Blue is a beautiful colour which we associate with peace and calm. To introduce the colour ‘blue’ to the youngest members of the Udgam family, activities were arranged for the Playgroup. They were asked to dress up in blue coloured clothing. In school they happily joined in different activities like hunting toys in sandpit, clay play, threading blue beats, playing table games and so on. The happiest part was when each child was given a blue dolphin to take home, their new friend!

Children of Senior KG were taken to “Gandhi Ashram” by their teachers where they were shown different activities happening in the ashram. The museum opened up a world of pre-independence era for the children. Then they were shown the working of the Charkha, the spinning heel that Gandhiji used to spin cotton. They were already familiar with the ‘speak no evil, hear no evil and see no evil’ monkeys and were thrilled to see them. The purpose of the visit was to familiarize them with the life and times of Gandhiji, the Father of the Nation. The visit also helped to instill confidence in the children to go out of their familiar surroundings and proceed together as a team. 

Fear of Maths is quite common in children and due to this fear their performance in Maths suffers. Maths doesn't have to be scary, children should not be afraid of numbers.

Hence, Udgam Pro Activity Club initiated and arranged Maths is Fun- Vedic Mathematics Workshop. The four day session was attended by 51 students. Our aim was to boost confidence and create more interest in the subject. Vedic Mathematics is a super fast way of making all Mathematical Calculations easy. The formulae are very easy to understand and are time saving.

An interclass skit competition was conducted among students of Class VIII. The students selected various stories, plays by various eminent such as R.K. Narayan and William Shakespeare. They scripted the skit.  Every child in the group was assigned a role or two. The content ranged from comedy to tragedy, treachery, social values and sacrifice. The skits were on Macbeth, Comedy of Errors, Annual Day Mishap, The Tryst With The Temple, The Lion In The Circus and Parent’s Sacrifice.

The judges had a difficult choice to make but the best performers won. 

Thuds of the ball to record the maximum number of bounces, bells to keep the participants of Musical Chair on their toes and joyous screams as the rope of Tug of War finally declared the winning side, heralded the morning at Udgam School. These were just some of the activities which were going on in Senior School along with Dumb Charades, Guessing Games and plenty more. If the Seniors were having fun, the children of Middle School were not far behind in games with Hop Skotch, Dog and Bone, Tug of War and other indigenised traditional games. The children of senior classes demonstrated to their younger friends through presentations and posters about the relevance of Children’s Day, about Pandit Nehru, his childhood and achievements.
Primary School had activities throughout the day in all classes. These included classic and cartoon movies fully loaded with cupcakes and popcorn, speeches about the importance of the day, craft work, wish tree making, card making and sandwich making. One singular idea was writing about their partner (only positive qualities) and presenting it to him/her. 
The juniormost section, Preprimary had an amazing time too. They had a Puppet show which the children thoroughly enjoyed. Then they had a’ visit’ from Chacha Nehru which was a good way to acquaint them with the great statesman on whose birth anniversary Children’s Day is celebrated. The child had a funfilled day which was over too soon.

Commerce students have an elaborate syllabus which includes details of working of various factories as well as the import and export process. To give the students of Commerce practical knowledge about the working of factories, the students of Class XI studying in Commerce stream were taken to an aluminium factory located at Kathwada. The students were introduced to the actual working of a factory and the many prcesses that go into creating the final product while ascertaining quality. They witnessed the recycling procedure of scrap aluminium into sheets that are cut and moulded to make aluminium vessels. The factory at Kathwada imports the scrap metal from Dubai and the final product, aluminium vessels, is exported top countries like Saudi Arabia, Kenya, South Africa and Dubai. The vessels are sold in Indian markets as well. Aluminium vessels are in high demand because they do not rust easily nor do they break. The metal is quite neutral and doesn’t react with the contents that are kept inside. The students were able to comprehend the factory process and also the import-export systems.

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.

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 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.

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…