Story-telling for Literary Week

As a part of the Literary Week at The Indian School-Second Shift, an edifying story telling session was held on 23rd August 2016 for the students of classes 2 to 5. Ms. Jaishree Sethi, resource person and story teller, deftly narrated a Russian folk tale.

The session commenced with an introduction of Russian:

What is your name? Kak vas zavoot? My name is Meenya zavoot . How are you? Kak pazhivayesh Fine Spaseeba preekrasna Grandmother/Scarf Babushka Little girl Malyshka Bear Meldved

Soon the auditorium was filled with a guitar strumming an old time favourite Mera joota hain Japani sir pe lal topi-Rusi.'. Although unfamiliar with the young students they happily hummed along.

A slide show introduced the children to the Russian flag, dress, food, monuments and traditions.

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The raconteur then picked up a story from a bag of stories she carried, MASHA AND THE BEAR and narrated it with a digital visual of the book.

Masha was a little girl who had lost her way in the forest and was captured by a bear. As Masha was a good cook and kept house well, the bear did not let her leave the house. One day, Masha baked some tasty pies and asked the bear if he would take them to her grandmother. The bear agreed and Masha secretly climbed into the basket of pies. The bear started for grandma's home but on the way, he felt tempted and decided to eat one of the pies! Fearing that she would be discovered when the bear opened the basket, Masha called out: How dare you eat someone elses pies! The bear was petrified and dropped the basket and ran until he was out of sight! The moral of this tale is the importance of keeping one's wits and not losing one's head in difficult situations.

The story session wrapped up with a round of riddles and an activity to identify Russia, Africa, Iran and India on the Globe.

Next was a craft activity - a mask of a bear ( a character from the story) which was created from paper circles of different shades of brown.

The participation by the students was commendable. They enjoyed the mask-making activity and were keen to help each other. As was clearly evident they now know Russia a little better.