Tuesday, May 15, 2012

KAJOL: A DAY IN THE LIFE

The students, parents, and staff of Wes Hosford Elementary School in Sherwood Park, Alberta, Canada, have been demonstrating the true spirit of giving in a partnership with One! International since January of 2003. The partnership is a special one.  Each year the students fund raise and/or gather needed items for the children in Mumbai India. The Canadian children learn about life for poor children in another country on the other side of the world, and our One! children in Mumbai learn that Canadian children are very generous and care about them.

Each year a presentation is made at the school.  Some years Tania has been in Canada and able to personally tell the Wes Hosford children how important their efforts of helping are to the their Indian peers.  Other years, videos have been shown.  On a couple of occasions, a demonstration of the size of a typical slum home was given. The students ask very good questions and are committed to helping their Indian school friends.

This year, at the school assembly in April, 2012, the short video entitled "Kajol: A Day in The Life" was shown.  Before showing the video the children answered questions about their understanding and knowledge of what One! International does and where the agency worked.  The children were then asked to pay particular attention to the differences between a day in the life of 10 year old Kajol, who is the star of the video, and their own daily life.

It was amazing to hear all the differences the children noticed.  They clearly had been paying close attention to the video.  They will have a much better idea of how the "One! children" live, and how they spend their day.

Although I didn't keep track at the school, I think the children identified at least 20 differences before we had to end our discussion.  Please watch this little video.  My challenge to you - see how many differences you can identify.

http://youtu.be/BfLi-_tiIco



During the weeks following the viewing of the video, the students had their annual fundraiser for One! International. This year they collected Dental products for taking to India.  They were able to collect enough products to provide all of our students with new toothbrushes and toothpaste.  BRAVO
In addition to this, they organized a school Bake Sale. The proceeds from this sale were over $500 - that is a lot of baking. 

We are so grateful to: the students, the parents, the staff of Wes Hosford, and in particular Ms. Brosseau who, with her students, organize the yearly efforts.

A very big THANK YOU from the Canadian volunteers, the Indian staff, and  particularly from the children of One! International in India.