MEET THE EXPERT
Session #1: KNOW YOUR HERBS
Research shows that children are intelligent learners and are highly motivated, who actively seek interactions with the people around them. Children are born with ‘built-in’ exploratory tendencies, and engage all their senses to investigate and master tools and resources, to develop their skills, and to build their knowledge and understanding of the world. The freedom to combine resources in many different ways may be especially important for flexible cognitive development, by enabling children to build pathways for thinking and learning, and to make connections across areas of experience.
Exposing children to different kinds of learning experiences is an essential part of experiential learning and it is differentiation in the true sense. This is what Indian Education School expects to achieve through its recent initiative, ‘Meet the Expert’ program. Subject experts on various topics are invited to interact with the children. The presentation of the topic by the resource persons, is followed by a question- answer session and a follow up activity. It is a collaborative program which aims at developing different skills while exposing children to first-hand knowledge by subject experts.
The first session under this program, ‘Know Your Herbs’, was held on November 22, 2020. Dr. Muneer Mammikutty was the resource person for the session. Dr. Muneer is an Ayurvedic Physician and Public Health Professional. At present he is working as Strategy Lead with a non-profit organization based in Pune, India. He graduated in Ayurvedic Medicine from Amrita University and has a degree in postgraduation in Healthcare Management from Tata Institute of Social sciences, Mumbai. His interests include medical pluralism, nutrition, maternal and child health.
Dr. Muneer enlightened the students with his excellent presentation on ‘Know Your Herbs’. He sensitized the children on the sanctity of Ayurveda, the magnanimity of mother nature and the reason behind Ayurveda gaining global impetus. He explained that Ayurvedic Medicine is one of the ancient forms of traditional medicine which is in practice from over 6,000 B.C. and the Vedas refer to this traditional medicine and its importance. Ayurveda, he further explicated, focuses on the entire body healing with the help of detoxification and its main focus is on boosting the immune system, the energy systems through natural remedies. He mesmerized the children with stories on the origin of Ayurveda and also told them that being the world’s oldest holistic healing therapy, it is believed to bring balance between the mind, body, and spirit for better health. He spoke to the children about the importance of common household herbs and shared with them recipes of simple home remedies. After the presentation, children asked very thought provoking and valid questions during the question-answer session.
Mr. Ramachandran Menon, the chairman of Bhavans Middle East, in his closing thoughts spoke to the children about benefits of Ayurvedic medicines, citing examples from his own life. He advised the children to embrace a healthy lifestyle and keep themselves fit physically and emotionally. Principal, Mr. T. Prem Kumar, spoke about the importance of Ayurveda and how it has been gaining global acceptance as an alternative system of medicine.
During the function, Ms. Advika Ram, the first prize winner of Ayurvedic Quiz conducted by the Indian Embassy, Kuwait, was felicitated by Ms. Lalitha Prem Kumar, the Vice Principal of primary wing.
Dwani Shanthi Nair, the junior head-girl, welcomed the gathering and Haridathan Madhusoodanan, the junior head-boy, delivered the vote of thanks.
A follow up activity on the topic was done in class the next day.