The Progressive School Vol 02 Issue 04

with water excites the children but
through this, we also teach them a
valuable lesson on how when not
conserved, water may not last for
the generations to come and this
is a race against time.
Similarly, gamifying lessons
can make the teacher’s job more fun
and help students fully understand
concepts and implement them in
daily life. This is a really important
tool in the educator’s toolkit.
Repetition:
When you do a job repeatedly,
day after day, year after year, you
become really good at it. This is
exactly why we respect those who
have more experience than us. For
children too, this applies. Making
children repeat games, songs,
stories and activities, commits
it to their memories and helps them
understand it better. Turning boring
and mundane lessons into fun poems
or stories can really help make the class
more effective. I mean think about it, you
remember the rhyme ‘twinkle twinkle
little star’ from over 20 years ago but
often you don’t remember the news
article you read yesterday! Keeping this
in mind, we teach many of our concepts
through board games that we develop so
that children can keep playing them over
and over again to completely understand
the concept. Our board game, Garbage
Grab allows children as young as 5 to
develop cognitive, analytical skills and
motor skills along with teaching them
the concept of waste segregation.
Collaboration:
We often see that working in teams
for projects is extremely fun and the best
ideas come out of these experiences.
Human beings are known to be social
animals and working together is not only
Amishi Parasrampuria
fun for children, it also helps develop
extremely crucial social skills. Learning
to work together to solve common
problems at a young age can dramatically
impact the adults that these children
turn into. One thing we incorporate in
our programs is to create small teams for
each game that is played and give each
team a time limit. Children are motivated
to work together towards a common goal
because of the short amount of time
available to complete the task.
Sharing experiences:
Just as adults benefit from peer
mentors, friends and family, children too
benefit from sharing their experiences.
Sharing experiences not only helps their
communication skills, it also help them
gain confidence and develop soft skills
such as empathy. It also allows them
to learn from the experiences of others
and inculcate these learnings into
their own life. Our sessions begin with
understanding the starting point of what
the child understands about the concept.
This allows us to be better educators
by creating a customized experience
for that group of children and it also
allows the child to communicate his/
her experiences confidently, drawing
from his/her own experience.
Challenges:
Keeping children engaged
through small, fun challenges help
them develop problem solving and
analytical skills. When they do
complete the challenges, it gives them
a sense of accomplishment which
in turn improves their confidence
and self-esteem. When they work
on challenges in teams, it further
improves their social skills. This can
be an exciting tool that teachers
can incorporate into the classroom
as a fun, non-formal way of teaching
concepts. School programs should often
end with a challenge for the week, these
small challenges allow for the learning
to continue at home and for children to
transfer the learning into a practical, real
life environment.
At Upcycler’s Lab we make
sustainability based learning tools for
children ages 5+. Our vision is to change
mindset and behaviour around the
environment so that we can create better
consumers for tomorrow. Our work is
mainly based around UN Sustainability
Development Goal 12 – Responsible
Consumption and Production.
We incorporate all the tools for
experiential and social learning
mentioned above in our products and
programs. Our games range from simple
topics such as waste segregation to more
complex ones like how to create the
perfect planet.
To know more, get in touch on info@
upcyclerslab.com
www.progressiveschool.in
JUL-AUG-SEP 2018
THE PROGRESSIVE SCHOOL
39