Children of Nursery School had a lovely time today when they were taken to visit Madhuban Farm for the day. They were greeted by a variety of birds, both rare and common. The farm has a rare collection of birds of species that are not found locally. They were amazed to see the colourful birds like Macaws, Ostrich, Turkey, Emu and many more. They also watched the happily swimming fishes with awe. A visit to the cattle farm was also very pleasant and they were able to understand the day to day process of farming.
The kids had a lovely time and came back with endless tales of the animals and birds that they had seen and the fun they had in the farm with their friends.

Just like we cannot imagine a world without colours, a world without black and white is unimaginable too!
Based on this idea, children of Preschool observed Black and White Day. The story of “The Hare & The Tortoise” was explained by PLE activity teachers by arranging the lovely “Shadow Show”. Children enjoyed this different method of learning stories and had lots of fun. All the soft boards were displayed with different theme based on “Black & White” like Penguin world, Football, Animal Kingdom, Musical Harmony, Panda, Night, Sheep, Dog, & Chess. Beautiful activities were arranged with this wonderful themes & ideas. A day not be missed and always cherished by one and all.”

Nature played the role of teacher when children of Class 1 were taken on a Nature trail to Vasant Nature Cure Centre. They gained first hand experience about the process of planting. They were able to see a variety of fruits and vegetables growing from very close quarters. Nowadays children of this generation do not have the opportunity of getting to see vegetables growing and only see them being sold in markets and stalls. They were amazed at the beauty and wonders of nature and even an ordinary thing like a radish growing underground did not fail to amaze them. Facts when supported by evidence add to the knowledge and this was 100% true in the Nature Walk which was guided by their teachers with interesting bits of information.

Reading is very necessary for learning a language well. Only a good reader knows the finer nuances of speaking a language like an art. At Udgam we always recommend fostering reading habit as early as possible, beginning right from Preschool. To further emphasise the need for regular reading, our school celebrated Reading Week from December 1 to 6 in English, Hindi, Sanskrit and Gujarati.
The Primary Section made the most of the week by inculcating activities like answering riddles, extempore speaking from chits drawn, sequencing jumbled stories, rapid fire, spinning the yard, poster making, tongue twisters, writing and reading aloud simple poems, reading newspaper articles and discussing, character description from folk tales and noun games. 
In Middle Section activities that were pursued to enhance reading were news reading like a reporter after dividing new into categories like International, National, State, Sports and Weather. Along with sessions of story, book reading penned by famous authors was undertaken. In Hindi, children were encouraged to chant dohas by Kabirdas along with video screening. In Gujarati class, children had to draw lots to read books. Sanskrit reading was made interesting by giving them topics from grammar. The groups took down names and presented their topics on charts, quiz, dumb charade, housie, flash cards and so on. 
The senior school children presented book reviews of novels read by them. The students shared with their classmates the highlights of the novels read, the various characters depicted, the ratings the book deserved,etc.While some students used PPTs to present their reviews, others depended on their verbal skills to interact with the others and convey the content of the book read.

In the main action area of reading, the School Library, the students were shown videos of famous stories with morals. There were activities like story writing, paragraph writing, draw-a-picture, writing about your favourite character and Read-a-thon. 
A Book Fair was a Grand Finale to the Reading Week. It was attended in large numbers by students, parents and teachers. The children went around excitedly from shelf to shelf and selected books to buy and take home. We hope the spirit of reading will continue in the times to come…

The Talk Show held in Udgam School Auditorium today was nothing short of an eye opener. It was a guiding push given to the students of Class X by their seniors. No amount of career guidance can be as effective as when you learn about the real picture from your own seniors, as they say ‘from the horse’s mouth’. Following this Mrs. Sharmistha Sinha, Secondary School teacher, moderated a talk show that is sure to make students of Class X be the final judge and decide their subject options better in Senior Secondary.
Students of Class XI, Saumya Gupta, Rutvik Shukla, Ritika Kapoor, Jahanvi Shah and Ishita Shah, toppers in the examinations held in the first half of the academic year, spoke at length to the students of Class X about the right choice of stream after Class X. Simply going with the flow and taking up Science is not recommended. One should have the dedication, passion and aptitude for the subjects. They stressed on the difficulty level of Class XI as compared to Class X and the amount of effort that students need to put in, the vagaries of coaching classes, the need to forsake hobbies and sports, constant fatigue, health issues and the 24 hour regime that goes into the day of a student of Science. The transition from Class X to XI is nothing short of a quantum leap. So it is better to be sure of one’s abilities and aptitude before taking the leap. They also generated awareness about the hyped results of coaching centres and the negative issues associated with not being able to clear JEE or AIPMT.
There are so many options that are available to students these days that they should take the CBSE conducted SGAI aptitude scores seriously and follow their passion. The old cliché about following the heart to reach the goal is very true and more relevant now with so many options available. And thereafter one should put in 100% effort regardless of the chosen field of endeavour. The bottomline is one should be happy…and pursuing a goal that is close to the heart ensures that. And if one is sure of the goal then no amount of effort and sacrifice can unnerve her/him.

An elocution event is not very easy especially for children of Class 6. And when the event is in Gujarati, it requires true skill and plenty of practice. There was a preliminary round in individual sections in which students were selected. This was followed by the final round. Topics were varied like Swachch Bharat, Sachin Tendulkar, The importance of time and so on. The children spoke eloquently in fluent Gujarati.

The moment I finish the lesson for the day, my students start shouting, “Teacher, O. Henry story.” I had promised them a-story-a-day!

I have told my class all the O. Henry stories that I could remember. By now, they even know the famous ‘O. Henry twist’. The other day when I narrated a real-life incident the students pointed out that it was like an O. Henry story. This writer is a big hit in my class. The students are looking for his books in the library.

After O. Henry, I went on to short stories written by Maupassant, W.W. Jacobs, George Orwell, Ruskin Bond, R.K. Narayan, incidents from Charles Dickens’ and Shakespeare’s books too and stories of unknown writers.

Little did I realize then that indirectly I was getting them interested in reading. Every day some student or the other brings some book to me, just to show that he or she is also reads books of such classic writers!

It is a pleasure and gratifying feeling to know that children can appreciate the subtle humour, sorrow and other emotions found in many of the stories. Even at a time when they are exposed to the melodramatic serials churned out on our television channels.

Some day, when are grown-ups, I am sure they will remember the stories and themselves go to read the originals!

– Ms. Radhika Iyer

As a part of FA activity, students of Class VII were assigned the task of interviewing their teachers.
Students were divided into various groups and asked questions to various teachers such as:
1) What brought you to teaching?
2) Where do you see yourself after 5 years?…