Summer camp for kids from the slum
Rather than write a blog with the audience in mind, we thought we would share a glimpse of this superb summer camp Viji, Varun and team are running and in the process providing opportunities for the numerous volunteers and the kids from the slum alike.
See the fun they are having.
And that’s how they steal a bone!
Hi All!
Here is a quick summary of the summer camp progress:
- On Sunday, April 13th a bunch of volunteers talked to parents and signed up 29 children from the slums behind Unity Park for the summer camp. They are in the 5-13 age group. The list of children can be found here.
- We have 24 volunteers in our group of which 8 are children.The list of volunteers can be found here. Given the erratic summer schedules of the volunteers, we decided to gather the volunteers we can find for any given slot and conduct the camp at the school. Currently, it looks like we can conduct the camp on a few weekday mornings and on weekends mornings and evenings. We need to ensure that each volunteer group that comes together has at least one Kannada speaker, one adult and one woman – can be the same person. We need to have a minimum of 2 volunteers for any given slot. Rather than group the children by age-groups, we decided to conduct the camp for all the children who are available and group them if needed, during the activity. The volunteers availability will be checked using WhatsApp. I am hoping that the camp schedule gets a little more organized next week.
- We have access to the school’s open corridors, grounds, library and locked corridor. We do not have toilet access. Keys to the locked areas will need to be collected from me and returned back to me. School property needs to be maintained with care. My address is in the signature. We can also have a maid clean up the place once we fix the timings.
- Food – We are looking to provide bottled juice and biscuits to the children during their camp. The food will be sponsored by the Rotary Club of Bangalore IT Corridor. To reduce plastic waste, we plan to use steel cups and 2 liter juice bottles. All food receipts will need to be submitted to me and I will fund it and have Rotary reimburse me.
- Activities -The list is here. Please keep the activities very simple. For example, the Simon Says game using the ‘Uppi Dada‘ character fell flat with the children but a very simple Heeee-Haaaa game that Ramya devised was a big hit!
- Kannada phrases – Viji Iyer and Medha have created a list of Kannada phrases you should know. The list is here.
- Recap of your session – Please fill in this spreadsheet as soon as possible after your session. We will use this to capture our feedback and learn from it. Please take pictures of your session and post on WhatsApp or in a new folder on the Google Drive. I can help with that.
I am excited about the camp starting real soon – It looks like we may be able to do a soccer session with the kids this Friday morning from 9-11 AM!
Best Regards
Viji Vennelakanti
9535641414