"Life is pretty simple: You do some stuff. Most fails. Some works. You do more of what works. If it works big, others quickly copy it. Then you do something else. The trick is the doing something else."
...Leonardo da Vinci
V-Excel News
Dr. Vasudha Prakash was invited as a speaker for TEDx. Created in the spirit of TED's mission, "ideas worth spreading", the TEDx program is designed to give an opportunity to local communities to stimulate dialogue with achievers. In her talk on 'The Journey of an Impulse' she emphasized on how important it is to keep our dreams alive and to ensure that hurdles do not stop us from converting these into a reality. The event was conducted on 21st July at GRT Meriden Hotel in Chennai and was organized by SVCE, Sri Venkateshwara Engineering College.
The Hobby Club Photography class took place in the Mandaveli School. Children from Clarke School, Vocational Unit and our special school, participated in the social awareness photo shoot. One of our volunteers Mr.Manivannan who organized the session took children out of the campus and asked them to take pictures of different things on the streets. The pictures can be seen on the V-Excel facebook page. http://www.facebook.com/vexceleducationaltrust
We had five interns through AIESEC volunteer network from China, Russia, Hong Kong, and Europe. The students of our Center were engaged in a lot of activities, new games, singing and dancing with the interns. Some of our older children enjoyed learning a new language Chinese and diligently practiced making some of the symbols taught. For the interns it was an all new experience being with special children. They unanimously felt that they had learnt a lot in the course of their interactions with our children.
Kaleisdoscope Learning Centre
13th July, the 'Water Day', has become an annual July event where the children and teachers play with water and beat the Chennai heat for at least two hours on that day. Sensory experiences such as these are also a whole school free play event and the non-directed, non-goal oriented experience lends itself to a natural, holistic, enjoyable, social and interactive session. One wonders where disability disappears when fun is the medium of interaction.
18th-23rd July was showcased as 'animal week' in KLC. In the 2-3 pm session, all classes participated and demonstrated animal stories, animal rhymes, animal walks, played animal races and dressed up as animals. This year we have planned a theme week every term - animals and their study was a common topic through the grades.
Grade 5 concluded the study of Persian civilization by celebrating on the 25th. Children came dressed in different Persian headgear, cooked Persian snacks and enjoyed Persian music and dance. Kindergarten and Grade 1 had a day out at the beach while Grade 3 and 5 visited the Theosophical Society on 26th July.
Ankit Bhootra, a student of Upper Grade 4 was chosen to be trained for a basketball tournament. Bhuvan from Grade 2 was this month's child study and the teachers had in-service training conducted by Parimal, Puja and John.
Children of various classes visited the Sringeri Mutt Jagadguru Shankaracharya Sri Sri Bharati Tirtha Mahaswamiji in batches throughout the week to seek his blessings.
Academy for Teacher Excellence
The Counseling Course started on the first Saturday of the month. This is our second batch for the Level One course. We have about ten students in this batch. We are planning to launch our Level Two Counseling course shortly which will address advanced counseling concepts and techniques.
We conducted a full day workshop for their teacher of Dhanalakshmi School. We divided the group into three - primary, middle school and secondary - and had different facilitators for each. We covered some common ones and some grade-specific ones for all the teachers. It was a very nice experience doing this unique workshop for a 99-year old school.
Under our corporate training workshops, Dr. Vasudha and Parimal, our Counseling Department Head, went to Kolkatta to conduct a workshop on 'Guilt Free Parenting' for a corporate. This was our first experience to conduct an all fathers group. Two young men who were not even married also attended it just to understand what it entails!
Early Intervention Unit
The month of July has been a month for inducting new children into Early Intervention program. We design and formulate individual development plan for each child, depending on their age, development stage, lag/condition and its severity.
We have been receiving young children with Cerebral Palsy. However, given the increase in their number, we are now working on commencing a special class room for these children.
Children come to our Unit as infants, toddlers or at a very young age. We thus lay emphasis and focus on intense parent training for activities of daily living and feeding techniques.
Play, an essential part of childhood has many advantages. Aside from the fact that it is enjoyable, it serves as an effective tool for communication with children. Recognizing this, we have incorporated it in their programs from this term
V-Excel Satellite Centres
The enrolments are increasing at both our Tirunelveli and Nashik satellite centers. In these places since many parents are not aware of the children's conditions we need to invest a lot of time hand-holding them and training them on ways to work with their child.
We had done assessments of a few new students in Tirunelveli. A parent meeting was also conducted to brief them of our services and programs.
Music does wonders with its universal appeal, especially for children with special needs since it has a calming effect and we have found a teacher at our Nashik Center to teach music to our children. We are planning to have music classes on Mondays and Fridays from 5 p.m. to 6 p.m.
V-Excel Remedial Centre
The highlight of July month was the group session conducted by us for VRC children on 14th July. We had planned many activities, games, action songs and all the children participated with great enthusiasm. The session aimed at reinforcing their remedial learning and motivating them through fun activities.
This was a busy month at VRC. We completed assessments for three children and met the parents to explain the assessment findings and to discuss their future program. We conducted review meetings with parents of three existing children to discuss the children's progress and get their feedback on changes they had observed with respect to their child.
We are working with a few children with Autism and ADHD in the morning sessions. Our main focus is on their sitting tolerance and school readiness skills, both very crucial for their overall development.
While the afternoon session has predominantly children with LD problems such as Dyslexia, we also have a few children in the Autism Spectrum who are attending other schools but come to us in the evenings for remedial classes.
Our computer teacher and special educator Latha Kannan has started working with Shankaran, one of our oldest students with Down Syndrome. She takes computer classes and teaches him data entry operations.
One of our Counselors has started counseling for parents of a new child. We intend to offer this service to parents who we feel may benefit from it.
Sudha Sukumaran who completed LD course with us has joined as part time remedial teacher. We welcome her aboard to join our team.
Rural Outreach Program
Under the government's Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan program, we have been covering the Villipuram district of Tamil Nadu and serving over 4000 special children in the region. Since the schools have begun in full swing, our special educators have been busy working with the regular teachers and guiding them to work with children with difficulties in the classroom.
The Resource Rooms and Day Care Centers have also begun to see a better attendance of children from this month.
Vocational Training Unit
One of our successes has been a VTU student, who underwent training in external therapy from our specialist. She has now learnt the art of foot massage and foot bath. From July 2nd week this student has graduated a level. It gives us joy to see how she has become independent and can single-handedly do therapy for the other students.
All VTU trainees, staff and volunteers had gone to seek blessings of Sringeri Sharadha Swamigal. They were well received by the Mutt volunteers and were taken excellent care of. Aditi, one of our students was given an opportunity to sing before the goddess.
The VTU received an order for terracotta masks, Warli painting and key bags from Svanubhava Trust. The students were extremely busy executing the order. The finished products were extremely beautiful and were appreciated by one and all!
Parent support group has moved one step ahead. A few like-minded parents have got together for a preliminary meeting with our Founder-Director Dr. Vasudha with a business plan to see how they can work together for to secure their children's future.
Counseling and Assessment Unit
We started our parent art therapy group on Tuesdays. The response of parents to all the activities was very touching and we saw all of them really letting go and become children themselves again. We also had art in-service program for our teachers and therapists.
We started our parent counseling sessions for this year in KLC, VRC and VTU. As a practice, we meet the respective teachers before and after the counseling session. These meetings with teachers are very important in getting the holistic picture of the child and class and teacher.
Two of our counselors conducted a session for the new parents of KLC about independence skills, managing tantrums, following rhythm and routine, and how to train children in self help skills. This goes a long way in their ability to handle their child in home situations.
The Counseling desk at the corporates is gathering momentum as more and more people are coming forth and sharing their issues in confidence. This is a manifestation of their comfort with our counselors and we are glad to be able to support the associates.
Contact Information
V-Excel Educational Trust
#1 Norton 2nd Street
Mandaveli Chennai 600 028
Tel: 91 - 44 - 24620243
91 - 44 - 24956373 E-mail us or visit us at www.v-excel.org
V-Excel Center for Research and Rehabilitation
(In assocation with S.V. Sarada Foundation)
50 Sreyes, M.G. Road
Shastri Nagar, Chennai 600 041
Tel: 91 - 44 - 24522061
91 - 44 - 24521986 E-mail us
Academic Concepts, Inc.
1403 Merrywood Drive
Edison New Jersey 08817
Tel: (732) 572-3748
Tax ID: 22-3632715 E-mail us
