When cyclists, skaters ruled the street

PANJIM: Avid walkers, cyclists and children on skates made the best of the Dayanand Bandodkar Marg on the entire Campal stretch on Sunday morning for a few hours during the No- Motorised Zone ( Nomozo) celebration that lasted from 9.30 am to 12 noon.

It was an initiative of Aamchi Panaji to educate people on the advantages of having no cars and buses on the road once in a while.

Volunteers of Aamchi Panaji wearing Nomozo T- shirts worked hand- in- hand with the police and other authorities to ensure the event went on without any problem.

Architect Talullah D’Silva, who conceptualized the idea, said the D B Marg was closed for traffic from 9.30 am to 12 noon. “ We sent our volunteers to assist the police in keeping traffic at bay on this road. We did this because many people were not aware of the closure. We managed to get the permission for the Nomozo only on Friday,” she mentioned.

The event saw artist Harshada Kerkar put up a work of art made out of natural material on the road at Campal near the Forest Department. Taleigao- based Bookworm Library organized a story- telling session.

The Nomozo gave a big boost to the Konkan Fruit Fest on its concluding day. A volunteer at the fest said the stalls received a good number of people on account of the Nomozo celebration.

Ward corporator Kabir Pinto Makhija said Nomozo was a good initiative in a long time. We need something like this happening more often, but it has to be advertised well, he observed.

Some of the citizens who participated in the event said it was difficult controlling their children who were cycling and skating. “ It was excitement and a sense of adventure to ride and skate on a street which otherwise is full of vehicles,” they stated.

A senior citizen remarked why do we need cars and buses on Sunday? “ They all can give their engine a rest and allow us to live,” he added.

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Who Can Attend: Educators and people who work with literacy .

Where: Bookworm, Taleigao Goa

When: Friday June 1^st

Time: 10.00 am – 5.00 pm ( Please carry packed lunch or avail of take away service) Tea/Coffee available.

Fee: Rs. 200/-

Facilitator: Dr. Lynn Mario T de Souza – Professor of Linguistics at the University of Sao Paolo, Brazil.

Call: 9823222665 to register or for more details.

The team at Bookworm loaded the van with books for all ages, mats, easels, puppets, art material, stories and readers and hit the street.

Sunday morning, beneath the canopy of the glorious, lush, comforting rain trees, children and adults read, listened, talked to each other and explored books.

A Cholta Cholta Treasure Hunt was organised to explore the Campal area with Pritha Sardessai. Flowers and leaves offered by the rain trees was used to create stunning art with Harshada Kerkar and Elaine and Niquita read stories and engineered story thinking activities all morning.

Krystal, Sujata and Niju had fun doing everything, on a NoMoZo  street.

For more photos, visits our facebook page https://www.facebook.com/bookwormgoa

Panaji is going to witness a unique citizen’s initiative called NoMoZo (Non-Motorized  Zone), which  will make its debut on Sunday,  May 13 between 9 a.m. to 12 noon on a stretch  of road between Kala Academy and 2 Signal Training Centre. 

A non-motorized zone is a designated length of road where adults, children, senior citizens and differently abled people can walk freely, cycle,  jog, roller skate, exercise, play, explore and meet fellow citizens. Ideated by an enthusiastic group of citizens called Aamchi Panaji working as a team with Corporation of the City of Panaji, it addresses the complex issue of traffic congestion and how all our city streets are piling up with a burgeoning number of private cars and other vehicles.

It seeks to educate citizens that the solution lies not in widening roads to accommodate more cars but to replace every 30 cars with a city bus, dedicated cycle lanes and pedestrian paths. Freeing the streets of private vehicles predominantly cars, NoMoZo will allow people to move freely, decrease vehicular congestion, lower pollution caused by emissions, improve health and sustain urban mobility. Many groups have extended support and will be participating at NoMoZo.

The Sunday Evening Quiz Club will have a quiz session while Bookworm Children’s Library will conduct a treasure hunt, book reading session and an interesting art session with Harshada Kerkar. All these activities have been planned on the side lanes parallel to the main thoroughfare which will be exclusively used by pedestrians, cyclists and roller skaters. To experience a car-free street, simply walk or cycle to the Kala Academy Junction on DB Marg. For residents or visitors from the outskirts of the city or outside, you could park at the Parade Grounds, Kala Academy parking lot or the Betim Ferry Point. Citizen volunteers and supporters of this initiative will be working as a team with the Traffic Cell Panaji to help diversions in traffic between 2 Signal Training Junction and the Kala Academy Junction. So shop and wrap up all your personal chores early Sunday morning and keep your date with NoMoZo.

While Panjim is kicking the driving habit at NoMoZo, Bookworm is calling all readers to bring their reading habit to the streets.  So join us for “Cholta Cholta Treasure Hunt” we’ll see Panjim as we never have before.  And while we’re at it, we’ll show you how we’ve already taken reading to the streets with our Mobile Outreach Program (MOP). Also join Harshada Kerkar who supports “Art that Grows”and participate in public art installation.

May events at Bookworm. Please pass the Calendar and the word around. We need a buzz to stay alive:-) and we need kids and parents to come through those doors!

Tuesday was over all the best day of my week so far, thanks to Bindi Su.

So I started with a small picture talk with the std II children. They tried to guess what Bindi Su was looking at the cover page. They came up with many things seeing the green and the red….chaadar, nose, sari, bindi…. Then when I pointed out to the white tyres…someone said “Tyre!” and then there was a flow of bus! lorry! car! They were thrilled….

We read the whole story together…the repetition pattern worked very well. They were mouthing the words soon after two examples. Though, I realized text-wise, the book was very simple for my Std. II. They were able to decode easily and I think the repetition pattern helped comprehension. 

Children noticed small details on the page during the reading…like the balloon seller and his  balloons. They also LOVED predicting which animal would come next. And they were SO thrilled when they got it right! 

They especially loved the page on the sea…the ferry was new for my Mumbai kids. They all wanted to touch the blue and the fish. 

When we finally came to the last pages, I gave them all a paper and they were quite enthusiastic about the questions the book left them with. They weren’t disappointed that the story did not ‘end’. All of them, well most of them said, no the car doesn’t stop. 

I was fascinated by some of their responses to why the animals ask Bindi Su to stop : 

· they wanted a lift to the jungle

· they wanted to cross the road

· they were scared of her because she was going TOOO fast

· my favourite – they wanted to stop her and tell her “Ooooh how lovely you look!” 

· she ran over the frog and crushed it, they had to take it to the hospital

Special Educator Niquita Ferrao, Goa wrote:

I woke up this morning thinking: “Why didn’t Bindi Su stop? WHY? That’s the effect Bindi Su has on its reader! It gives EVERY child the opportunity to think creative and let their imagination soar! It delivers exactly everything a book that every child should be encouraged to read.  It is learning oriented and fun! This picture book is engaging, fascinating and captivating. With inclusive education in every school, even children with special needs will also benefit from this book. Children on the Autism spectrum for example possess great attention to details; they look for the finer details in a picture drawing and are commonly visual learners. The illustrations of Bindi Su bring to life the text to kids who have just started reading or may never really learn to read.  . Easy reading, one line per page and repetition of the same words through the book will definitely help children with learning disabilities. Even the font colour and size have been appropriately chosen for children who are partially visually impaired. If you look at pages 1 and 2, the colour of the font shifts from white to black to enable better contrast. The end of the book is what I would consider a knockout. As a special educator, Bindi Su, gives a child the freedom to choose his form of expression and to think creative. One is not limited to write but even draw- which facilitates fresh and honest assessment.  …and now I’m back to thinking: Why didn’t Bindi Su stop?

1. Book exchange on a monthly basis.

2. Interaction with the teacher about the nature/type of books that are preferred

3. Sharing with the teacher about the book box being renewed, nature, type, link with curriculum.

4. A story session with extension activity when it fits into the school time table.

Children signed up to learn to cook and bake with Anita Martins-Pereira and Elaine Mendonsa.

Bookworm positions Cooking and Baking as at the Library is one of the most favoured learning activities for its multi-sensory and integrated curricular dimensions.

Cooking and baking makes specific demands on reading in sequence and decoding short sentence, exposes young chefs to new vocabulary. Recipes make demand on functional math skills for measuring and approximations, use of science to understand how changes matter and what the various processes that are used for cooking are. Cooking and baking links food to cultures and peoples and allow young children to get a ‘tactile’ sense of how we are influenced through food. But the most positive enabler is that young people make their own food, being actively involved at every level and stage of the process and take some samples home to savour and enjoy with a recipe to do this again and again.

Wordsmith:

Using words and images to express ideas was the main theme of this workshop.

Story Writing: What makes a good story, what are the parts of a story, who decides what stays in a story and what not, what is a character and what is a setting, are conclusions necessary, can a story be connected to my life and can I fun crafting a story?

Participants were facilitated by a host of writers, Victor Rangel Ribeiro, Salil Chaturvedi, Anniruddha Sen Gupta, Milan Khanolkar, Salil Konkar and Jose Lourenco who visited the workshop to interact and support creative writing with the kids.

Clay Animation Workshop:

Children worked with Salil Konkar and Milan Khankolkar and made a short film using clay to craft characters, called The Wizard and the Green Dragon which you can view here.

Tribal Motifs in Art and Craft:

Children used traditional motifs from Warli, Madhubani and Gond Art to create objects that they crafted in fabric, paper, wood and foam.

Bookworm is happy to support Brian and Natasha Farias who have begun their own MOP site in Chicalim village.