In times when rote learning has become the norm in schools, Butterfly Fields - a brainchild of IIM/IIT alumni – has started a unique initiative to make learning enriching and enjoyable for the students. Come weekends and children in the age-group between seven and sixteen gather to take part in various activities of the club at Nowroji Road. An initiative taken by Sharat Chandra (IIT-Mumbai, IIM-Kolkata) and Uday Shankar Raju (IIM-Kolkata), the club endeavours to integrate basic principles of mathematics and science through practical experiences.
“The idea is to make a student understand the basic fundamentals at a single go instead of mechanically learning the theories through textbooks. The course starts at a very basic level and focuses on fundamentals,” says Uday Shankar Raju, Director of Butterfly Fields, Vizag.
Every student is given a tool kit, material for the projects and activity books. The workshops involve a one-hour session of science and mathematics followed by a session on puzzle solving that integrates the basic principles of the subjects.
The club has also released various other learning tools like nutri-mania cards, jungle-maze, math-maze and practical training modules like Junior Architect besides others.
For instance, students learn to make earthquake-proof structures through the clay and know and identify plants through field trips. Such similar sessions are conducted to amalgamate real-life applications for scientific and mathematical concepts.
“It is about taking the concepts taught on the blackboard and re-implementing them as practical models,” he adds. The club also organises special workshops for schools and conducts vacation camps and regular field trips for the students. The classes are divided into sub-junior, junior and senior categories.
