Blogging with Velammalians

                                                                  It was the Perspectives class with Ramya madam. We 8th graders sat around to talk about our views on any topic during the 8 th period. This time the topic was about Uber Elevate-the eVTOL machines. Each of us was given a copy of the article that came in “The Hindu “dated 6th September 2018 on Mumbai could get Uber air taxis by 2023 . Then the animated discussions started. We discussed its speed, the advantages, our worries, our expectations so on and so forth...All these perspectives were collated in an ‘Idea Fan’ and was organized and put in order.   Our perspectives on the Uber Elevat...

Who doesn't have a birthday.... our beloved city of Madras too, has its birthday!  The first and oldest city of modern India, Madras, came to be known by the name on 22nd August 1639.  Kolkata is 50 years younger than Madras and Bombay is about 35 years.And here she is,the old city with all her exuding charm ...Namma Chennai !!! This year our lovely city Madras just celebrated its 379th birthday. Any idea why this celeb???  The idea of Madras Day was born when a group of Madras lovers got together a few years ago and decided ,”Yes ! The city needs to be  celebrated and its history, traditions and culture needs to be talked about “ Our city celebrated  Madras Week  by dedicating seven days to celebrate the history, culture and traditions of our place Though called the Madras week celeb,it became a “Madras Month” with festivities and events planned throughout August and a bit of September.  Madras week festivities included heritage walks,...

Swimming is my favorite sport. I feel that it is a very good exercise for both body and mind. There are 4 different styles in swimming- freestyle, back stroke, breast stroke & butterfly stroke.  I have been practicing all these 4 styles and have been learning swimming from the age of 6. Every day I go for swimming classes from 5:30 to 7:30am  in the mornings. If my mother doesn’t take me for my swimming class even for a day, I get offended and pick up a quarrel with her. This everyday morning routine makes me feel energetic. My coach says “Swimming shapes our body and helps us stay fit. Swimming is a sport for both boys and girls alike.” We have lots of boys and girls in our swimming classes. Michael Phelps is my role model. My father often shows me videos of Michael Phelps, the awesome swimmer from the US. He has won 28 medals in the Olympic games and 23 of  that aregoldmedals. My future aim is to win medals in Olympics like my role model Michael Phelps and...

Kalam Day The 21st century global society is considered a society of progress, especially in terms of technology and inculcating learning curiosity,which is also a part of Velammal NewGen Schools. And the best way to initiate that is the Science Learning Festival. This month’s Learning Festival was on the Great Man-Dr.APJ Abdul Kalam, the great scientist   and an inspiration of modern times. It was held on 4 th August 2018. Students of each grade displayed special projects that they were working on to give their friends, family and community a taste of what goes at NewGen School ,Navalur. This Learning Festival could be described as a museum of education and also an opportunity for families who were interested in Velammal NewGen to see the school and experience the excitement for learning we embrace. It was really amazing to see collaborative inquiry and practical learning that helped in improving and embedding science skills for Primary/Secondary students. We h...

Tiny tots brain storming Today, 5 th  of September 2018, we at Velammal NewGen School Navalur celebrated  Teachers’ Day  where the members of the Student Council organised a program for the teachers. The day started with hustle-bustle with enthusiastic students running around and organizing everything. The day before, students of Grade 5, 6 and 7 met the principal, discussed about the show and planned for the D-Day. The students had planned to conduct this program and the preparations were going on full-swing for a week. Teachers were honoured with flowers, hand-made greeting cards and most importantly, our shower of affection. Students and teachers alike, had a gala time with brain-racking riddles, poems and songs, some heart-warming and some heart-clenching. Students threw smiles on the faces of the teachers with roses too. The motive behind the program was to ensure the teachers enjoyed their day and the day lingers in their memory as a “ memo...

Dear young bloggers of the NewGen schools, Good luck and tons of best wishes! God bless you all in whatever you do. And here’s wishing you all the very best for all the new learning experiences, that schooling at Velammal has in store for you.I would like to extend my warm wishes to you all on the new beginning of this blog.   Let blogging be interesting and unusual for you and let it bring new knowledge and discoveries, as well as new challenges. Please have the following as advi se dear bloggers ·         treat the blog as a forum to exchange high order thinking ·         refrain from uploading cheap and irrelevant materials ·         ensure that no one is hurt by your upload ·         try as far as possible to use it for original thoughts and may sometimes for thoughts that impress you and may be useful to others Make the ...

Dear Teachers, Wish you all a Happy Teachers Day! We must realize that we are no longer teachers but the leaders of 21 st  Century. We like it or not, it is TIME that has changed images to videos, lectures to activities, text book to tab and rote learning to discovery learning. When the change is inevitable, let us learn to change the perspective of our profession and the styles of our teaching to float in the Ocean current of the 21 st Century. Gone are the days when we centered ourselves to drive passive learning in the class rooms. Let us fast-forward now from people to process, learning to research, objective to outcome, knowledge to skills. Let us arise, awake and sleep not! The purpose of our presence in the class rooms is not for teaching ‘basics’ but ‘new basics’! We learnt by reading or listening but our children wish to learn by doing and experiencing. So, let us discover the ways and means to teach in a way the children want to learn! Let us chang...

There was fun and frolic and lot of feverish celebrations in our city on Madras Week , observed from 19 th -26 th of August 2018.This week, that age was the time when the city’s name “Madras” came into origin. Our school students celebrated the Madras week to eulogise the culture, values, people and traditions of old Madras. The students showcased the differences between old Madras and the new Chennai through role plays, speeches, food stalls etc. The ninth graders had set up food stalls offering dishes which were eaten by the people of the early 1900’s in Madras. In the Madras quiz competition conducted by the Department of Social Science, whizkids, Vinisha and Sagaarika, emerged the winners. The whole week madeus feel like we were in the past again. It made us realize what all we had lost over the years. Students also came dressed up in ethnic attire.. It was a colourful event at school. The celebrations encouraged the students to re-live some of these customs a...

Our grandpas and grandmas used to rave about Madras and we kept wondering what is so special about Madras that’s not there in Chennai. Oh, Yes! How we wished our Chennai was Madras… Madras Day is a festival that celebrates the city of Madras on 22 nd August every year. Contemporary Chennai is no longer the hamlet-tish Madras of the yester years. It is fun going around Namma Chennai in our local electric train They say Buckingham Canal fed Madrasis once upon a time. Can’t really believe. Now its dirty. This is in sharp contrast of our glorious past and the present gloomy condition of our water ways. Hope most of you watched the movie “ Madarasapattinam” I think it is our responsibility to restore the British-era canal to its past glory. Our city colleges produce Kalams and Ramanujams every year. Chennai  is, a place called home an amiable locale a city that withstands everything and a capital with a swagggg!!!!! That’s NAMMAAAAA MADRAS!!!!! RISHO...

The Madras Day celebration was all around the city in August and our team of sixth graders got to know about all these.We read that Madras day is the day when Madras was named by the East India Company way back at 1639. Those days our Chennai was called as Madrasapattnam or Chennapatnam.  To remember her glory, heritage walks are conducted every year to the heritage sites left by old Madras. We have also asked our Principal mam to take us out to St. Mary ‘s Church and the Rippon building which are worth seeing heritage buildings. “Namma Chennai “as we fondly call her ,has the cultural flavour from December kacheris to Barathanatyam, ghana to kalakalkutthu.  She is the safest city in India and we love her for giving us that secure feeling . LOVE YOU MADRAS! Love you Chennai ! We are proud to write about you.            J.Sanjanaa S.Manasa A.Nidarshan V.Nikarika K.Kaushik Ram By the sixth grade blog...

On a wonderful great sunny Saturday,the 1st of September which was a bright day but a gloomy afternoon, we students of grade 6 ‘A’were called during the 8 th and 9 th period to get a feel of a novel way of learning Social Studies. A madam by name Ms. Krithika, invited us for a theatre class. She discussed about Gender bias,a Social Science lesson through theatre techniques and also discussed about “stereotypes”. We had few games related to the topic such as clap passing, a game which one kiddo should pass the clap to next child and the process went on, and mirror game in which two were paired up and one became a mirror and should mimic the movements that the other person did. Later we had another game called energy ball, a game in which people added their talents in the energy ball when their turns came. That was it for the games. Then everybody tried to use neutral words and speak in neutral voices.   By this time we all sat up, as it was not yet another Social S...

From Gaana Songs to Google CEO From Gaana to Google CEO Mr. Sundar Pitchai Chennai has left its mark behind. The fact that amazed the eigth graders is that Chennai aka Madras was founded way back in 1639,long long ago. The age of our dear Madras…? anyone has any idea? Its 379 you couldn’t believe right. Still she is young at heart with all new thoughts. Oldie but youththth! People say that the founding day of Madras was the day when a deal was struck between the British administrators and the Nayak rulers. So we set out to explore the Madras day celebrations and to say the truth we were quite impressed. Madras day is all about focussing on the city, its history, its past and its present. Now we will foster what we observed. The idea of a festival to honour the city is conceived by three people. S. Muthaih, Journalist Sashi Nair and publisher Vincent D Sauza in 2004. We also happened to learn that what had started off as a small intiative had grown into a week long...

The talk of the Town... Madras is celebrating her 379 th birthday. Hey all ! you celebrate your birthday don’t you. Our fabulous city Madras did celebrate its birthday on 22 nd August 2018. We Madrasis started this celebration from 2004. From Fort St. George to Kapaleeswarar temple there are real old gooddy gooddy spots all around. Even though our city has changed her name from Madras to Chennai, we call her by her maiden name when we celebrate. That’s how its “Madras Dayyyy”. We all love being part of this city and what we youngsters can do for this city and people is well known when we came together during the Chennai floods 2015. From Chennai super kings to Mr. Sundar Pichai we have things to boast about. Lets polish our old assets the historical buildings and upkeep our heritage sites and let us feel proud having them around. Of course old is Gold. Love you Madraaass💖 Anthieya J Heama S Prasanna P Sahana P Hemachandran R Bloggers of Velammal N...

What we think Madras Day celeb is all about……… Living in this city, we just discussed what it is like being in Chennai,a Madrasi.It is an emotion!   Our place is famous for delicious food like Idly, Dosa, Vada, Sambhar and the filter  kaapi  and also known as ‘The Gateway to the south India’. Our city flaunts the second longest beach, Marina Beach and second largest water Lagoon , Pulicat lake. We cling to traditions like  Jallikattu & Silambam.  Our traditional dance “Bharathanatyam is noteworthy. What we all got to know from the Madras Day celebrations that happened all around the city recently is worth sharing here. This great city was found on August 22, 1639. This was the day, when Fort St. George was acquired by the East India Company from the local Nayak rulers. This day is being celebrated as ‘Madras Day’ every year from 2004. Madras Day focuses on the city, its history and also motivates companies, communities,particularly student gr...