any kind and a smaller number of girls compared to boys, they are often left out sooner in the game than most boys. The game, however, continues to be popular with repeated requests from children to play it a number of times. 

Conclusion

To keep the spirits high, we sang “We Will Rock You” by Queen and then reflected on our week’s activities. Remembering all things children learnt, origami animals they made, quiz and computer-related activities they engaged in. I also informed the children about a few activities we may engage in next week. 

Literacy-based Summer Camp: Day 4

Now that children had experienced a few days of activities at the camp, there was a sense of routine for them as well as me. I had created a rough plan for each day of the week before I came to Warangal. However, I ended up modifying much of it, given the different ages of children, their irregular presence, and their late arrival. Also, I had to carefully plan activities that were sensitive to the children's language diversity, including movement (as they did not like to be stationary for long), as well as the new information they could learn in the camp. My interaction with children revealed that, except for one or two children, most children did not have much general knowledge about their surroundings, world, including geography. To address this gap, I introduced books and wanted to engage children in information-seeking activities over the internet. 

Children began their day by creating an origami frog. In order to teach the children, it has become a ritual of sorts to spend time each evening learning paper-based animals from YouTube. The other day, Sahil asked me how I learned these origami animals. When I shared that I usually learned them from YouTube, he said he found it hard to learn from YouTube. I even mentioned that he could pause the video, which makes it easier to understand the paper folds and repeat them.  However, his question and the difficulty of learning from the said source also made me realise that learning from a source is also about training oneself in a certain kind of pedagogy. In a class on multimodal analysis, which I undertook with master's students at the Tata Institute of Social Science in March, this is exactly the problem that two students encountered. When I asked them to analyse the modes in a painting video on YouTube that had no words, one of the students found it difficult to analyse and speak about the pedagogy of the video. One of the reasons for this difficulty was that our idea of learning is heavily based on a spoken language pedagogy. However, we often forget the things we learn through observation, moving through the world and engaging with things around us. 

Quiz

I had planned a map-based quiz competition for children. This was based on the computer-based group activity they undertook in the class the previous day. i.e. search for countries and information related to them on globetrottinkids.com. I had also asked them to use the time at home to read more about it on their devices. I divided the children into groups of two for the following rounds. 

1. This is the capital of which country (seven such questions from South America)

Children were unable to respond to most questions. This included Sahil (child of a teacher in school and went to a different school), who was usually better informed than most children. However, this also became a learning opportunity. Each question became a way for children to learn about countries as well. Next, children were expected to name five countries from a continent. For group 1, I gave them Europe. For group 2, it was Asia. Children found even this question difficult. Nevertheless, they were able to make a few points in this round. I was surprised that Karthik, who was usually quiet, was able to get a few countries right in this. When I probed further, it was his love for sports that helped him. He followed teams of certain countries for certain sports, which gave him some insights into countries and their locations.

Next, the children were to respond to any five countries that speak French for group 1 and Arabic for group 2. Given that a large number of children in the classroom were from a minority background (Muslim), it was easier for children to come up with Arabic-speaking countries than French-speaking countries. I also learnt that a country like Palestine was referred to as falestine by children in their local language. They said that's what they called it.  Khwaja, in between the quiz, also asked me to share information on other countries that speak Arabic. 

In the end, Sahil’s group won by ½ a point more than the other group. He was very irritated and slammed a book on the floor. I have a feeling that this may be because he thought he knew more than most children in the classroom. However, in this particular activity, he was similar to most of the children around him. This realisation perhaps broke his illusion, which left him uncomfortable. 

Favourite Actors

In my doctoral study, I had noticed that children spent a lot of time watching movies. Imitating dialogues, songs and scenes. I wanted to use this interest for literacy-related activities with the current children as well. For this purpose, I divided the children into groups and asked each group to write their favourite actors. This led to animated conversations between children. Children who did not speak at all began to open up and express themselves. I next asked them to perform a scene or song from any of the movies they liked, and the other group had to guess the actor or the movie it was from. Children were shy and hesitated, but began to discuss options in their groups. Many of the performances were from Telugu movies; however, a few Hindi movies, including Dhurander’s dialogue, were also heard. 

I then moved the activity further for children to start thinking of a short film or drama in their respective groups that they can come up with to perform at our exhibition. Although initially, children felt lost, they began to think of stories they already knew. Salim, who often looks disinterested, came up to me and narrated a story from the Quran. When I encouraged him to use it and think of it from a performative angle, he began to retell the story to his group members. I noticed that girls and boys often hesitated to work together. In fact, the other day, the father of a girl came to class and insisted that she be made to sit away from all boys. However, when I sternly told the parent that I would manage the class and that he should not order the children around, he felt embarrassed and left. 

Khwaja, to my surprise, wrote a completely new story. This is the same child whose mother is an administrative staff member in school, and had mentioned to me that her son was slow. Sometimes, I feel that if we could show empathy and care towards children, give them time to figure things out for themselves, we would find solutions to many of the literacy-related problems we associate with children. The issue is also that we expect children who come from completely different backgrounds to all learn in the same way. 

In between all this, Sahil continued to move around the class, requesting access to his laptop that his father held in the other classroom. When I refused, he insisted that he could not think of any story, and the use of a laptop would only make it better for the group. I think Sahil’s demand also made me realise that purposeful use of a computer can also be detrimental to learning.  I continued to push him to talk to Khwaja, his group member and help him with his story. My effort continues to be to get him to support other children and get him to collaborate.

 

Sunshine in my Pocket and Birthday

We ended the day with Justin Timberlake's song, Can’t Stop the Feeling. This song was slightly longer than the other songs that children have learned in the camp. However, children did enjoy the beats. They were also given the printed lyrics of the song to sing along. 

In the end, we celebrated the day by cutting my birthday cake. Rakesh (my spouse), to my surprise, had sent one to the school’s address. Children were very surprised that I had not mentioned it earlier. I guess birthdays are very special for children. I remember feeling that way as a child. Nevertheless, I did not want to make a big deal about it and distract them. I was very content that I got to share the cake with them and receive their heartfelt wishes (including that of family, friends and a teacher who called and wished). 

Principal and availability of Computers 

Working in the current context, I have noticed that children’s general knowledge about the world is extremely limited. This is an insight that came through in the doctoral study as well. One of the reasons for this is that children often spend much of their time at home, in their neighbourhood, did not have access to uninterrupted internet. When they did have access, they did not have people around them from whom they could learn the fruitful or informative use. It also made me realise how our people in our environment impact our habits and influence our engagement with the world. The use of the internet for information seeking and knowledge gathering can also be seen as a kind of social capital that many of these people did not have. 

The result is that it led to a vicious cycle. The lack of virtual devices and resources meant children did not have fruitful examples in their environment to use the Internet for productive purposes. Thus, children used the internet to watch Instagram reels, watch YouTube videos or play games. While children from all backgrounds and classes engage in these activities. However, in the case of children at the margins, their use gets exaggerated, given children’s limited access to the internet and devices. Thus, parents and teachers of children at the margins refuse to give them devices, since children only use them for their entertainment. I have become more and more aware of the circularity of this argument. 

After the camp, I met the principal and continued to share my concern with her. The principal, who, despite her fear of the Internet in the hands of “these” children, is an individual who listens and continues to engage with me. I pushed the point that I shared my laptop and tablet with children for a reading of the world map the other day, and they enjoyed it very much. Also, they were very careful with the devices. I also said that these children do not have access to these devices in their homes, so they can only rely on the school to provide computer-based skills. If the school is also unable to provide so, then it will be very difficult for them to acquire these necessary skills, including creating an email, when they move into the world of work. I noticed that she resonated with me, and after many days, I saw the logic behind it. She said that she will try to get access to the computers. The management, according to her, was on a cost-cutting spree, recently having fired a senior-level employee, so she did not want to ruffle any feathers. 

This conversation highlighted the politics of resources and their limitedness that are often created for children at the margins. For the management of these schools, the low-fee private schools, like the Victory High School, continue to be a money-making scheme with limited investment to make any improvement in the quality of education or skills. The principal, even with her good intentions, has limited resources at her disposal, much of which is used to run the day-to-day functioning of the school. 

 Literacy-based Summer Camp: Day 3

A few new faces joined us today. Two of whom were children of the administrative staff. This included a child who was in the 2nd grade. The different age groups in itself has not posed many problems. However, later in the day, it led to a scuffle, to which I had to be stern and raise my voice to stop the behaviour. The addition of new children each day creates new dynamics among children. It also becomes difficult to see the progress of children over a sustained duration. Nevertheless, at least four children continue to attend the camp, and hopefully, it will help to document their progress over a period of time. Interestingly, all three of these children came in very quiet and shy. However, they have now begun to speak up and sometimes even disagree with me. 

While the camp is for literacy-based activities, I have had to design other non-literacy-based activities along with them. Critical thinking, reading and writing activities seem to put a lot of pressure on children, and they disengage. To avoid this, I usually have two main literacy-based activities in a day, and I cushion it with other movement, craft or art-based activities. For example, in today’s session, I had asked children to get their favourite object to the camp, and I would then ask children to draw their favourite object and write about it. However, I cushioned it with several “fun” (a term children often mentioned in their feedback) based activities. 

Scavenger hunt

I had planned a scavenger hunt for the kids today. These included seven clues I repurposed from online sources and made them relevant to children’s context. See a few examples below. Table. 1

The used candies as a reward for each clue that children found in each place, stuck with adhesive tape. Given the diversity of children with different levels, I divided the children into groups and gave one clue for each group, to avoid any competition and avoid noise or nuisance for the other school staff. 

Getting the first clue will be a joy. Look for it where you put your displays. Answer: display board in the classroom	Now that you are playing the game, look under your favourite seat. Answer: under their seats
If you want to find more clues look at the entrance of this place Answer: school gate	You are finding clues and feeling bold, now go to the place where the stairs begin. Answer: railing of the first stair

                                                    Table 1 Scavenger Hunt Clues

This task not only got children to read the clues, but also got them moving and having fun as a group. 

Children really enjoyed this activity. However, Sahil continued to dominate every clue and conversation with his snarky remarks, on every child and activity. I had to continue to remind him to be polite and respectful. I got the children to the chart paper with camp rules and reminded them to keep it a safe space. However, Sahil’s behaviour continued to remind me of Seven Star Girls from my doctoral study, where children from the upper caste and privilege continue to dominate conversations in a mixed classroom, overshadowing others. As someone who has exhibited similar behaviour during my own childhood and adult life, I feel it is so important for educators to teach listening skills, humility and support for peers to children in classrooms. In a competition-driven education system, this is a lesson that is often ignored. I too learnt this lesson late, during my fellowship at Anveshi Research Centre for Women’s Studies. It was uncomfortable, but I am very thankful to my mentors for making me see my own privilege and tolerating me. 

Favourite objects

After a movement-filled activity, children drew and wrote about their favourite object. I had asked the children to get their favourite objects the previous day. At least five of them had gotten such an object with them. The others who were new drew an object from memory. While children easily drew the objects, sharing colours, pencils, sketch pens, and erasers, writing about the objects posed particular problems. Although many children spoke diverse languages, they did not engage in much personal writing in their spoken language. This meant that there was a disconnect in their speech and writing language. Even if I asked them to write in any language, given English language dominated in the classroom, because of me, children wrote in English. Often asking their peers or me for translation or spellings. See children’s artifacts below. 

Khwaja's artifact

Karthik's artifact

Salim's artifact

Child 4

Ruhi's artifact

Child 6 artifact

Child 7 artifact

Child 8 artifact

Sahil's artifact

Child 9 artifact

Child 10 artifact

Each child then made a presentation of their artifact. Often, they would read lines they had written below their drawings. Sometimes, adding a few words from their mother tongue. Sahil, along with other children, continued to disrupt the presentations, mocking or taunting other children. I had to put my foot down and sometimes raise my voice to stop him. All the while, continuing to draw their attention to their peers’ work and support them by listening to them. Paying attention to others’ work is hard for children. It is also a habit that they have not inculcated. Given the teacher-centred pedagogy of the school, children are perhaps also only attuned to be attentive to teachers. 

Computer-based activity

Through the last four days, I continued to request that the principal to help us provide laptops for children. However, this continued to be a resource and perception-based challenge. The principal, including the management, continues to suggest that it is a waste on “these children” (notions included uneducated parents, ill-mannered, wasting time online) and their community. In addition, the management (a chain of schools) did not allocate any funds for access to working devices and the internet for these children. The principal also believed that parents did not want children to spend additional time on screen, and their idea of studies was mainly textbook-based. I believed that children, especially from marginal backgrounds, needed to develop technology skills, essential for their future. Including creating an email or using the internet for knowledge-based activities, or learning to use it to their advantage. As a way out, I designed an activity where children could work in groups. Sahil volunteered to get his laptop from home. In addition, I used my laptop and tablet for a group-based activity. Children were divided into groups of  4 each. Each group was then asked to open globetrottinkids.com website and study different countries, their capital, information related to their food, currency, etc. Each child was also asked to click on a country and read information on it, and then share the device with their peer. Children spent about 30 mins on the website. This activity was used the next day to design a quiz competition.

Brainstorming - Anger

We next brainstormed the word “Anger”. Why does one get angry, and who makes you angry?  Salim continued to write that he gets angry when he gets beaten up. This is perhaps the second time he mentioned it. See the image below of the activity. Children often mentioned fighting or using their anger for a destructive purpose. When I asked if anger was a good or bad thing. Sahil said, "It is difficult to decide that". I tried to direct children that sometimes anger is a good thing and can be used to change things around them. I used examples of children like Malala, Lokesh and Gitanjali (see images below) who also got angry and created something useful from that energy.  I shared some material on the reasons for anger and how you can use anger to do better things. 

Reading time and conclusion

Children spent the last 20 mins reading books from the reading corner, sharing their books with each other or spending time talking. We ended the day with a song from the movie, Rock On. Socha Tha, the song makes you question your day-to-day life and see wonder in things around you. Khwaja particularly waits for this part of the day as he enjoys the songs we sing in the camp. He also reminded us to carry out the feedback circle where we discuss the day, what they enjoyed? What did they learn? And what they did not like, as well as any feedback children had for me. Most children hesitate to speak, but Khwaja has become very comfortable in speaking his mind. This, perhaps, is also an effect of him, being regular to the camp and developing trust in the process. 

Note: All names are pseudonyms

Literacy-based Summer Camp: Day 2

The day began with Salim and a new student Sahil. The latter is a child of a teacher in the school who attends a different school. Sahil is very proficient in English and has better communication skills than other children. I was apprehensive about taking him. From my earlier experiences with children from advantaged backgrounds, they tend to overshadow others and make it difficult for other, less advantaged children to speak. I saw glimpses of these today as well. Nevertheless, having Sahil also meant that other children continued to benefit from his knowledge in other activities. It then required a balancing act on my end where I had to not only allow expression of all children, including Sahil, but at the same time, create a safe space for apprehensive and shy children to take their time and others to listen. The instances below from the day detail some of these balancing acts and children’s expressions. 

The day began with creating an origami butterfly. This process of creating things with paper gets children to focus their hands and senses. Some children struggle to remember the exact paper folds, or others add too much pressure on the paper, and it crumbles. Nevertheless, they continue to engage, learn from peers, and try to get it right. In the middle of this activity, Khwaja and a new child, Karthik, joined us. Karthik is quiet and hardly speaks; however, he continued to participate. 

Map Making

We moved into a map-making activity, where children had to draw a map of the route from their home to school, with all the surrounding elements around it. Children drew elaborate elements of things around their homes. Sahil drew a big entrance of the school, and our conversation moved around purpose and representation on a map. This included the idea that elements on the map do not have to be the same scale and can only be representative. Taking this idea forward, Sahil drew a scale at the bottom of his map. In addition, he continued to work with Salim and help him understand the task better. See children's maps in the images below.

Sahil and Salim's Map of their surroundings

Karthik drew a map of the school

Khwaja's map of his surroundings

We then pasted children’s maps on the classroom wall, and each child presented their map to their peers. I also asked questions to each child on things that were unclear or made suggestions. While Sahil was the first to present his map and did this very easily in English. Salim struggled with English. When I encouraged him to use his own language, he mixed Dakhini and Hindi to speak about his map. However, it was clear that he needed time and patience. In the middle of this presentation, Sahil continued to move around the class, making snarky comments at others’ presentations. I have to continue to draw children’s attention to the rules of the camp. That is, listening and supporting their peers. Perhaps this needs to be a regular reminder.

Salim’s map included elements around his house, but also elaborate buildings, a mosque and a very extensive use of green. Khwaja, on the other hand, included past elements that no longer existed, including trees, which he really liked but were chopped down recently. Karthik drew a map of the school itself. While he drew a smaller house, the sections of the school were more prominent in his drawing. 

In the middle of this activity, four new children entered the classroom. I have had to contend with the fact that, given the informal nature of the event, children will continue to move in and out, with no regularity. Perhaps this is also a form of children’s agency.

While children were engaged in origami at the beginning of the day, I also created a reading corner at the far end of the classroom. These included a collection of books in Hindi and English on various topics. If new children came in the middle of an activity, I directed them to the corner so that they could engage themselves in the book. However, this also became a disruptive element, as Sahil continued to move towards the books and engage others in conversations when he finished his tasks. From the next day, perhaps, I would open the space only during the reading hour at the end.

Brainstorming "Courage"

For the next activity, which now included about 9 children, we brainstormed what it meant to be courageous. Children came up with various notions, including brave, people they found brave around them. I also encouraged them to share stories of people they found courageous around them. A boy shared that he found his father and mother brave, given they provided food, education, among other things, despite economic hardships. Others shared how they found their sister brave. Sahil added that being brave meant doing things in spite of being scared. I then asked them if they thought they were brave. Some said almost, others clearly refused. I drew their attention to tasks they did daily, like crossing the road, coming to school or doing hard things. This created a buzz, and children started talking about reading and writing as hard things that they did anyway. I then pasted printouts with information on children who had done brave things in India and received bravery awards from the Prime Minister. Children read their stories pasted on the walls. See images below.

Brainstorming "Courage"

This led a child, Sohaib, to come to me and tell me about an Instagram story he had read about a 7-year-old boy who recently crossed a strait between India and Sri Lanka and won an award. He was very captivated by this story.

While I opened the space for children to use the rest of the time in the reading corner, Shoaib wrote a few lines about the swimming boy and wanted me to read it. He said he will add a few more points about him and show me tomorrow. I was intrigued by how the conversation about courage led him to put his thoughts to paper. I will add more on Shoaib’s writing in the following post. 

Children continued to enjoy reading the books, occasionally coming to me to ask questions. I sat away from them, writing my reflections, letting them read undisturbed. Some children read on their own while others read in groups. I was surprised by how much children enjoyed going through the books. The school does not have a library; maybe this is something that can be built with the help of the principal. 

We also sang the song, “We will rock you”, thumping to its beats and clapping our hands. I gave each child a photocopy of the lyrics so they could sing along. Children certainly seemed to enjoy the song because many of them asked for a similar song in our feedback circle. 

Feedback circle

Children asked for more art, craft and song-based activities. Some even asked for carrom, chess and other board games. Sohaib said he liked the brainstorming activity. Some mentioned linking the map activity. Request for computer-based activities continues to be put forward by children. However, between the school's unwillingness and my resource limitations, creating a virtual project activity, is perhaps untenable this time. Perhaps more group based and shared activities can be tried out.

Note: All names are pseudonyms.

 

 Literacy based Summer Camp:  Warangal, Telangana

The literacy-based summer camp evolved from my doctoral thesis that examined children at the margins’ school and out-of-school literacy. The thesis concluded that perceptions about children at the margins continue to guide pedagogy (memorisation and textbook-based) in the school; the hegemonic presence of school and its pedagogy also guided adults' perception of children outside the school. Children locked between school’s strict reading and writing pedagogy, where marginal children’s personal meaning has no space in formal pedagogy, the gap between school and home-based modalities continued to increase. Nevertheless, children continue to express themselves in in-between and out of school spaces of the school, in their home languages, through translanguaging, or multimodal forms. 

The literacy-based summer camp evolved to continue to create a space for children to express themselves in multiple forms, connecting children’s out-of-school context to their school, which may help bridge the gap between their various contexts and school-based reading and writing. Given my own language limitations, I used Hindi and English. Nevertheless, children were free to use Telugu (the language of the region), Dakhini or mix languages freely. In case I could not understand a word, other children become translators, supporting each other. The activities used in the camp are designed taking into account children’s interests, freedom of movement in the classroom, group work, thinking time and elements of joy. 

The summer camp is held in the same school as my doctoral site, i.e. the Victory High School. The principal has generously allowed me to stay in the school (in a guest room). The principal, with the help of teachers, selected 8 struggling (or as the school calls them “Weak”) children, each from class 6, 7 & 8 (ages 10 to 14 years). The reason for this is that, as I found in my doctoral study, due to a lack of social capital, often children from minority, historically marginalised backgrounds occupied these positions. I used the same criterion to select children for the camp, too. 

We use one of the classrooms for our camp, which runs from 9 to 12 pm Monday to Friday. Although I had planned week-long activities for the 3-week engagement. The number of children, their participation (each child comes at a different hour), meant I had to think on my feet, and the plan changed every day.  

Day 1: The highs and lows

After much preparation, coordination, and travel, the day of the camp finally arrived. I was excited and looking forward to seeing a lot of children. Before the children arrived, with the help of school staff, the benches were rearranged in a circle. I then waited for the children to show up. 

By 9.10 am, there was still no sign of anyone. Slowly but surely, two boys arrived. Mohammed and Khwaja. Both are 13 years old and have just finished their 8th-class examination. They came in shy and sat together on one of the benches. While we waited for other students to come, I had to think on my feet and replan my schedule. We began making origami birds. Khwaja was the son of a school staff member, Sabina. In our interaction the other day, his mother mentioned that she had three kids. Khwaja had a twin who was smarter than him. She said it's perhaps true what they say, one twin is slower than the other, suggesting Khwaja was slow. She said he tries to read and puts in a lot of effort, but does not remember much. Throughout the day, I continued to hear perceptions of adults (Principal, parents) around children, which were mostly negative. Mohammed, on the other hand, was the brother of a previous student I had worked with last year and already knew me from his sister. In fact, when Mohammed mentioned his sister, I saw the resemblance. I felt grateful that the children I had earlier interacted with me left feeling positive and encouraged their siblings to interact with me. 

Introductions

By this time, another child had joined us, Jyoti. She quickly picked up the ropes and was much faster in understanding the folds of the origami bird than the boys. However, I could feel that she felt out of place a little, being the only girl in class. Next, we moved to introductions. This involved a dance movement, sharing their name and one interesting fact about themselves. I started the activity to put them at ease. After a dance move, I shared my name and, as an interesting fact, told them about my dog, who has made me empathetic towards street dogs. When it came to children, they felt embarrassed to perform a dance. I think perhaps it was too much to expect these young adults to feel comfortable in their bodies, and especially in a school context. Nevertheless, Jyoti pitched in; she performed her dance move with ease. Her interesting fact was, “Even if I am not a Christian, I go to church, because of my friends, who are Christian”. Motivated by Jyoti, Mohammed, who did not want to dance, but shared (in Dakhini)  that “he had a pet who stays with him and often goes places but comes back”. Mohammed encouraged Khwaja to speak up, who looked terrified and struggled to speak a word. Mohammed then pointed out that Khwaja swims. I did not want him to feel unnecessarily worried and moved to another activity. 

What does "Safe" mean to you?

I wanted children to devise their own rules for the camp. To align the rules to a common goal, I wrote the word “Safe” and asked all three of them what it means to them. This activity was inspired by Jane Sahi’s book, “In our Own Words” (2015). Children slowly and surely began to voice their ideas. I had to continue to point out that they need to think of the word from their own experience. 

Children's notions of the word "Safe"

Children continued to find it difficult to get the right spellings, so I encouraged them to ask me. Jyoti also spoke in Telugu, which we worked together to translate into English. The languages of children continue to be an important part of the way they express and what they express. Removing “a” language from the classroom opened up children’s expression, created room for dialogue, and queries. There is no doubt that it would have further helped if I spoke Telugu. 

Values of the Summer Camp

Next, we moved to creating rules of the classroom. Children found this activity initially difficult. I encouraged them to think and mull over the rules that will make them feel safe in the classroom, like in their homes. Slowly, they began to add their ideas. We finally ended up with the following rules for all of us.

Children's rules/values of the camp

The Interview 

For the next activity, children had to interview each other on three questions. These included, “How will you describe yourself?” “What do you like to eat the most?” “What kind of things do you do after school?” “One thing you could change around you?” While the two boys noted the questions in their books, a new child entered the class with his father. The father, upon seeing me, began to tell me in front of all the other children how slow his ward was and how if I made him read and write, he would pay me Rs. 1000. During this time, I continued to look at Salim. He looked visibly upset and on the verge of tears. I told the father that his belief in Salim was very important to make any improvement, and each child knows something. My response, perhaps, made him feel a sense of empathy for Salim. He put his hand on his son’s shoulder and agreed. He left the classroom, and I got Salim to learn origami birds from his peers, distracting him. Or so I hoped.  

The other children continued to interview each other, and I made notes of what they were doing.  Mohammed’s responses included watching Warangal Diaries after school (a multilingual web series). He loved eating biscuits with tea and liked to eat biryani. He said he would also like to change his cycle to a better one. Khwaja, on the other hand, said he loved to eat burgers, liked to watch and play cricket. He also spoke about mistakes he made in his writing and how he finds it difficult to keep up with his handwriting. When I enquired further, he said he found it difficult to remember things as well as when he tries to write a “O”, if often becomes an “F”. I am no expert on special needs, but from what I know, Khwaja perhaps needs a specialised diagnosis. I am still looking into this, given that his family does not have the resources to pay for it. 

In between this activity, Javed came to school. One of the children I had worked with during my doctoral study, he also became an integral case study in my thesis. At first, I could not recognise him, given how much he had grown in terms of his height. It was really nice to see him. He is now working at a medical shop and is preparing for further professional studies. I asked him to get other children to come to school. When I enquired about his paintings, an art he had earlier spent hours practising, he said he had left it, given the lack of time because of studies. I encouraged him to continue it and offered to display them at our exhibition on 23rd May.

Javed continued to participate in our activities; however, I could see that the activities did not really interest him. Nevertheless, he was kind and supportive of other children.

Writing Prompt: Aliens want to visit Earth

For the next activity, I gave them a hypothetical situation where everyone on earth had died, and they were the only people left on earth. The aliens who came to Earth wanted to know what life on Earth is like. We are the only examples they have. Children wrote a few sentences to this prompt. 

The image below contains children’s responses to the writing prompt. While all of them wrote about their family, Salim, to my surprise, was the most creative. In his response, he asked aliens not to come to Earth, as it was not a very good place. His reasons being people fight, get beaten up, and it's very hot. Salim took a lot of time to write his letter, often seeking help from his peers to get the correct spelling. Nevertheless, he managed to write an absolutely original response. 

Children's description of life on Earth

Storytime

Moving on, I read the story of “Useless Mr Sadanand” by Satyajit Ray to the children. Children did not enjoy this story much, and I had to stop midway. I realised that they needed better stories. For this purpose, I finally received the books (via Speedpost) I had gathered to create a reading corner (suggested by Geetha M, a PhD peer). This perhaps might work better than reading a story to them. 

Feedback Circle

We ended the camp with a feedback circle. Although children often found it difficult to express things they did not like, I encouraged them to speak openly. Khwaja finally said that they did not like the Sadanand story. They requested more origami computer-based activities. 

I've been trying to arrange for computers in the school for a while now. Although the school has a computer lab, internet access is denied to children. On digging further, I was told that the management does not think it is appropriate for children to use the Internet, especially “these” children whose parents might create an issue if they create a nuisance. “These” has come to mean many things, including the lack of judgment, ability, capacity, etc., for not just children but the community as a whole around the school. Even when a computer personnel agreed to connect the internet with the computer, at a nominal fee, I was asked, “Is it worth the price?”

This perhaps is the question, that left me deeply troubled. Who decides the worth of anything? The question of literacy is unquestionably entangled with the politics of power. I realised that some of these questions of worth, also need to enter the activities of the summer camp and children need to start thinking of it and take action themselves.

Note: All names are pseudonyms.