AMA KALIKA KENDRA-NIYATEE FOUNDATION

 

Why do we need “Early Stimulation Activities”

 

              It is always joyful watch children playing with their toys or learning how to walk. Every child begins their life by exploring their sensual stimulations. They observe everything around them with curiosity. For parents, this curiosity is often heart warming but sometimes a concern too, as their exploration might put them in danger. In the first 1000 days of a child, he/she experiences maximum neural activities and they form new neural synapses at an accelerated pace. In lay man terms, this is when he/she learns at an accelerated rate.

              Every child learns their basic motion and skills during this age. He/She learns how to walk, hold things, facial expressions, posture and framing words and sentences. As he ages, His/Her neural synapses formation slows down and is unable to learn these skills effectively for the rest of the life. In our creches, we understand this fact and try to engage each child in activities, designed specifically to enhance their social, motor and executive functions. There is one thing about learning that equally applies to adults too, that is, we subconsciously resist any attempt to learn if the environment is monotonous or intimidating. Therefore in our creches, we do not teach or train our kids, but we make them play, participate in competitive events and organize excursion trip, as a way to learn with fun.

              We begin with short activities like walking the path or catching the balls and then take it to the next notch by challenges like treasure hunt and trace the path. We also make them sing and dance on action songs to imprint images/visuals that they shall memories and remember, such as name of objects, animals and their characteristics. We also take the children to nearby Anganwadi to interact with other children and sometimes to the local shop to purchase a candy. These outing and interaction enables them to develop their social and executive skills.

             The most important aspect of Early Stimulation exercise is perhaps is their ability to talk. Talking is the only ability that set us aside from other mammals. We encourage our creche workers to communicate with each and every child in the creche. Telling them a story, fantasies or singing them a song will certainly help these children to grasp words and learn to form their own sentences. Our ultimate goal behind running these creches has always been and shall always be to nurture, care and ensure that no baby is left out before it’s too late to intervene.