Be it making breakfast for two, designing a skyscraper or signing an international treaty, there is one task that underlies most activities that humans engage in - planning.
A systematic approach is often looked upon as the pathway to a successful project. Going by the adage of ‘catching them young', the NIE session at Campion Anglo Indian School guided standard VII students on planning fun projects under the first module of ‘Project Design'.
Divided into two groups, the boys chose ‘Organizing Teacher's day' and ‘Sports of interest' from a host of topics. Resource person Meenakshi Vellaiyan stressed that a methodical and systematic plan was prerequisite for fulfilling desired results of collecting information, studying a subject in detail and presenting the outcome within the stipulated time.
As a preliminary exercise, students were asked to frame a statement of purpose (SOP) summarising, succinctly, what they intended to accomplish.
Ms.Meenakshi introduced the concept of using keywords to narrow down vast topics like ‘study of ocean mammals', chosen as example. Using keywords like ‘whales', ‘dolphins' and ‘sea', she settled on the study of blue whales as focus of the project.
Following her lead, students listed entertainment and organization as primary keywords and branched out into dance and drama, invitations and bouquets as secondary keywords for the project of organizing ‘Teacher's day'.
Using the guidelines, the second group confined their study to international one day cricket. .
