Education without Exposure and
Experience is Incomplete!
You need
Creative intelligence to come up with an idea;
Analytical intelligence to know if it is a good
idea; and practical intelligence to sell it.
There are a lot of children who have the
potential to be successful in their fields.
GUNDECHA EDUCATION ACADEMY
is a unique
and genuinely innovative educational institute
for the children of today, where the belief is
to do things differently and not do different
things.
The focus of
the school is to make the students independent
through activities that absorb children’s
energies, help in their mental growth and teach
them how to interact in a group.
Our Journey
began
four
years ago,
in
2004
with the
vision to….
Create a stress free atmosphere, inculcating
self-study habits, targeting concepts and skills
rather than content, trying to make teaching,
activity based and enjoyable. Give exposure of
all the possible fields so as to enable students
to make a choice of what they like & what they
want to do in future.
Our Core
Values:
To inculcate
amongst our children; self-confidence,
curiosity, initiative, inventiveness,
self-reliance, persistence and the skill of
innovation to solve problems in real life
situations.
Our Curriculum:
Encourages
the child to assume responsibility for his/her
learning.
Stimulates the Left and
Right Brain abilities so that the child gets a
balanced education which caters to ‘whole-brain
thinking’. Thus the curriculum is
designed keeping in mind that the vast treasury
of information has to become knowledge in the
child’s mind.Various computer aided
programmes and tie
up with different educational organizations have
enabled us to become self-sufficient in using
and providing computer assisted education to our
children. The latest technological advancements
in the field of education have been incorporated
to keep the child’s mind agile and active.
The
organization
Educational Initiatives conducts the
skill based
ASSET examination for our students.
The results of the same are systematically
conveyed to the students and parents.
With a view
to develop and integrate the use of the four
language skills i.e. listening, speaking,
reading and writing, the Computer aided
Waterford Early
Learning Programme
where learning to read, play with numbers and
explore Scientific concepts are easily grasped
by the Preprimary students is an added step
towards imparting knowledge in a fun-filled way.
The
Helen O’Grady
Children’s Drama
Academy
trains the students to speak effectively and
confidently. It helps to enhance the ability of
the students to express their ideas and feelings
in their own words and gives them an exposure to
good and appropriate English.
Our Faculty
(Creative Communicators):
Creativity is
the work value amongst our teachers. They are
information processors, problem finders, problem
posers and facilitators to our young problem
solvers. Their qualification is the ability and
the imagination to generate fluent and novel
ways of organizing ideas, content and materials
for our young problem solvers.
They are
given an opportunity and freedom to boldly
explore new and creative ways of teaching and
learning. To assist them in their endeavour the
school, with the assistance and support of
educational organizations of repute, provides in
service training to the teachers from time to
time.
The
IT based
teaching modules make it easier for
the teachers to explain abstract and difficult
concepts. The highlight of these softwares are
the easy accessibility in every classroom (each
classroom is equipped with a TV and a computer)
and the flexibility given to the teacher to use
them as and when required. There is no voice
over so the teacher is able to explain, rewind,
pause etc. at his/her
own pace. The focus here remains on
understanding the concept rather than making the
child rote learn. The visual ability to
understand concepts is enhanced and the students
are able to use the information and knowledge
acquired to answering application based
questions.
The concept is developed further with
interesting and eye-catching teaching aids, and
concludes with innovative assignments which show
sensitivity to students who have fewer resources
beyond the school.
The aim of the teacher is to give constant and
ample encouragement to those who have a tendency
to give up easily on academics and at the same
time closely monitor the student’s progress and
is in readiness, accordingly, to alter the
materials or change the type of instruction.
The school
results of the ASSET examination are analyzed
and changes are incorporated within the
curriculum by the teachers accordingly. The
teacher workshops conducted by the faculty of
Educational Initiatives is in keeping with the
fast-paced learning techniques.
Our Students (Young Explorers):
In today’s
day and age where children are becoming rote
learners and tuition classes are
thriving it becomes
imperative to make our young learners equipped
with the ability to think, apply and be
creative. The competition is tough and our
children must be able to cope without losing
their childhood. Our children are individuals
who are capable of sailing through difficulties,
of course with the full fledged and
whole-hearted support of our
Counsellors and
Special Educators.
Our Peace
Makers
The
Counselling
and Remediation Department is run by
our team of dedicated
counsellors and special educators who
guide and support the children in today’s
fast-paced life. The faculty is registered with
the Association of
Counsellors in Mumbai and each of the
members have their
personal registration number. The workshops and
seminars conducted by various medical
associations for learning disabilities and
student issues are attended on a regular basis
by this team of educators.
Their motto
is to give words of gratitude, praise, sympathy
or concern; and words of love and joy, as these
inspire greater effort and give added confidence
to our young explorers. The learning
difficulties faced by the students are
professionally tackled by the trained faculty.
They also maintain a profile of every child,
assess intelligence levels and devise learning
programmes
accordingly. The
aptitude tests
and career
guidance programmes
assist the child in making the task of selection
of subjects at the later stage, a simple one.
Workshops conducted by the
Counselling and Remediation Department of
the School
Life Skills - Think Quickly, Think Differently
Topics Covered :
What are Life-Skills?
Changes expected while growing up
Emotional and Social Changes
Keeping Healthy
Physical Hygiene
Food Habits
Exercise
Skills For
Adolescents
Topics Covered…..
What is Adolescence?
What changes take place during Adolescence?
Physical, Emotional, Social, Intellectual
Skills required for one’s personality
Personality Development
Do I feel this?
Power and communication failure
Tension and
anxiety
Indecisiveness
Confusion
Who am I?
Study Skills and Success in Exams
Knowing your learning style
Developing
study skills
Study skills are ………..abilities which help you
do well in your exams.
Career Guidance
Alcoholism – Drinking is a Disease
Drug Addiction Awareness
Trust, integrity and respect are the pillars of
collegiality, which are further strengthened
with a touch of culture, a strong positive
value-system that easily functions within the
framework of specified norms.
We believe in
the true sense that Work is worship, and the
teachers and the taught can begin worshipping
work right from the very first stage. In
selecting
activities for S.U.P.W., we make a
conscious effort to minimize the expenses on the
materials required. We generate the required
contents from the local resources. The teachers
take every precaution to ensure that the
students make safe and proper use of the tools.
“I like a Teacher who gives you something to
take
home to think about besides the
Homework…”
Some
Activities initiated by us………………………………
Celebration of Annual Events; Annual Exhibition:
Introducing India to Indians; festivals and
school functions; theme based Annual Day, Sports
Day
Celebration of festivals in an eco friendly way;
making natural colours;
wick making; Hindi Diwas;
Marathi Diwas; folk
dance competition; stalls on Indian states
Preparations for important & national days;
Organizing Book Exhibition for Open House;
Cleanliness Drives; Covering Books; Science Week
celebrations; Bookbinding; Debates on current
issues
AIDS Awareness Programme;
Anti addiction Programme;
Environment Awareness
Programmes
..… like Water conservation, Kids for
tiger- saving the tiger, Snake show-saving
snakes; Screening of the movie - ‘Rhino’; theme
based puppet shows
-
Money
Generation Programmes
Best Out of Waste: Making and selling articles
made by students; selling old
NiE newspapers; Book
Marks; pot painting; theme card making for
festivals; Rakhi
Making
Interviews with auto rickshaw drivers; Visits to
Old Age Homes; Each one teach one: Adult
Education Programme;
Collecting & Donating food items to Help Age
India.
Donating
toys, food items; books and stationery to the
children of Mobile Crèche; Parent Orientations
Fire Fighting Session; Personality Development
Workshops; Health check-up; First Aid
Demonstration;
Career Awareness
Programme
Tree Plantation Drive; ‘Say No to Plastic’;
Field trips – BNHS, NIC,
Kora Kendra, Ecotel
Hotels; Composting – manure making; Slogan
Writing; Water Conservation
Organizing
Canteen Day - as part of a
Maths Project on
Profit & Loss; donating the profit thus made
Canteen Day was organized as a
part of a Mathematics Project. The money earned
as profit in the activity was donated to “Help
Age India”. The activity not only helped the
children to learn the concept of profit-loss but
also trained them to handle money. Above all,
the final outcome of donating the money thus
generated sensitised
the children towards society and inspired them
to do something helpful and useful for the
society.
“Happiness lies in making others’ happy"
CHRISTMAS CELEBRATIONS WITH A DIFFERENCE
The students
celebrated Christmas with the children of the
mobile crèche. The mobile crèche children were
invited and the students shared & served snacks
and fruit juices to them. As gifts the students
donated one of their own special toys or games;
gift wrapped it and gave away to the children. A
handful of sugar brought by each student & staff
member was collected,
vermicelli and milk powder packets were
collected and then handed over to the teachers
of the mobile crèche to be cooked into ‘kheer’
– a sweet dish for the mobile crèche children.
“Grandparents are our heritage and are essential
members
of
our families and communities.”
A VISIT TO THE OLD AGE HOME
The students introduced themselves to the
members & residents of the old age home. They
presented a Cultural
programme (dance and magic show) and
distributed sweet, shawls, bed sheets, biscuits
etc. to them. The visit aimed at inculcating
values of empathy and sensitiveness to entertain
the inmates & share a few moments of happiness
with them.
INTERVIEW WITH AUTORICKSHAW DRIVERS
The school had organized an interview with the
auto rickshaw drivers as part of
‘Relationship
with Community helpers
Programme’. The students of
class VII were divided into 4 groups. Each group
was made to draft an invitation card, invite the
auto rickshaw drivers working in and around
their societies. The students heard and
understood the problems of the auto rickshaw
drivers and also explained to the drivers the
problems faced by the general public due to
their behaviour.
After discussions on these problems, an effort
was made to find solutions to some through
skits. The students tried to dissuade the auto
rickshaw drivers from troubling people /
passengers by spitting on the road, refusing to
be hired etc. An effort was made to show them
their importance in the society. They were then
offered roses and snacks. This helped to
strengthen the relationship between the students
and community helpers.
“Charity Begins at Home”
MONEY COLLECTION PROGRAMMES
Generating money for the conduction of
programmes is an
essential component for an S.U.P.W.
programme. This was
innovatively done by our students. They
collected old NIE newspapers, used notebooks,
made articles and greeting cards,
rakhis, pots and
generated the money by selling these articles.
The money thus collected was donated to the
organization called “Helpage
India”.
“Vision
without action is a daydream.
Action without a vision is a nightmare."
ENVIRONMENTAL AWARENESS
‘Better to light a candle than
to curse the darkness’
Most of the school going children are keen,
observe the details of their environment and are
especially interested in working and playing
together. Anything that is new to them arouses
their curiosity. This is the stage when an
intelligent teacher can exploit the curiosity of
the children in such a way as to develop their
interests, attitudes and skills in these
activities and inculcate in them a sense of
cleanliness, co-operation, self-reliance and
dignity of labour.
“Nature is the Art of God”
NATURE WATCH TREE
PLANTATION CLEANLINESS DRIVE
In order to
imbibe this quality among our students they are
asked to clean their classrooms and the school
premises from time to time. Students are taught
to make dustbins for their classrooms. The
preprimary students are taught table manners.
Meditation and yoga is done every morning during
the assembly. For we believe “A healthy mind
dwells in healthy body”.
BEST OUT OF WASTE
A child enters the primary school at a very
pliant and impressionable age. It is, therefore,
imperative that the start of his academic life
should provide him rich and meaningful
educational experiences for a balanced
development of his emotional and creative
abilities along with the scholastic ones.
‘Best out of waste’ as the words go means making
useful and productive articles out of what is
generally considered as trash and disposed into
our waste paper baskets. What we consider as
waste can turn out to be very useful.
‘ALL WORK AND NO PLAY MAKES JACK A DULL BOY’.
Students should be motivated to
utilise their free
time to do constructive, creative and
interesting work. The prospect of changing one
bit of scrap into something of use, gives us
pleasure. The good habits developed at an early
stage, benefit us later in life. “The journey of
a thousand miles begins with a small step”. As
we all know ‘Rome was not built in a day’. This
creativity will spread and there will be a time
when there will be no trash, scrap or waste
around. Children made countless stuff, like
jewellery boxes out
of waste, greeting cards,
paper bags out of waste paper, which we
gave to our parents/visitors on the annual
sports day.
INTRODUCING INDIA TO INDIANS - was our topic for
the exhibition held in our school.
It is our
pride our honour to
protect and preserve/ conserve India’s Heritage
and Culture. Topics Covered:-
India from
Vedic Age to Modern Times
Indian
Mythology
Indian
Freedom Struggle
Science and
Achievements
Astronomy,
Wildlife
Unknown Facts
About India, Art and
Culture
Great People,
India in Future, Yoga etc.
VITHIKA - SUPW exhibition
We have had the
opportunity of hosting a
SUPW exhibition, titled VITHIKA, which was a
collaborative effort of the Association of ICSE
Schools of Maharashtra
(AISM). The exhibition had 24 ICSE schools
participating in the exhibition with some really
creative ideas being put on display. Our
students put up various stalls on interesting
topics like, “sweep and bind”, “from dust to
desk”, “earthen delight”, “cane art” etc. These
stalls saw students demonstrating pottery,
making cane baskets, display first aid measures,
exhibit making of handmade paper etc.
The growing
technicalization of society has brought
increasing demands for literacy.
Lack of literacy leads to
disasters, morally and mentally - a breakdown,
leading to misunderstandings, lack of unity and
harmony. Also more poverty, destructive
minds, chaos and confusion, imbalanced minds and
the life!
As a part of the SUPW project, we at Gundecha
Education Academy realize this fact and strive
to secure the future of society and India. A
small step in this direction is already taken by
the students of std. IX, which involves giving
the basic education to our Class IV employees.
We look forward to implementing the motto “Each
One Teach One” by the senior students.
If you are literate, educate at least one child
who needs to learn the basics or at least one
can try to encourage and cultivate reading
habits among children who are lost in textual
lessons.
ADOPTING A SCHOOL
Keep Trying…
Rabindranath
Tagore said in his
speech when he received the Nobel Prize. “I feel
that what we suffer from in the present day is
no other calamity but this calamity of
obscurity, of seclusion that we have missed our
opportunity of offering hospitality to humanity
& asking the world to share the best things we
have got.”
When all the citizens of our country will walk
together to the 21st century, when
all our people will have basic education and
when all the children are healthy not
undernourished, learning in school and not
working in fields & factories can
we say that we are
closer to the realization of our dreams!!!
At
Gundecha Education Academy, we are finalizing
the formalities of adopting an
adivasi school
located on the outskirts of the Sanjay Gandhi
National Park, Borivili
(East). All our SUPW activities would be aimed
for the betterment of this school.
With such a
planned approach and foresight our
first ICSE
results were overwhelming and came as
a welcome, motivating and encouraging one. Our
first batch of ICSE-March 2008 had 49 students
registered with the Council. The school had a
100% pass result with 39 of the students
securing distinction marks. The lowest
percentage was 67.5 and the highest being 95.2.
This commendable performance by our students was
a joint and collaborative effort of the students
and the teachers. Of course the various
innovative techniques employed and the focus on
learning and understanding concepts enabled the
students to perform well.
We aim at
becoming a dominant player in the junior college
education by offering the best educational
experience to our aspiring students. We don't
just wish to restrict ourselves to imparting
quality school education, but wish to go a step
beyond by laying a lot of emphasis on the
college education that shapes the careers of our
children. With this in mind we want to inculcate
the right training to aspiring students.
The
commencement of ISC is yet another achievement
for the school. The classes for the ISC –
Commerce and Science streams began in mid June
this year with 28 students enrolling for Science
and 6 students enrolling for Commerce.
New
Endeavours …
The
Institute of
Innovations and Research in Educational
Technology.
To initiate
researchers in education we started the Pre
Primary Teacher Training Course of one year
duration wherein the provisional affiliation of
SNDT has already been sought pending approval
from NCTE.
Our Journey Continues….
(This
is just a step forward and a beginning. We have
a long way to go.)
Our Mission:
We, at
Gundecha Education Academy aim at providing
quality education in a facilitative challenging
and positive environment; encouraging sharing &
caring so as to make dynamic, inquisitive and
rational individuals who display high self
esteem and a sense of morality.