Each teacher has had a unique journey in starting and running these mini-schools. There have been different challenges that they have met and crossed to accomplish this. Children have also come from very different back-grounds and the impact on their education before the mini-schools and how they took to the mini-schools were unique. However, there were several common strands that I could see in their responses.

Pedagogy
Teachers have used activities, and games to teach conceptual clarity. They have all done science experiments and showed that to the children. They have conducted arts and crafts for the children. They have organized group activities like functions and cooking sessions with the children. While these were enjoyed by the children, the teachers also seem to have developed an appreciation for these and seen the value in doing these for children’s education. They are all hoping to use these in the schools they go to as well.

The Whatsapp group as a forum for exchange of ideas was also identified by many of the teachers as a big plus.

We hope to continue these into the regular schools. Our teacher will also take these lessons with them when they go to school. Our computer teachers are going to focus a lot more on such activities. We hope to continue providing the teachers a forum for exchange of ideas.

Freedom
One of the key point most of the teachers identified as a way in which the mini-school experience was different from the regular schools was the freedom they had in deciding how to teach the children. While this also brought them a lot of challenges and responsibilities, the freedom they had in dealing with them was uniformly appreciated by all the teachers.

During the normal days before Corona, I have at times heard from government teachers about this lack of freedom to teach the children. I have always been an optimist at heart that a teacher would want to do well by the children if wrong pressures and incentives were not there. This experience with teacher-freedom in our mini-school experiment further convinces me about the need for such freedom.

Excited vs Afraid about the transition
There was a pretty clear divide between older boys and girls. The boys were excited about going to the new school. They looked forward to seeing old friends and making new ones. The girls (esp the ones in 6^th and 7^th std who are going to a different school now than they used to), were concerned about their new school, new teachers, travel arrangements etc. Some were even concerned that their families may not allow them to go to school if things didn’t work out.

It is going to be a challenging time for all of them – even for the younger kids and the older boys who weren’t as concerned about that. I really hope all our mini-school children transition smoothly to their new schools.

On Continuing the mini-schools
Many of the children and the teachers wanted the mini-schools to continue in some form. In this transition period, it will provide the children some hand-holding when they get settled in their new schools. It will also retain some of the emotional connect that the teachers have developed with the children. It will further provide them a forum for doing the “right” kind of teaching. They will be able to dedicate greater time to activities etc.

It also protects from the systemic problems of schools in Tamilnadu. The entrenched rote learning and the complete lack of care for the welfare of the children’s education which have become apparent during this Covid school closures, will not affect Asha’s mini-schools.

But at the practical side, the teachers are spending the full working day working at a regular school. So to expect them to have the energy to continue running a mini-school in the evening is not feasible. Therefore, for now we have permitted teachers who are interested in running a mini-school to do so in their places. Asha will continue supporting them in terms of nutrition (where we are doing that), materials and a token additional salary as well.

In the end …
Our mini-schools have been a very successful initiative. Our teachers continued getting salary when they most needed it. Children continued education in a manner that was as good by most measures and even better by some measures than what they got at school. And we did this without compromising the health of the teachers or the students.

It was just as emotional a farewell for me after having travelled with all of these teachers and children for the last one and a half years.