On the second day we arrived early at Mathru School, Yelahanka. On account of it being children's day the teachers were taking the children to a near by park so that they could play. They had planned a few activities like running races and the like.
The children had formed a continuous chain which was lead by a few of the faculty toward the park. All the children were barefoot. I was slightly stumped by this observation as I thought the ground and road must have been quite hot. On asking the teachers, they told me that they had asked the children to do this since they wanted to them to experience the textures to and from the park and making the students stay barefoot was an easy way to do the same. I decided that I would do the same at a later point and was quite surprised to find that the ground at the park was pretty cold, even under the harshest sun.
On going to the park the teachers took the children for a round on the inside of the park. Then they were taken to the playground where once they were acclimatised the teachers started the activities. The activities have been enumerated by Rashmi in her post, so I won't repeat them again. I would however like to enumerate certain observations that I made-
1. Some of the totally blind children had less inhibitions than the partially blind children. I saw that during the running races the children who were completely blind tended to run with more abandon than the children who were partially blind. (this was not true of all the children)
2. In the running races the children started out running in straight lines in the general direction of the sound and then they started running towards the person when they were about 20m.
3. During the in and out games, Shaurya added an element of turning either Left or Right based on what he shouted out. It was interesting to see that even though the children had turned left or right their spatial sense allowed them to still jump backwards and forwards while facing the front.
These activities were an unforeseen trove of information. We learned so much about the limitations of the visually impaired and understood other aspects of how they experience through their other senses. The children were also a delight to play with.
On going to the park the teachers took the children for a round on the inside of the park. Then they were taken to the playground where once they were acclimatised the teachers started the activities. The activities have been enumerated by Rashmi in her post, so I won't repeat them again. I would however like to enumerate certain observations that I made-
1. Some of the totally blind children had less inhibitions than the partially blind children. I saw that during the running races the children who were completely blind tended to run with more abandon than the children who were partially blind. (this was not true of all the children)
2. In the running races the children started out running in straight lines in the general direction of the sound and then they started running towards the person when they were about 20m.
3. During the in and out games, Shaurya added an element of turning either Left or Right based on what he shouted out. It was interesting to see that even though the children had turned left or right their spatial sense allowed them to still jump backwards and forwards while facing the front.
These activities were an unforeseen trove of information. We learned so much about the limitations of the visually impaired and understood other aspects of how they experience through their other senses. The children were also a delight to play with.
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