New Students Join Ek Koshish!

Yesterday, Ek Koshish hosted a new class of children who come from slum areas of Delhi NCR in Faridabad: Four children, Arun (about 7 years old), Priya (about 9 years old), Monika (about 5 years old), and Poonam (about 2-3 years old), attended their first class with us. In the picture, see Poonam, Priya, and Arun as they diligently took out their English notebooks and got to work at the beginning of class. Poonam is too young to join our classes, but the rest of the children have already learned quite a bit. They have been going to a government school in the neighborhood; however, they have not shown much progress with their work. They have learned the English alphabet, counting up to one hundred in English, and some of the "Prathmik gyan" (the Hindi words meaning "alphabet"), but they have not accelerated beyond this point in their studies. They live not too far away from the Ek Koshish office, so we have welcomed them into our study group. Because it was our first day with the children, we learned about what the children have already learned, their weaknesses, and where they left off in their studies since summer vacation started. We look forward to working with our new students, who are more used to the routine of a structured classroom, and we hope that they too will help their fellow students, who are struggling, but determinedly proceeding, with the English alphabet!