Dear Readers

Welcome to the October 2009 issue of the Sathya Sai Education in Human Values UK email newsletter.

This month:

A Lunchtime Club: Ontario Canada
“Living the Values 2009” By Ayishwariya Menon
Story Time
Mahatma Gandhi Competition
“Living the Values 2009” By Juliet Bell
Calendar of Activities (Online)

If you have any feedback, or would like to share your experiences of SSEHV, please write to us.

Kind Regards,
The Editor

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A Lunchtime Club

At Massey Street Elementary Public School in Brampton, Ontario, Canada, students aged eight to ten have been actively participating in an SSEHV lunch club. During the past school year, two groups have been created and each group met weekly. At meetings, it is emphasized that each member is an invaluable part of the team and, by developing this kinship, students learn to get along with each other.

As a staff initiative, a value for the month is chosen for the entire school and the lessons for the lunch club, most of which are taken from the SSEHV manuals by Carole Alderman, are planned accordingly. During the winter months, the sessions are held in the classroom. Students enthusiastically participate in a variety of fun filled and highly interactive activities, such as:

• Silent sitting by playing concentration games, participating in breathing exercises and eventually travelling on a positive mental journey with soft inspirational background music.

• Bringing morals and feelings of stories to life through group discussions, role plays and sharing of real life experiences.

• Value songs, also learned by playing games such as “musical chairs” and “passing the parcel”.

• Reading the quote of the day by students of the lunch club, as part of the school’s daily morning announcements. At the weekly meetings, students engage in lively discussions to further develop an understanding of the application of these quotations to their daily lives.

• Opportunities for group activities during which time values such as team building, patience and respect for each other are reinforced. These group activities include poster making and other arts and craft related to the value of the month and special occasions. The highlight for the group activities has been the monthly baking and decorating of cupcakes and cookies to share with the abused women and their children at the Salvation Army Family Resource Centre. During the past year, the class of students with autism also joined in this activity. It was truly a rewarding and invaluable lesson for all of the students.

From March to June, the students of the lunch club are involved in many jobs around the school, providing them with many more opportunities to practice values. These jobs include, student ambassadors, kindergarten registration volunteers, playground buddies for students with special needs and kilometer club monitors.

The Principal, as well as students who participated in the lunch club, provided positive feedback. The Principal remarked that the lunch club has helped form a solid foundation for students to work and play collaboratively and empathetically. While a student, working below grade level and experiencing disruptions in her home life, recounted a story and related how the morals of the story can be applied to her everyday life. Another student, struggling academically, when asked how his abstract colourful painting demonstrated his understanding of friendship, he replied, “we may all look different on the outside, but inside we are all the same.”

The response among the staff and students has been encouraging. Already students have asked to be a part of the lunch club during the next school year. A number of teachers have also expressed an interest in learning about SSEHV. As enthusiasm grows, many more students will be given an opportunity to benefit from this invaluable program.

By Tej Persaud

 

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“Living the Values 2009”

On Saturday the 3rd of October 2009, the British Institute of Sathya Sai Education (BISSE) hosted a fun filled and inspiring day of activities themed ‘Living the Values’ at the Abbey Primary School in Leicester. It was an excellent day with interesting speakers and enjoyable performances by the children of the Abbey Primary School. This is a partnership school where human values are integrated completely into the school curriculum and this was apparent in the behaviour of the children and the quality of the performances they put up.

A play was presented, based around the theme of bullying and how important it is to consider the feelings of others. This was produced in just one week with excellent showmanship from all the actors and more importantly, with a very inspiring message. Well done to the children for their hard work and cooperation in putting up a very enjoyable show.

This was followed by a poem by the 7 year old winner of ‘Abbey’s Got Talent’, the school’s very own variety show. Her poem was called ambition and was delivered with the sincerity and high standard that has become the norm with children involved with SSEHV. She then continued to provide us with a recipe for a good student which was both heart-warming and funny. Throughout the day, we were entertained with various testimonials from other students as well as their parents on the benefits of attending SSEHV classes.

Anita Jethwani held the audience enraptured with a very touching and inspiring tale of how she became involved in SSEHV. It was most interesting as she was once a banker who found her true calling in teaching and has now been a teacher for about 8 years. She presented us with facts on what employers look for in school leavers and discussed how this was lacking in the current school system as they were essentially looking for strong character and integrity. When she began teaching at her school, she was asked to take on the ‘worst’ class in school with very disruptive students who were also behind their age group in most school subjects. She started doing 3 minutes of silent sitting every day with the children and within a year, her students were hailed as examples of calm and well behaved students not only for her school but also with other schools in the borough.

Anita has also been conducting a regular SSEHV after school club that has this year been upgraded to a course at the end of which the children will receive certificates. She went through a typical lesson with us using an interactive white board and it was most enjoyable. One of the experiences she shared with us was particularly touching as one of her students, upon hearing the story of ‘The Hare and the Tortoise’ remarked that the tortoise reminded him of ‘that man in America’. This was puzzling to her and with further questioning it was discovered that the student meant President Obama thanks to his rise to success despite his disadvantages. All in all, hers was an excellent talk and a great example of how SSEHV changes lives of all who come into contact with it.

Songs were of course a part of this fun day. Renu Gidoomal, a wonderful artiste, took the stage and got everyone into the mood for singing and clapping with her beautiful voice and high energy. It was great to see the effect she had on the children who were completely engrossed in her session.

I can think of no better advertisement for SSEHV than the master of ceremonies for the day and headmaster of Abbey Primary School, Mr Tim Foster. His energy and enthusiasm provided a perfect accompaniment to the day and was a great testament to the concept of the teacher being an example in the system of Educare. It is no wonder that the children of Abbey School are doing so well with such an excellent teacher to care for them.

All in all, it was a most enjoyable day with lots of laughs, hugs and maybe a happy tear or two which was very much in keeping with the theme of the day. My personal take home message is best captured in the words of the Abbey school song : ‘Give it all you got, Give it all you got, Give it heart, Give it mind, Give it soul, Don’t stop!’

By Ayishwariya Menon

 

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Story Time

Peace: Smiley, the Clown

Quotation - ‘We cannot always do what we like, but we can like what we have to do’. Schacatel

Smiley, the Clown, was always happy. He worked in a circus and his job was to make people laugh with his seemingly silly behaviour. His behaviour wasn’t really silly. In fact, he had to be very clever to think of ways to make people laugh. And it is a very important job because laughter helps to keep people healthy, that is, when we laugh with someone, but not if we laugh at them and humiliate them, making them feel bad.

When Smiley was a child, he was called Simon, but his family and friends adopted the name Smiley because he used to think of ways to keep everyone happy and peaceful.

When Simon was five, his Dad was in the army. It was his job. It was wartime. Sometimes you can be in the army in peacetime, but Simon’s Dad was there in wartime. He did not like it. Simon’s Mum did not like it either. When Simon’s Dad was not at home, the boys used to argue and fight. Simon’s elder brother, Tom, would not let him play with his toys. Their Mum got fed-up telling them off. “Oh, do give me some peace and quiet,” she would say.

One day, Simon said to Tom, “Let’s pretend Dad’s home now and that it is peacetime.”

“How can we do that?” asked Tom. “Dad isn’t home and it isn’t peacetime.”

“We can go to the bottom of the garden and pretend Dad is in the house and you can let me play with your tractor and I will give you my lorry,” replied Simon.

Tom looked at his brother, Simon who was smiling as usual and smiled back. “I get it. When Dad’s home, we have to share our things and give him some peace.”

“Yes! Well, we could do it anyway, couldn’t we?”

“Mum would like that, wouldn’t she?” said Tom.

We went down to the bottom of the garden and played in the mud all afternoon. We were covered in it. Guess what Mum said when we came in?

“Goodness me! What a muddy pair you are, but it looks as if you’ve had a lovely time. I would much rather you were muddy and are happy boys, than clean boys who fight.” .

We told her about pretending that Dad was home. She said, “Well, how about pretending he is home every day, if it means not fighting and being happy instead.

“We will try,” said Tom.

And we did.

Questions:

1) How did you feel when you heard the story?
2) Did it remind you of anything in your own life?
3) Why did Simon suggest they pretend their Dad was home?
4) What was the result of this?
5) What name would you like to give this story?

 

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Mahatma Gandhi Competition

Back in the early summer of 2009, the Leicester council granted the formation of the Gandhi statue. As they erected the statue on the famous Belgrave Road in Leicester, this got me wondering if the local younger residents actually knew who Gandhi was and what he stood for and how he helped bring independence too India.

As far back as I can remember, my local Primary School, "Abbey Primary School" were brilliant in giving us knowledge of our Asian culture and history.

Our Company; The Trophy Parlour, decided to run a competition and get the local children aware of what Mahatma Gandhi achieved and understand his principles and values.

We decided to run a competition where we are going to commission a gold coin of Gandhi and share out all profits with local charities.

The Children had to come up with quotes of what they thought symbolises Gandhi. The winning quote would be inscribed on the reverse side of the coin.

The Children were creative and came up with imaginative quotes.

On the front side of the coin is the image of Gandhi and his famous quote "YOU MUST BE THE CHANGE YOU WANT TO SEE IN THE WORLD"

The Winning quote which was inscribed on the reverse coin is "PEACE WILL MAKE THE WORLD A BETTER PLACE"

The winning quote was judged by the Leicester MP THE RIGHT HONOURABLE MR KEITH VAZ.

He visited the School to represent the competition winner with medals where the winning student also won vouchers to a free meal at the local restaurant.

The Student with the winning quote was Nikhil Gohel a student of Abbey Primary School, and a member of the Good Values Club, Leicester.

Hasmita Parmar "Teacher" & Mr Kumar from Leicester "Good Values Club" were very helpful with making this competition possible. They helped organise and coordinate the competition in a very short period of time.

We are in the process of getting a one off gold coin manufactured along side replica bronze medals of the coin, which will be available for sale to the general public to purchase very soon.

By Upesh Chauhan
The Trophy Parlour, Leicester

 

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“Living the Values 2009”

Another fun-filled, inspiring and motivating day was spent at Abbey School, who hosted this National Day for the second year running and is now a recognised “Partnership School” with BISSE (British Institute of Sathya Sai Education). I could not help but notice the total commitment to using the SSEHV programme, as it was so evident throughout the school and in the manner of the children who were happy, polite and helpful.

Once again the school had been beautifully decorated and showed the care and pride that they all take in their school, events & festivals. The atmosphere within the school was of peace with gentle background music playing.

The day got off to a good start with a lovingly prepared healthy breakfast, which had a wide array of nourishing food and fruits for all to enjoy - especially for those having travelled some distance to join us.

During this time Dipak Fakey was leading the members of the “Good Values Club” through their regular ‘Silent Sitting’ exercise. This also gave others an opportunity to experience this significant part of the SSEHV programme.

We were then given a further feast for us all to digest throughout the day. The full programme promoted, illustrated and demonstrated the ways that the Human Values are put into practice in our lives as well as within our current education system.

Carole Alderman, Director of BISSE – gave a welcoming introductory speech celebrating the progress and developments of the past year. She also gave a glowing synopsis of our host – Tim Foster – Head Master of Abbey who through his dedication and focused career had been able to raise the school’s ratings from 50th place to one of the top 10 now! He had initiated many innovations such as their now very successful cricket team. He is also Executive Head of 3 schools in the area – so the values are alive and growing!

Tim Foster took on the role of ‘Master of Ceremonies’ for the day. Through his positive, animated and ‘up-beat’ repartee he made the day entertaining and inspiring. He focused on what was so evidently paramount to him – the future welfare of our children’s educational needs and how we can best meet them at all levels. Each speaker was given a full and in depth introduction by Tim giving a background of the person speaking.

Firstly the Deputy Lord Major of Leicester and Governor honoured us with her presence to officially open the day by ‘Lighting the Lamp’ and spoke to us of her own personal experiences. She expressed her own passion for the need for human values today and the positive impact it has had on the community. She thanked everyone for ‘taking this programme forward’, for ‘the shared vision’, ‘ the volunteers’ and the ‘future role models’.

Rosemary Marron, director of ISSE in Ireland for over 10 years, with a background of training in mainstream education and research; gave us a most interesting insight into the historical and analytical perspective of EHV. I am hoping a transcript of which will be circulated, so more people will have the benefit of her talk in full, which needs to be given justice by digesting it slowly with all the facts that she has so diligently researched and eloquently compiled. There were so many pearls of wisdom and aspects discussed within her presentation worth re-visiting and giving us much ‘food for thought’.

Tim put us through a couple of ‘brain gym’ exercises during the day – taken from ‘Accelerated Learning’ training -which is regularly used in the school, great fun even if some of us ‘more mature ones’ need more practice!

A group of the pupils - mostly 8 year olds - then put on a wonderful play “I Didn’t Think” with apparently only one week’s rehearsal, which we would have not known by their confident performances clearly putting the message intended across to all.

Following the break two young pupils of 7 & 10 stood up and gave ‘testimonials’ with an air of confidence.

Anita Jethwani, who teachers in London, told us of her journey with SSEHV having started out in banking and found her true vocation within the community. She told us that in London there were around 250 languages being spoken and she had felt that ‘there was the need for the language of the heart’ too, which led her onto teaching. She demonstrated using a lesson plan and told us of the amazing effects that 3 minutes a day using silent sitting exercise had had on her class of ‘excluded’ children with behavioural problems. This class was later chosen as an example of ‘good behaviour’ by the authorities! This showed us the practical use and benefits found within the children. She mentioned a glowing report from OFSTED who had acknowledged the improvements being due “to secure spirituality” being in place. Her talk ended with a delightful Universal prayer.

We were then entertained by some rousing songs all of which emphasised human values before enjoying a very tasty lunch, which had been kindly provided by Region 4 of the Sri Sathya Sai Service Organisation UK. This was also a time to catch up with colleagues, network and meet new people also interested in promoting SSEHV.

In the afternoon we had the formal presentation of the confirmation of the “Partnership School” with a certificate and accompanying plaque. The Training Team from BISSE then presented certificates to those who had completed the up-dated Level One Diploma course in SSEHV this year as a way to ‘acknowledge publicly their work and commitment’.

We then had another rousing musical interlude where Renu Gidoomal talked of ‘fusing secular and spirituality’ into her tours and led us through several songs together - which despite the ‘technical hiccups’ were thoroughly enjoyed by both young and old – leaving us wanting more…

Two parents gave touching and sincere testimonials, which were so obviously ‘from the heart’ expounding the benefits experienced in their families.

Jiten Patel – Training Team leader in BISSE - led us all through an interactive session where everyone enthusiastically participated making animals out of foil to depict a value –as well as being enjoyable we were being reminded what it were like to be children again and that ‘we were leaving a legacy for the future’.

The next play was an adaptation by the children, using SEAL material and focusing on positive transformation. It carried a serious message about bullying and how to find constructive resolution – the children made it real and portrayed the intended messages well within their acting.

The day was finally brought to a close – all too soon. We were reminded of the day’s events linking each one to the theme of the day “Living the Values” and that by putting these precious values that we each hold within us into practice we can work together for a better world.

It was a wonderful day and I am so excited by the progress and impressed by what the children are achieving at Abby Primary School and the potential for the future of SSEHV - I look forward to the next event…. bring it on!

By Juliet Bell

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