Sharmila Deo

Environment Education Programme in the Bhimashankar Wild Life Sanctuary area

LocationCountryCategoriesDate
Bhimashankar, MaharashtraIndiaEducation, Indian Sub-continent12 Aug 2008

The main activities planned for this project are:

i) Ten environment education workshops (four in Phase 1,six in Phase 2 which is the second year) will be conducted in two schools to cover about 150-250 students of classes 7 and 8. These workshops will be conducted by specially appointed environment educators. Knowledge base on issues pertaining to the conservation of BWLS and its biodiversity will be strengthened.

ii)Activities at primary and upper school levels will be conducted. The activities will be specific to the local context, and appropriate educational aids will be developed. The activities will be child centered, and will include indoor and outdoor games, art and craft, theatre, nature walks, film screenings etc. As far as possible, curricular links will be drawn.

iii) Development of relevant and local educational material. An information kit consisting of various educational aids e.g posters, cards, worksheets, booklets, games etc linked to content will be developed for students to be used during workshops. Schools will be encouraged to make these accessible to students to enhance their interest and learning. The material production will be in the local language as that is the medium being used in schools in the area.

iv) Identifying and training two people from the area as local environment educators. Preliminary talks are on with Maharashtra Arogya Mandal (MAM, an NGO that has worked in the area for many years) for help with identifying the environment educators, as well as exploring possible collaborations that will strengthen the programme. The training of educators will happen before each workshop and on the job during the workshops They will be trained on the thematic areas of the workshop as well as on how to conduct the workshop.

For more information contact sharmiladeo@gmail.com or go to www.kalpavriksh.org

Project Update: September 2008

As you are aware the project, though officially started in April 2008, we had started the exploratory phase in September 2007.

In the initial field visit, our first task was to get permissions from the Tribal Department for the programme. After that we had discussions with a locally based NGO, Maharashtra Arogya Mandal (MAM) and firmed up our collaboration.

Jointly, MAM and we decided the schools to work in, and had meetings with the school authorities.

In January, we got a small funding from Concern India to support the exploratory work, which saw us through till March-end.

In this period we had meetings with several persons based in Pune, whose inputs have been and will be useful in developing the programme. A lot of content was worked out with the team members.
We also identified the local educators who we have begun training for the workshops. An educator workshop was held at Pune, to strengthen their knowledge base on some of the issues.

We received confirmation from Concern India that they would part fund our programme for a year.
IN MORE DETAIL:-The first school workshop took place at Terungun Ashram school on 23rd of July 08. After an introduction about the programme and us, we started the first session with a discussion on urban and rural environment, location of Bhimashankar, types of forests in India and types of forests of Bhimashankar. The posters developed for this activity were circulated among the children.

This was followed by a game on "Tailing the Shekru".

After all the children had a round of pinning the tail, there was a discussion on the 'Shekru' or the Giant Squirrel regarding its food habits, nesting, length of its tail, its status as a State animal etc.

A craft activity 'Leaf Zoo' was then organized where groups of children collected various types of leaves from their surroundings, and made animal collages on artsheets. Before sticking the leaves, there were some observations made on the leaves regarding their shape, colour, texture, etc to impress upon the children the diversity found in just a small area in the school's vicinity.

On the 24th of July 08, the workshop was conducted at Tokawade Ashram school.

The introduction, 'Tailing the Shekru' game and 'Forest types' were already conducted in a prior visit, and we started the session with a recapitulation of the session conducted earlier.

It was then followed by the 'Insect Game' played in groups of 8 students. The cards developed for this activity were used.

After the game, there was a discussion on insects, linking it to each species having their own niche in nature, and the various food chains that exist in nature. The concept of interdependence of species on biotic and abiotic factors was also explained in this session.

The 'Leaf Zoo' activity was conducted after which the workshop ended.


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