My association with School Chameleons and Ms.Sudeepta Dhruva, goes back to years post Covid-19. Her vision and keen intent to provide a platform for schools to share success stories of implementing United Nations Sustainable Development Goals caught my attention instantly. Ms.Sudeepta and Ms.Seema Sood as Co-Founders have embarked on a mission to reach out to educators and society to motivate, encourage and guide sustainability initiatives. As a school leader, this opened a clear avenue for me to connect with people around the world who believed in the same goals with varied and interesting learning activities.
I was delighted to meet Sudeepta Ma’m along with Ms.Seema Sood and Ms.Reeta few days ago at School Chameleon office to engage in a thought provoking conversation. What made it enriching was the natural flow of thoughts to identify and encourage young learners to work for preserving and conserving nature. Ms.Sudeepta shared stories of schools taking up some amazing work to support the needy, safe disposal of waste and replenish mother earth with compassion.
The stories were plenty and meaningful to listen to. Whether it was a school counselling boys and girls to understand hormonal changes and how challenges are faced by girls at puberty. The physical and physiological changes lead to behaviour modifications and where there is lack of understanding, this is hugely uncomfortable and stressful. How this was handled with sensitivity and candid conversations along with steps taken to ensure safe disposal of sanitary pads in a school was incredible.
A Preschool group devising interesting and simple fun ways of communicating through actions for daily routines, self-discipline, clean and hygiene self-care were all great steps to imbibe in any school. This chain of pre schools went a step further and involved parents to follow these at home consistently too and now the young children have a much safer and better routines to care for themselves and nature. It is said that any good practice must begin at the youngest age possible for continuity lifelong.
The conversation extended and included more like-minded school heads post lunch on this day. Each school has own culture, work environment and issues to deal with. We realised a common goal is to provide successful learning for every learner. One area that stood out as significant was how schools and young students come forward to participate in sustainable development. Our curricula provide ample opportunities to take up steps and also understand the need for protecting our environment. Identifying causes and developing simple and practical solutions need to become mandatory aspect of our teaching in every subject and grade. Minimising and stopping the damage of environment by activities that may be causing the same need to be highlighted.
Learners of all ages value and participate in activities when they appear interesting and relatable. As educators, we need to create this for our learners continuously. Sustainability, care for nature, love for mother earth and always following guidelines to stay committed to these as goals must become important and well aligned. Then learning becomes meaningful.
Thank you Sudeepta Ma’m and Ms.Seema for some beautiful initiatives and work for showcasing sustainable efforts of young achievers and school educators alike. Your mission to recognise and encourage create not just interest but willingness to take responsibility of replenishing our planet.
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