Science in rural schools
Science exhibits
A permanent science exhibition has been set up at Vidnyanvahini’s office (Prayogika) at Dhayari in Pune to celebrate International year of Chemistry by shri Jayant Phalke in January, 2011 on “Chemical bonds and Valency. They illustrate topics such as why chemical bonds are formed, the bonding mechanism, configuration of orbitals on atoms, sigma and pi bonds, types of bonding like covalency, polar covalency, electrovalency, metallic bonds. Etc. These are useful for students from grade 9 to 12 as well as general public. More such exhibits will be added in future.
If a group of 10 to 25 interested persons desirous of visiting this exhibition, they may call shri Jayant Phalke (91-9890944526) and arrange for such a visit.
Student camps
Vidnyanvahini conducts a Vidyarthi Shibir (student camp) annually in Pune in the third week of June each year. The participants of this camp are rural students of 10th standard accompanied by their teachers. The intention of the camp is to widen the horizon of the rural students by exposing them to a diverse range of subjects and experiences. During the five day residential camp the students are addressed by subject matter experts in a variety of subjects like bioengineering, nano technology, stem cells, solar technology, astronomy, rocket technology, and so on. They get instruction on easy-to-prepare science experiment kits and are also taken on educational visits to industries and institutions around Pune such as Tata Motors, Armament Research and Development Enterprise, Defence Institute of Advanced Technology, Bharat Petroleum Refinery, IUCAA , Pune University etc.
Rural science centre, Anadur (Grameen Vidnyan Kendra)
A Vidnyan Kendra, set up jointly in collaboration with Halo Medical Foundation at Anadur in Osmanabad district of Maharashtra, offers the opportunity to perform science experiments to students of surrounding rural schools. The Centre also conducts competitions in elocution, essay writing and quiz on science related subjects for these students.
Mobile library
To encourage the habit of reading among students, Vidnyanvahini circulates book bags among schools. The bag contains about forty books on science and related subjects and is kept in a school for a semester. A teacher is given the responsibility of circulating the books among students. Typically, four schools take advantage of this scheme every year.
Publications
For students learning science in Marathi, there is a paucity of books other than textbooks prescribed by the government. Vidnyanvahini’s publications tend to address this issue. The books so far published deal with atomic structure and issues of relevance to adolescent girls and boys. Vidnyanvahini has also published Marathi translations of English books dealing with topics in mathematics.
In a similar vein, while there is increased availability of computers at schools, they are rarely used for teaching due to lack of computer-aided teaching resources. To address this lacuna Vidnyanvahini has published a series of Powerpoint-based presentations in Marathi on science. Similarly video tutorials on various science subjects and experiments are in the process of creation.
Following books have been written by members of DAG and published by either Vidnyanvahini or other publishers.
विज्ञानवाहिनीच्या संवादकांची पुस्तके
विज्ञानवाहिनी प्रकाशन
अणूचे अंतरंग - लेखक श्री . जयंत फाळके
Story of the atom - author Shri. Jayant. Phalke
मनोविकास प्रकाशन
किमया गणित मैत्रीची - अनुवाद डॉ . मधुकर देशपांडे
दिनदर्शिकेमधील जादू - अनुवाद डॉ . मधुकर देशपांडे
संख्यानगरीत भटकंती - अनुवाद डॉ . मधुकर देशपांडे
हितगुज उमलत्या कळ्यांशी - वयात येणाऱ्या मुलींसाठी - लेखिका सौ . पुष्पा पालकर
हितगुज - वयात येणाऱ्या मुलांशी - लेखिका सौ . पुष्पा पालकर
