NewsletterVol : 0905

Introduction.....

www.fountainheadschools.org, email- surat@fountainheadschools.org,blog-fountainheadschools.blogspot.com

MELAMELA

Come..See..Get conquered.. said the invite.....

Our efforts to continuously learn

and evolve saw Vardan

and Ankita along with teachers

Runa Nath, Hasina Saifee and

Sanjana Amarnani attending

PYP – Regional Workshops at

Mumbai. The focus of these

workshops was the ‘Written

Curriculum’ and ‘PYP in the 3-5

years’. Zahabiyah Shaikhmahmood,

Grade 1 class teacher, attended

a workshop, ‘Connecting up the

brain, body and emotions in the

learning process’, organized

by DPS –Tapi.

We are also happy to announce, that we are having our Pre-authorization visit, by IBO

officials, on the 7th and 8th of December. This visit is an important one in our jouney

towards becoming an authorised PYP school. Well, more news of happenings at school

waiting for you in the following pages. Enjoy yourselves.

Happy Reading!

festive season. Embroidery artists

also gave a brilliant display of their

work for which Surat is known for.

Apart from these artists from outside,

Fountainhead School had some

great artists among its staff who

displayed their creative side with

demonstrations of warli painting,

origami, nail art, mehndi, tattooing,

rangoli etc. Works of the visiting

artists and the creative

CREATIVE

Dear friends,

Vacations are over, students are back

and we are back, with one more edition

of our newsletter coming to you. We

have hoards of news about happenings

at our school, field trips and other events.

Various activities related to our UOIs,

Maths and English were conducted and

along with these, we also celebrated

Navratri, Hindi Week, Gujarati Week

and organized an Art Mela.

The Dangs Trip organized for the 3rd,

4th, 5th and 6th was thoroughly

enjoyed by the students and teachers

alike. The ‘PRAYAS’ team needs to be

appreciated for making all the

arrangements and making the effort to

bring the people and nature together.

They have been involved in various

activities at school and enjoy interacting

with students.

Noble, Vairagi and Raguveer had

organized a splash painting activity

for the students where they would use

leaves, spoons and brushes to splash

paints onto a plain surface. It truly was

an activity that students thoroughly

enjoyed. Kinjal Shah with her rangoli

designs gave a lot of ideas for the coming

Gowri

It was an invitation to a “Creative Mela”

held at the city’s Fountainhead School.

It sure was a mela, but with a dif ference.

Various artists from the city had been

invited to share their talent with the

students & guests and they also had a

fabulous display of their creations.

Tejas Danecha’s pencil sketches were

awesome and so were the water colours

by Naisargi Dave. Ankur Desai and

Jwalant Patel with their sculptures and

Maharshee with his clay modelling were

very inspiring. Tejas Shah’s caricature

drawing was enjoyed by all. Stela Patel

and Swati Vachhani encouraged the

students to be part of their Kutch art

display.

Creative mela

Decision making

Air all around

My big book of school

Connecting with nature

Machine making life Easier or Difficult

Exhibition

Share the planet

Health and Hygiene

Experience to share

Marketplace

Let’s enjoy the weather

Nation Reading

works of the students were on

display. There was also a display

of paintings on Gandhiji. There

was a talent corner where

parents, visitors and their

guests could try their hand at

sketching and painting. It was the

first of its kind held at the school

and it promises many more to

come.

Gowri

Air….Air….Air…. all around us!

Grade-1 teachers.

Creative Mela

My big book of school.....

During the activity they came to know not only about the

work done by the school’s staff but also they came to

know about their daily routine and how they are balancing

their life style. Thereafter students made a book with all

the interaction done by them and they presented in front

of the class (individually) We believe what makes

Students have shown great persistence in

learning and have always been active to take

part in inquiry. Our 2nd unit was “My school”

in which they have learnt not only about

the school but also about the people of the

school. We had done an activity called

‘guest speaker’ in which some of our school

people came and student were interacted

with them. The activity evolved into a

wonderful age-appropriate and spontaneous

discussion on caring for their own

school and it’s people.

holding a big news paper and then

discovered “ when we are going along

with the air, the paper is flying and when

we go against the wind, air is pushing

the paper”.

With the guidance of teacher, students

made pinwheel, paper plane and sail

boats and observed how some shapes

moved faster. Students performed all

the given experiments very

enthusiastically and made inquiries

about it. At the end of the unit the

students had with them answers on

various applications of air such as

jumping bags, glider, pichkari, hot air

balloons and sailing boats etc and this

was an evidence of their understanding

about the different properties of air and

its related applications.

The teacher of grade 1 had to start

a new unit of inquiry and to “tune in”

the students, filled the

classroom with objects which

displayed varied properties and

applications of air. After entering the

room, children got excited to see

different air toys, flute, whistles,

bubbles etc and started playing with

them. After sometime, they started

inquiring as to why those things have

been kept in their classroom. Then

one of them pointed out that all the

things have relation with “hawa”.

After that inquiry started, aided by

the questions put forth to them by the

teachers. To see how air pushes and pulls

things they ran in the school campus

The students of Grade 5 presented a

short skit to explain the “Steps to make a Decision”

& put up displays on “Tips to

” & “How to take a

decision under pressure”. The skit was enjoyed by all

students and the teachers found the “Tips” & “Decision under pressure”

especially useful.

make a Decision

DO YOU KNOW HOW TO MAKE A DECISION?????

meaningful context and therefore everybody wins.

this style of education work is that

it plays to a child’s strengths in a

Runa (Nursery Light)

The students of Grade 5 presented a

short skit to explain the “Steps to make

a Decision” & put up displays on “Tips to

make a Decision” & “How to take a

decision under pressure”. The skit was

enjoyed by all students and the teachers

found the “Tips” & “Decision under pressure”

especially useful.

Well, Grade 5 can teach you how & they

did exactly that on Friday the 13th of

November. Decision Making encompasses

all age groups , gender & class of people.

It involves reasoning & analysis of situations

& therefore considered important enough to

include in our UOI-Who we are?

Grade 5

27th November 2009- it was a day when

Fountainhead School, Surat joined

schools all across the country to

celebrate reading as a pleasurable and

enriching activity and the best part of this

event organized by Scholastic India was

that it had a noble cause attached to it.

Right from Nursery to Grade 6, the whole

of Fountainhead School joined hands to

be a part of this event. All the students

took the reading pledge (beautifully penned

by Gulzar) followed by a string of interesting

activities where we had the children

listening ardently to read- aloud sessions

and thereafter putting down their reflections

in the form of drawings; performing dramas

based on the attributes of the learner

profile; teachers putting up a puppet show

for the younger ones; students being part

of reader's theater where they showcased

their artistic capabilities by delivering

dialogues complete with expressions and

voice modulations; students having a

One Nation Reading Together 2009.....

reading game which had the element of

developing listening skills along with

having lots of excitement and fun;

students trying to identify verbs, nouns, etc

while reading a passage; preparing posters

highlighting the innumerable advantages

Monica

and joy that come along with the reading

of a book; compiling various stories

written by the children themselves; making

bookmarks and it was such a pleasure to

see that students could identify the

different genres of literature and prepared

bookmarks according to genres, for e.g.

a horror story had a bookmark with a

danger sign on it.

It has been a wonderful and great

experience for Fountainhead School to be a

part of this event where one such act of ours

is in turn going to help so many needy

children have access to the reading of books

and benefit from the same. We certainly

look forward to being a part of such noble

events in future as well.!

Our grade 6 students experienced

this when they had been on a Nature

Camp to the Dangs Forest. The

camp was organized by the

‘PRAYAS TEAM’ and the whole trip

was truly a very enriching one.

The children also learnt to manage

things on their own and be organized &

disciplined. They tried to be as close as

they could to the nature. The children

were very particular in keeping the

surroundings clean, used salt in place

of toothpaste, avoided the use of

detergents and it was so nice to see

them doing everything without cribbing.

connecting with nature.....

To sum it all, it was a great exposure for

everyone – students as well as teachers,

and we would certainly like to thank &

appreciate the ‘Prayas Team’ who looked

after every detail with precision, be it the

students’ learning, entertainment, security,

food and other requirements and made it

a memorable event for all of us.

Ever explored the breathtaking world

of nature?! It’s amazing to discover

that nature not only mesmerizes us

with its enthralling beauty but at the

same time, if given a thought, teaches

us ‘the way to live life’.

Just have a look at the rivers,

mountains, the trees, the animals,

the birds……and you can feel that

each component of the nature has a

specific purpose (aim in life), a

systematic and organized way to work

(discipline), everything complements

each other to work in harmony and

maintain the ecological balance

(team work & synergy) each

component so important to the ecology

& each one giving so much (making

you feel humble) & asking only for

UNDERSTANDING THEIR

IMPORTANCE. Isn’t that simply great!!

Students of Grade 5th & Grade 6th did a

commendable job when they gave support

to the 200 years old tree in the Dangs by

laying boulders around it – their way of

giving back to the nature. The star gazing

activity through the telescope was something

that thrilled the children. They all were quite

excited to see the moons of the planet

Jupiter. Their day would start with exercising

& jogging early in the morning and end with

having lots of fun. The children will definitely

remember ‘HONOLULU BABA’ which had

them in splits of laughter and will agree that

the experience they had in Gira river can

anytime beat the water parks we have.

The children had many experiences

ranging from learning to entertainment.

At one time they were trekking to find

out the source of the river Gira and next

they were out to reach the top of the peak

& have the exotic view of the Saputara

Ranges and Dangs Forest.

Monica (Grade 6)

Machines-making life Easier or Difficult ???We started the unit with the tuning-in activity

of provocation table, where we kept a large

number of objects like juicer-mixer, skates,

ladder, spoon, bat etc. The students used

their thought process to inquire the relation

between all the objects that they explored

and this activity tuned them for the unit.

The students had fun in their learning about

the concepts of gravity and friction, with the

help of monkey bars and slides in the Jungle

gym.

“ We have developed machines to make

our lives easier. “ was the central idea of

the last unit taken by Grade-3. But,

somehow we teachers felt that this unit

will make students’ life difficult ! The

reason behind it, was that we have to

teach our LITTLE ones the HUGE

concepts of simple machines, friction

and gravity. So, we decided to make it

interesting for them and their life easier !

The workstation activity for understanding

levers, provided them with hands on

experience and even helped them in

understanding the different classes of

lever. Students gave a very enthusiastic

and overwhelming response to the cart

and winch making activity. The list of

learning experiences in this unit was a

long one but we would like to mention

a few. They were: screw inspectors,

work-relay games, interviewing school

workers, making 3D-models of simple

machines, making lemonade and viewing

videos about complex machines.

Overall this unit, made the students and

the teachers, THINKERS and this unit

was so much enjoyed by the students

that even after completion of this unit,

whenever they come across any machine,

they identify the simple machines in them.

paintings, baskets from Africa, and a variety

of masks, all from different places around

the world. The students had good exposure

to different forms of art forms.

The visit to the exhibition was a new

experience for most of the children and

a good eye-opener into our incredible

world of Art.

This was the theme of an exhibition held

by Grade 5, on the 13th of Friday, in

November. The exhibition showcased

our Ecosystem; its biotic & abiotic factors,

its biomes, water biomes, trophic levels,

food chains & food webs. The exhibition

was well attended & the interest shown

by the visiting students was excellent. It

was of special interest to Sr.K.G.

students as they have a connected UOI

on “Habitats”.

Grade 2

Smriti Arora (Grade 3)

An added attraction to the exhibition was

an art activity for the visitors. The

Pre-primary students coloured lots of leaves,

fruits, butterflies, caterpillars, crabs, fishes,

sea-anemones, etc. while Grade 1 & 2 had

to draw any living thing of their choice.

Grade 3, 4 & 6 had to write a slogan or

draw a picture about conservation. The

teachers too drew lot of pictures with

messages on conservation.

Thota Vaikuntam’s paintings centered

around the traditional South Indian people.

The children explored the bright colours

and pictures of animals in the paintings

of Amit Ambalal. They connected Jogan

Chowdhury’s painting to Aboriginal

art, as he too used circles and dots in his

work. Following the art exhibition, we

visited the home of Anuradha Viswanath

(our librarian) to view her impressive

collection of art. She showed her

assorted pieces of pottery,

There was an art exhibition held at the

Regent Mall where displays of artwork

from a range of Indian Contemporary

artists were put up. Grade 2, as part of

their UOI –“Through the arts people use

different forms of expression to convey

their uniqueness as human beings”, had

an interesting and informative visit.

Paintings of different artists like Shri

Haku Shah, S.H.Raza, Thotha Vaikuntam,

Manu Parekh, Amit Ambalal,

K.G. Subramanyam, Jogan Chowdhary

etc were displayed. The children got to

explore areas of interest of each

artist’s work, and came up with their

own perspectives as to why a painting

was done in that particular way.

S.H. Raza’s work is mostly based on

abstract and geometrical patterns.

“HOW WE SHARE THE PLANET?”

Visit to Art exhibition......

Gowri (Grade 5)

The drawings across the age groups

were excellent & were put out on display

in the assembly for all to see.

This exhibition was truly a learning

experience for the Grade 5 students

as they were fully involved in the

preparation, presentation & winding up

activities related to the event. The

responsibility with which the art activity

was conducted, especially the organising

of students in groups, distribution of

papers & colours, coaxing & encouraging

the younger students to colour, collection

of material right up to the return of all art

material to the relevant department needs

to be appreciated. “Hats off” to the

students of grade 5 for a job well done.

The students also mentioned that apart from educating others they too had an opportunity to learn a thing or two from the younger students.

Truly, the opportunities to learn never cease to amaze me!

We could conclude that this UOI on healthy

lifestyles can help the children in

understanding the importance of making

balanced choices of the food, necessity of

sleep, exercise and recreation. Sr. KG

What do we mean by nutrition? What’s

this food pyramid all about? How do

different food groups provide us

balanced diet? Why sleep, exercise,

recreation, hygiene etc. are essential

for our physical and mental health?

These were some of the question faced

by the young inquisitive minds of

Senior KG during the second UOI on

“Healthy Lifestyle”.

They understood that as we need nourishing food and exercise for our body, similarly we need good amount of sleep and recreation for our mind. They got the a fair idea about different food groups and at the same time understood their respective places in the food pyramid including their favorite junk food which occupies minimal space as it can be eaten only once in a while.

Health and Hygiene .....

Visit by a dietician, Mrs. Anita Singh

further helped to broaden their

knowledge on balanced diet. Activities

such as Healthy Island wherein children

were able to place the picture of the

food accordingly in the food pyramid

were an enjoyable one. Other areas

such as oral hygiene as part of the

personal hygiene was highlighted so

as to make them aware of the cleanliness

of teeth in order to avoid unpleasant

experiences such as cavities, toothaches.

How to take good care of the teeth was

briefed by the dentist couple Mr and Mrs.

Shah. Children underwent oral checks

and were handed over the check-up

cards. Our PE teacher focused on

different types of exercises such as

Yoga, aerobics etc.and their

significance in our daily routines.

Shraddha Pachauri

Market Market everywhere.....

The unit was triggered off with a “Barter

Day at School” where the students

exchanged their old things with a better

one. This activity helped the students to

understand the failure of the barter

system and the emergence of markets.

Students then proceeded to explore

major markets of Surat. The unit on

“How we organize ourselves”

Places like Shanivari market ( a second

hand goods market), Dhiraj sons (retail

store), Textile market, Tarwadi market,

Mandi on wheels (vegetable and fruit store)

and Sahaj super market were explored to

understand the emergence of a need of a

market place, the supply chains that help

markets run efficiently and the unethical

practices going on in the markets.

was made exciting for Grade 4 as the

students had many field trips exploring

markets in the city of Surat.

clearing in the forest to play games and

after we returned, we all bathed in the

river for 3 hours. In the evening we went

for rappelling and rock climbing. As it

started getting darker, we headed back

towards the camp. In the night after a

hearty dinner, we had a star gazing

session. We were amazed to see that

the whole sky was filled with twinkling

stars. We saw Jupiter through the

telescope and that was the most

exciting part of the day. Students played

around the campfire and sang songs till

late night. The third day was sad for

children as they were not ready to leave

the place and go. They wanted to stay

and enjoy the nature. The trip was a

healthy mix of enjoyment and learning

as students learnt many facts about our

mother nature and how different animals

hunt each other and the way that they live.

The organisers of the camp “Team Prayas”

(http://www.prayas-india.org/) did a

wonderful job in organising this camp.

On the whole the trip was enjoyed and

will be cherished for the years to come.

The excitement roared through the

corridors of Classes when it was

announced that there was an

educational nature trip to Dang forest

that was going to take place. Students

got busy discussing the things to be

carried and the enjoyment they will

encounter there. There were a number of

questions that teachers faced when they

met the parents early in the morning on

the day of the trip. On the way to Dangs,

children enjoyed the journey where they

ate most of the times and played games.

We reached the campsite around 12

noon. When students saw the place that

they were going to stay, a glimpse of

amazement flickered on their face. It

was a beautiful scenario, almost surreal,

as if somebody is seeing a painting

hang on a wall. A place where there

were tents and nearby a river was flowing

with lush green woods around. The

chirping of the birds, the shining sun

on the water making it sparkle, the music

of the river nearby almost made it a

dream. On the first day, we did a short

trek inside the forest , inquiring

about many things like how the local

people used the land for farming, how

Dangs got its name, how people stay

here, what wild life one can find here.

It was quite exciting as we were told

many new things which otherwise we

wouldn’t be aware of. We also had a

bath in the river which was the most

enjoyable of all. The next day, early in

the morning we went to an open

Wonderful experience to share

Students also visited villages to see and

understand the demand and supply

chain. The field trips were engaging and

students learnt a lot by visiting the places

that they had never visited. Overall, the

unit was very well explored by the

students and the outcome in terms of

students’ inquiries and understanding

was much beyond our expectations.

Shraddha Pachauri

We feel hot in summer”, “we feel cold in

winter”, we use umbrella during he rainy

season”, “we come to school in the

morning”, “we sleep at night”, that was

the prior knowledge of Jr.kg children at

the beginning of the UOI- Our activities

are usually connected to the earth’s

natural cycle under the TDT- How the

world works? In order to provoke

learning, the classes were decorated

according to 3 seasons and day & night.

The children explored all the classes

and came up with various questions at

their level and made connections during

class discussion.

.

To further promote the

inquiry each class was divided into 3

corners. Each corner represented a

particular season i.e. summer, winter

and monsoon. The corner displayed the

objects brought by the children

themselves which was later used for

show & tell. Each child gave the

presentation about his/her object which

helped them to comprehend the activities

(summer & winter).

Let’s enjoy the weather

It was a great learning experience for both

the students and the teachers

Jr.KG Teachers

Edited by

Designed by

Gowri Murali

Bhavisha Parikh

and

C MN P SUO I G OONthSports Day - 24 Dec

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