Learning Experiences From Outside the Classroom - Part 3

More field trips taken by students of Jyotirmay International School during the months of August and September of this year gave them varied learning experiences at places like the a plant nursery, zoological park and snake park and fall in with our current blog theme.

Learning to identify plants by names and foliage

 On Tuesday 4^th August, our pre-primary students got an introduction to gardening at the Jagtap Nursery with a tour down the aisles to view different plants and learn their names.

These plants can be seen in the school's courtyard

Following a potting demonstration they even got to pot a few plants themselves. Moreover, they brought their plants back to school to water them regularly!

Eager to enter the zoo!

Then on 4^th September, students from the groups Clover, Iris, Coral, Saffron and Aster went to visit the Rajiv Gandhi Zoological Park and the Katraj Snake Park. 

This field trip was a part of two themes covered in their EVS class: the Web of Life and Wildlife Protection. The aim was to make the children aware of these animals’ habitat and their characteristic features.

Besides spotting mammals like Porcupines and Sloth Bears; big cats like the White Tiger, Bengal Tiger and an elusive Leopard; birds like peacocks, the Great Horned Owl, a barn owl and a long beaked vulture our students also got to see different species of deer such as Chinkara, Black Buck, Nilgai, Chital and Sambhar.

The Royal Bengal Tiger spied by one of the teachers

According to our teacher Somishala Ma'am, the younger children questioned about the existence of so many species of deer when any one type would be enough to feed a tiger. Then an answer coming from another child was equally wondrous: maybe the tiger liked a variety of diet from time to time, just like humans!

Listening keenly to a talk by Ms. Ashwini, Head of the Educational Department, our students learned about various new enclosures planned and how the Zoo acquires new animals. 

She specified that these are not captured animals but injured or strayed and also through an exchange program between other zoos.

Moving on to Katraj Snake Park in the post-lunch session, the children got to peek at various reptiles in their pits. Besides tortoises and terrapins which plodded along unhurriedly, there were non-venomous snakes of different species plus the Spectacled Cobras and the fast striking Russell Vipers which were contained in separate pits.

Students as well as teachers thrilled with the field trip

The takeaways from the exciting and informative zoo trips were at multiple levels: the students recollected their classroom learning by making vital connections of endangered species and symbiotic relationships. 

Meanwhile, the teachers too relived their childhood memories of visiting the zoo!