Journeying Together January 2019 Vol. 39

In this Issue:

Celebrations and Festivities Beyond the Classroom Inter House Events

Global Citizenship Special Assemblies Empowering the Educator

Junior Campus Events Awards and Accolades Students’ Corner

Overflowing Prosperity

Amidst great fervour and enthusiasm, it was a traditional Pongal, the Hari Shree way. The

grounds became a village courtyard decorated with rangoli and thoranams. The

excitement on everyone’s faces turned to sheer joy at the sight of the cow and calf.

Our Principal, acharyas and akkas and annas performed the pooja, to invoke

the blessings of the Sun God at this auspicious time. Every minute detail was attended to,

including worshipping the cow, cooking pongal in a vengala panai and distributing sugar cane

to our students. The cultural programs in Tamil presented by our students made it a delightful

day. At the end of the day we got to eat juicy sugarcane and lip

smacking sakkarai pongal.

Celebrations and Festivities

India is the Song we must Sing

India’s 71st Republic Day was celebrated with much patriotic splendour at Hari Shree. The

celebrations began by hoisting the national flag and singing the national anthem. Everyone

present recited the National Pledge. This was followed by performances scheduled for the day.

The repertoire included speeches in Sanskrit, Tamil and Hindi, a Bharatanatyam dance and a

foot-tapping musical performance. It was a memorable day filled with patriotism, pride and

enjoyment.

Inter House Events

An inter-house pinup board competition on the topic Bio Waste to BioGas was held for grades 6

and 7. All four houses took up the challenge with great team spirit.

- Sanjana T G, grade VII

Drawing their way for house points

Sun Rice!

The four houses engaged in an exhilarating ‘Battle of Colours’ in the Rangoli competition as part

of Pongal celebrations. The high school students used various mediums like flowers, grains,

Salt, millets, diyas and vivid colour powders to produce 4 beautiful rangolis highlighting scenes

from this harvest festival celebrated all over the country.

- Ananya Vijay Ganesh, grade IX

Prithvi Agni

Vayu Akash

Vayu

Agni

Prithvi

Akash

Utsav was an eye-opening experience. We learnt so much about our culture, its significance and

how helpful it is in shaping who we are as a country today. The research topics we picked were

varied and very interesting. Mr. Siddharth and Ms. Lakshmi were of great help in guiding and

giving us very effective tips on collating our project ideas and improving upon them. Utsav gave

us the opportunity to understand some lesser known but interesting aspects of our culture. Our

mentor teachers extended their continued support.

- Dheekshanya A, grade XI

Utsav in High School

Utsav in Primary

As part of our Utsav activity we visited the Goshala at Arulmigu Marundeeswarar Temple.

It was an amazing insight for the children. They learnt about the cow is revered as Gomata

and its importance in our ecosystem. Teachers explained the benefits of the products that

the cow gives.

Heading towards Board Examinations

Auspicious pooja and Seeking blessings from the Almighty, acharyas and parents before the Board exams .

New Horizons

Our Outbound trip to Pondicherry and Mahabalipuram was both enjoyable and educational.

We learnt about our heritage and culture. First, we drove to Pondicherry, where we visited

Auroville, Matri Mandir and Promenade. It was an informative experience and a visual treat. The

following day, we set off to Mahabalipuram where we visited the Butter Ball, a huge boulder on a

slope that looked like it was about to fall but was fixed in place. All of us tried our luck in pushing

it. We also visited the 5 Rathas and shore temple. We came to know a lot about our ancient past

from this experience. Learning combined with fun made this a memorable trip.

- Akshara & Ahalya Chandrashekar, grade VI

Beyond the Classroom

We, the students of Grade 5 went to the Music Academy to watch a Bharatanatyam recital by

Ms. Indu and Mr. Nitish. There were four different songs for which the dancers

performed, the invocation song on Lord Ganesha, the main dance on Lord Padmanabha, a dance

for a Meera bhajan and the final one, a Thillana. The dancers gave a lively performance with

lovely facial expressions, movements and perfect coordination. It was very interesting to watch

the entire performance.

- Grade V Shenbhagam

Learning through Music and Dance

Starting them Young

Field trip to the Traffic Park was organized for the students of grade II with the purpose of

introducing basic road safety rules to them. The Traffic Park is equipped with traffic signals, road

signs and road crossings. The children learnt about the various aspects of road safety in a play way

method. The trip was instrumental in sensitizing the children to road safety and the

significance of following traffic rules.

Solve Ninjas in Action in the Solver Space

Global Citizenship

Bio Waste Collection Awareness

As a green initiative, our school has installed a

Biogas Plant that converts bio-waste to biogas.

The student council members addressed the students

during assembly by showing videos. The students

were encouraged to contribute by bringing

vegetable peels from their homes.

Grade 6 and 7 Visiting the Bio Gas Plant

Students of Grades 6 and 7 visited the Biogas plant near the dining hall, during the

Global Citizenship class to understand its functioning. They enthusiastically cleared their

doubts and committed to bring vegetable waste everyday.

Grade 12 students created Behavioral Nudges to

reduce electricity usage in the school as

part of SDG 7 - ‘Affordable and clean energy’.

Their initiative is being sustained as they handed

over the project to a group of Grade 8 students

who are working on the SDG ‘Responsible

consumption and production’.

Sustaining the Goal undertaken

The student council members actively participated in a demonstration of how vegetable waste is

ground and put in the feeder of the Biogas plant.

Knowing the Working

Marghazhi and Thiruppavai

The month of Marghazhi is known for reciting the Thiruppavai. Sripriya Acharya explained the

meaning of these songs through various sessions. These sessions made us understand Andal’s

devotion to Lord Vishnu. We chanted Thiruppavai paasurams during these sessions. To conclude,

we enjoyed each of the sessions very much.

- Sidarth S, grade V

Special Assemblies

Virtual Hampi Tour

We the students of class 7 Vairam performed our assembly on Hampi and the Hampi Utsav

festival . We focused on the important monuments in Hampi. The skit was the backbone of the

show and it brought together all the other performances of our assembly.

Happy Harvest Time

The grade III assembly began with a song and dance on Pongal and a PPT on how the harvest

festival is celebrated across India. The assembly concluded with a captivating dance performance

that was based on a song thanking river Cauvery which is responsible for three harvests in a year.

Celebrating Freedom

Grade VII started their assembly with an informative PPT about the significance of Republic Day.

It was followed by a brief skit which brought out the essence of Jallianwallah Bagh incident and

how English as a medium of education came about. The assembly ended with a melodious

patriotic song and a brief explanation on the importance of our National Flag.

True to the quote, teachers from our group

schools visited us for an informative

session on Montessori method of teaching

and learning.

Empowering the Educator

As knowledge increases, wonder deepens

Chuk Chuk Chuk!

A train ride through beautiful gardens, wonderful and carefully preserved exhibits of engines,

coaches and wagons! Needless to say the children were delighted with their trip to the impressive

Chennai Railway Museum.

Junior Campus Events

Middle School facilitators receiving

certificates for successfully completing

the Growth Mindset program.

Our environments are always buzzing with new ideas and creativity.

Just Another Day!

Pongalo pongal! Getting ready to celebrate pongal with custom made pots done by little hands

with a lot of thought and creativity.

Pots and Dots

Awards and Accolades

More power to you girls!

Our under 12 girls team secured third

place in the Ellen Sharma Memorial

Inter School Basketball tournament.

Students’ Corner

In the summer of 2019, I, Gayathri Venkatesan attended a PAN India essay competition by

Takthe in partnership with UNESCO New Delhi, writing on the topic of 'Is protecting the natural

environment a priority?'

The top one hundred essays were to be published into a book known as 'Inside the Millennial

Mind', in which my essay was featured. I received the book from the book launch in New Delhi.

I learned many things about the topic as I researched and found some very shocking things as

well that I would not have expected in the slightest.

It was a wonderful experience, as the book contained the various thoughts of students akin to

myself all over the country. All in all, I feel like the entire experience, from participating in the

competition, to receiving the book was a journey that was wonderful and I would definitely do it

again if I had the opportunity.

- Gayathri Venkatesan, grade XI

Inside the Millennial Mind

People for People

The sudden arrival of the Sketchers Marathon runners on a sunday morning was unexpected.

Seeing a lot of runners tired, my mother made lemonade and cut fresh pieces of watermelons.

I took the lemonade and watermelon, set it on a table right outside our home and started giving

it to all the runners who went past our house. This made the runners feel hydrated on a

sunny day and I was proud of myself to have been able to help the runners.

- Nilank A Swaminathan, grade V

Global Warming

Global warming is due to pollution

Due to C02, Methane and nitrous oxide

But we don’t seem to care about a solution

While the temperature is gradually rising outside

By the end of this century

Glaciers will start to melt away

An increase of two degrees

Will make the oceans rise everyday

Seasons will become unpredictable

Climate change is inevitable

We’ll have to say goodbye to the Christmas trees

And farewell to snorkelling in the seas

It’s time for some introspection

For we could bring upon us the sixth mass extinction

Cease adding fuel to the fire

A greener Earth must be our desire

- Abhirav Narasimhan, grade V

- Ananya Jammi, grade I

Planet

This is the planet song

If you know the order, sing along

Planets go around the sun

Mercury is number one

Venus is number two

It’s too hot for me and you

Earth is the planet with life and its number three

Mars is number four it’s red because of iron

Jupiter is number five

And it is big in size

Saturn is number six

And it is the planet with rings

Uranus is number seven

Instead of revolving it spins

Neptune is number eight

And it is blue.

- Ram P Seshadri, grade II

- S Ananya, grade II

Teacher Editors - Ms. Hemamalini Sivakumar, Ms. Deepali and Ms. Meenakshi

Student Editors - Ms. Nivedita Naveen and Ms. Ananya Vijay Ganesh

Design and Technical Support - Ms. Preethi E

Photography - Mr. Ganesan and Mr. Sugumar

In February…

Sports Carnival Junior Campus - 15th February

CA/SA– Please refer to our website for dates of examinations.

Coming up next...Class VIII Outbound