SPRING 2019 BEST IN SHOW

Vidya Bhawan Public School

Udaipur, Rajasthan, India Congratulations, Vidya Bhawan Public School! Teachers: Pragya Tank and Manish Adiwal BPF Program Director:  Pragya Tank Kids: Manu, Devansh, Pavitra, Pukit, Sneha, Yatharv, Hriday, Rudra, Rishi, Gunjan, Daksh, Rhythm When kids from the Vidya Bhawan Public School poured their hearts and souls into “The Storm,” awarding them the Big Picture Foundation Spring 2019 Best-in-Show commendation to was a breeze! The kids were able to tackle our 2018-2019 music collaboration with extraordinary problem-solving skills.  The abstract challenge, designed to give all participating kids equal opportunities for self-expression, eliminated the ease that comes from directions and right and wrong answers.  Kids were given 16 pictures of a storm.  They were asked to interpret one of the pictures, with sound and motion, but without using traditional language or instruments.  That’s it.  From there, the kids were on their own.   This is the complete collaborative video: In the United States, Project Based Learning has received growing attention.  Based on common points of reference, kids solve challenges in self-directed and group-directed ways.  Thus, they invent their own paths of learning and delve with depth into areas of interest. Read what the Vidya Bhawan Public School kids’ teacher, Ms. Pragya Tank, had to say about this project: “You will experience our students’ observation, creation and innovation at its peak. For a week, I just worked with them around observing the picture plus the billboard (collection of all the pictures). what the billboard is trying to represent, what the chosen picture 16. is trying to represent. Believe me, students from all grades (my students here are ranging from grade 3- 10),  said that its a representation of how the world looks before and after a big storm that comes in. It was interesting to push the conversation to allow them to connect it with their own life’s cycle, how one enjoys the serenity of life, but then, how gradually the life starts getting darker, gloomy and troublesome. But eventually, all of this settles down and a new day embarks towards a more peaceful life. In short, life goes on. Then, we worked on brainstorming and asking them to observe each and every sound they hear, listen, see and experience, and then, connecting it with the picture. When asked what all sounds must we create that you see, might connect with the picture, their answers were- as for us, the picture seems like an early morning which has sounds of water, breeze, birds and animals, trees/ leaves. The track contains sounds based on the same. Everything, everything regarding the sound-making through using daily-life products, is entirely the imagination of my kids.”