Summer Stories, the Ira way

   This pic was taken when she was creating a space for her Videos. Her little nook. 

Summer has come and gone. It was another lockdown summer. 

The things on our mind were what could we do to keep our little human being busy, not fill her day with tasks but was there something new that she hadn't done before. 

Ira loves unstructured play and can play for hours by herself with her superhero figurines and blocks. She loves to draw and paint too and yes, day dream happily, lost in her own world. 

Mamma began her search and was bombarded with lots of summer camp information, some of them asked us to register and then bombarded with whatsapp messages, some had the usual art, craft, no fire cooking etc. Many camps on coding, programming etc. Theatre and drama camps seemed enticing too. This was a paradox of choices, honestly. 

In this myriad of searches, I came across a camp on Micromastery by Ryan Chadha of Jigyasa Academy. What was interesting was not just the fact that the camp had an information poster but he had written a blog talking about the concept and how it will help children. Micromastery was about learning microskills, small things that you practice and practice till you get really good at it. 

The camp that spanned over four weeks helped the children develop a variety of microskills like open mic poetry- writing your own song and rapping, public speaking and creating dialogues and role plays, doodling and zentangle, juggling and card tricks, making some snacks like truffle pudding, fruit mocktail and swizz rolls, and also being introduced to Japanese, along with making a brush robot! 

What she learnt beyond these microskills:

• Ira was homeschooled the previous year and this online mode of learning with a group of children was a whole new experience. 
• She was thrilled with how zoom worked and the breakout rooms. She had only used google meet to chat with friends before.
• Working in a team with other children and creating something new. 
• Listening to different ideas and appreciating them. 
• Understanding the importance of practicing what she learnt. For days, every evening she would want to juggle or just roll and tumble. Papa and Ir a learnt a lot of card tricks and evey little card had doodles and zentangles. 
• She also diligently would say, Excuse me and ask her questions. Thanks to Malu for teaching her this really really young. 

Amidst all the boisterousness, chaos, laughter and learning, the weeks flew by. 

During this time, Ira was also covid positive and the camp and interacting with the children really helped her get through those quarantined days. 

May turned out to open up a whole new world for Ira with Ryan introducing a camp where she learnt to do podcasts on Anchor and also Canva, where she designed posters and cards. She also learnt to make YouTube videos. Papa,who was her in-house teacher for this camp, in his enthusiasm got her a lapel mike and a gorilla tripod. Our girl was thrilled and made random videos for personal consumption. 

What we discovered about Ira from this camp:

• She likes to do anything that is creative and also, has a knack to do podcasts. 
• She has been writing her own songs and poems but this camp helped her hone her writing skills. Of course, Mamma or Papa helped her type out some of the scripts as she dictated the main ideas and then we worked to do the final edits together. 
• She has a strong idea of what she wants and will do it exactly that way. The element of Independence and autonomy just found another avenue of expression. 

As she turned 7 end of the month, she also described herself as an upcoming artist and podcaster! 

Apart from these two camps, we also learnt some chess and warli painting; and our biggest Summer discovery was Wendy Mac. Like WM says, " Whatever you draw is perfect!" 

What we learnt as parents:

• There is so much happening around and we don't have to do it all, and neither do our little human beings. 
• Do not fill the day with activities. They don't need a timetabled existence. Life is hard enough, given the pandemic. 
• Let them have time to do nothing. 
• It is absolutely fine to be bored. 
• Accept meltdown the way you accept an interested learner. 
• Accept the high activity moments and the slumber moments. 
• Choose activities that the child would like to engage in. 
• And finally, every engagement is not about 'what next', but also about enjoying the experience. 

A big shout out to Ryan and his team for a very well curated camp, to the numerous teachers online on various learning platforms who have their unique ways to engage kids and finally to Wendy Mac, for ensuring many moments of self affirmations with every little thing they draw, be it a guitar, a lighthouse or a cheese toast. 

So, to new learning, discovering self through all things creative, embracing new identities and having fun doing it all. To many more summer stories to come every year. 

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