After their daily online classes, Class 5 student Ayush Prem, Class 7 student Pavan Kumar Shetty and their friends -Samvith Shetty, Ajay, Vijay, Veekshan and Aman Rai from Akashbhavan in the city - get together at Ayush’s home to write poems, make music, film and upload videos on their YouTube channel ‘AVP creations’.
These children are making good use of their skills of singing, writing, video editing and playing instruments like guitar and khanjira, that they have honed during the lockdown. So far, they have come out with 21 music videos on songs written by Kuvempu and Kayyara Kinnanha Rai. There are four videos on poems found in the Hindi text of Classes 8, 9 and 10. Not just music, they have also made short videos on the craft, bird-watching and drawing activities held in their locality.
This interest in music was rekindled by government school teachers Premnath Marne and Aravind Kudla. Mr. Marne is the Hindi teacher at Government Secondary School in Chelairu, on the outskirts of Mangaluru, while Mr. Kudla is the headmaster of Government Higher Primary School in Moodambial near Vitla.
Advocate Sukesh Kumar has taught the children filming, while Adarsh, another resident, has trained them in the basics of guitar.
It all started with Mr. Marne’s two children joining 10 others in the neighbourhood coming together to play badminton in the evening when the lockdown began in March.
“Slowly I started organising group activities like story-telling, writing poems, acting, drawing, crafts and bird-watching with them. Once a week we had singing sessions where the children learnt basics of guitar and kanjira,” said Mr. Marne, a Carnatic singer with an interest in theatre.
“Activity-based teaching skills that we learnt during our teacher-training days under educationalist Gopadkar have been useful in the sessions in our neighborhood,” said Mr. Kudla, who loves bird watching and painting. “The children voluntarily get involved in these activities and learning has become fun for them,” Mr. Kudla added.