Welcome!

Hello Everyone! Welcome to the Summer 2008 blog!

My name is Vanisha Gandhi and I am interning with the Nanubhai Education Foundation for 10 weeks this summer in Kadod! I’m extremely excited to be here! Before I start describing some of my experiences in Kadod, I will tell you a little bit about myself: I’m a junior at Stanford University and I am majoring in Human Biology with a concentration in Health, Education, and Development in Underserved Communities. In addition to serving as an intern for the Nanubhai Education Foundation, I have also received a Haas Summer Fellowship to conduct research on curriculum at Kadod high school in hopes of starting a project-based summer enrichment program.

So Priya (the other Intern) and I have been teaching Spoken English classes for students in the 9th standard at Kadod High school for about a week now. All of the students are so enthusiastic and motivated to learn. Everyday, we teach 2 classes of 9th graders in the morning, and 1 class in the evenings. We have been studying the past, present and future tenses with all the students for the past week. We’ve also been practicing vocabulary by reading Dr. Suess books like “The Very Bad Bunny,” which was a huge hit, and by playing the favorite games of Hangman and Pictionary! We’re also starting our Autobiography Project. The 9th standard students are writing about their lives using the past, present and future tenses, and then they are illustrating their autobiographies!

When we’re not teaching, Priya and I’ve been hanging out in the Computer Lab (which is huge!) with Dhirenbhai, Nitinbhai, Shilpaben and a few of the computer teachers at Kadod HS! We’ve also been talking with the math, Gujarati and Sanskrit teachers at Kadod HS, and shadowing classes to learn about how the education system in Gujarat works. All of the teachers are extremely nice and helpful—they even promised they would teach me how to read and write in Gujarati!

During our first weekend here, Priya, Cat, Melissa and I ventured outside of Kadod! On Saturday, we all went to Bardoli to do some shopping with Dhirenbhai (the computer specialist), his sister and his cousin. We bought lots of new clothes to wear at school and got amazing discounts thanks to Dhirenbhai’s sister and cousin! On Sunday, we all walked to the Causeway, a local hangout that is apparently 2 km away! More on the Causeway in future posts….

Well, that’s it for now, but I promise I will post again soon! I’ll be sure to post lots of pictures as well!

Vanisha