BASTAR (CHHATTISGARH): In this strife-torn region, teachers and students got together to ease off some stress by holding a mega show to inculcate scientific temperament.
On January 22, over 44,000 students from 637 middle and 169 high and higher secondary government schools in the tribal dominated district of Bastar showcased more than 35,000 experiments and working models in a day-long Bastar Science Experiment project at 119 cluster centres.
All the installations were created out of household objects and those sourced from the local market. The event was organised simultaneously in 119 educational clusters involving 697 teachers of the district by Bastar Collector Amit Kataria as an opportunistic step to promote activity-based science learning as a continuous classroom activity.
On show were how lightning is formed, working of the human physiology of breathing, windmills, long-lasting bubbles, acids and bases, working of vacuum cleaner, static electricity, good conductor and many other examples from Physics, Chemistry, Biology and Mathematics. The show imbibed the essence of scientific methods. A team of The Limca Book of Records was in Bastar to assess the installations for a possible inclusion in the book.
“Nowhere in the country has such an experiment been carried out using easily available things from household or local markets used for activity-based science learning throughout the academic year,” said Nikhilesh Hari, the Prime Minister’s Rural Development Fellow deployed by the Union Ministry of Rural Development.
The project’s theme, ‘Kabaad Se Jugaad’, aimed to popularise the notion for application of rational and logical minds, which included exploring, handling, manipulating and observing through process skills.
“In restive Bastar region, there is a need to contest the predicament of superstition practices. Instilling scientific temperament among students will help encourage research attitudes and assumes significance for development of the state," said Kataria.