How to Develop my Child’s Musical Intelligence

The capacity to deeply understand, appreciate and create music is one of the finest abilities we possess as human beings. The amazing thing about this ability is that it is not just innate, but can also be developed throughout the course of an individual’s lifetime. Research suggests that the early years are foundational in developing a child’s flair for music, and some even go as far as to say that foetuses respond to music while still in the womb! Whatever the case, parents can do a lot to nurture their child’s musical ability. Here are some ideas we think you can try out:
1) Exposure to Classical Music
It’s a well-known fact that both western and indian classical music improve focus and cognition among other aspects. Giving your child a taste of classical music, instills in them a deep sense of awareness for rhythm and musical notes. Choose from a selection from maestros like Mozart and Beethoven, as well as from classical music from India, such as masters like Ravi Shanker and Bismillah Khan, among other legends.

2) Music from across Cultures
Different cultures vary in their range of musical techniques, instruments used and notational systems. Choosing music from across cultures broadens your child’s musical repertoire and ultimately, musical intelligence. Djembe beats from Africa, folksongs from Russia, European Gnossiennes and Chinese ‘Guzheng’ music, can help your child develop a unqiue appreciation for music from across borders. Do also experiment your child to explore music from different cultures within India, with a special focus on the ancient music of your particular culture.

3) Musical Games
Musical Games are great for helping children of all ages develop their musical intelligence. Playing games that involve beats, rhythms and singing can develop your child’s ability to identify and eventually create, their own music. Simple games like identifying chords, creating musical patterns, clapping to rhythms and continuing tunes can help your child make the leap from understanding music to creating their own.

4) Playing a Musical Instrument
The best international schools in Hyderabad offer music lessons for children. What sets schools like DRS International School apart is the individual attention and training given to children who play different instruments. We have dedicated studios and teachers for Guitars, Keyboards, Vocal Music etc to give students specialized coaching in the musical instrument they have understaken to learn. You can supplement this at home, by encouraging your child to practise playing the instrument at home, at a specific time everyday.
These tips help your child improve their musical intelligence, ability to read and create their own music and nurtures a life-long love for music overall. Do try them out and watch your little musician blossom.

How to improve my child’s fine motor skills

Fine motor skills are the skills use when we make small movements. These skills generally involve coordination between muscle groups and neurons in the fingers, wrists etc.
Your child's fine motor skill helps him/her to grow more independent, here are some activities which help your child develop fine motor skills.

• Clapping hands

Tiny tots feel great when they clap hands for a little achievement. Clapping helps them in improving the brain and hand coordination. Clapping is an exciting way to learn concepts in math’s like numbers and helps children develop a sense of rhythm, learn besides a flair for music.

• cutting out simple shapes with safety scissors

Let your child cut some stuff like clay dough, straws, strings, cooked noodles with a pair of safety scissors before cutting coarse paper. Cutting shapes out of paper with scissors in a proper way helps them improve their ability to coordinate finger dexterity, hand eye co-ordination.

• Pasting pictures

 Pasting cut out pictures to paper, for example, also develops fun. Take your child’s favorite rhyme and make a storyboard of that particular rhyme. Collect some pictures and assist them to paste these pictures to help them in improving their fine motor skills as well as in recalling rhyme and their plot lines.

• Puzzle arrangement

Tricky puzzles are always challenging and absorb a child’s complete concentration besides putting their thinking skills to test. Take cardboard puzzles and ask the child to arrange the puzzle. This can vastly improve their thinking skills and hand-eye coordination.

• Buttoning and unbuttoning

Little hands are always busy doing some or the other thing and most of all they also love getting ready on their own. Buttoning and unbuttoning of shirts can improve their fine motor skills. First, let them learn how to unbutton as matching buttonholes can be challenging. Demonstrate the process one step after step, encouraging your child to follow suit. Over time, your child will pick up both ability and speed.

• Building blocks tower or stacking

Stacking playing with toys or making a pyramid/tower helps children in developing their fine motor skills and also cognitive development, their ability to identify shapes and colors besides honing hand and eye coordination greatly challenge your child challenge to pick a particular shape or build color pyramid with in a time limit helps in the development of multiple skills. Like time management and self management skills.

• Clothes –line games

Little munchkins always try to learn from you and imitate you. Let them participate in your routine chores at home as this develops bonding. Hanging clothes to dry makes little muscles stronger. Challenge them to hang a single sock of different colors and ask the child to pick the other socks of the same color such activities would encourage the child to learn colors as well as the develop fine motor skills

• Lacing or weaving

Take a cardboard sheet and cut it into a shape of your choice and then punch in holes edges of the shape. Take some lace, add a piece of tape to both edges and teach them how to weave from one hole to another. Lacing activities like this ensure that your child has fun while he or she grows .

Friendly match at St.Peters'! Inter-School Friendly Basketball Match

‘Basketball is a lifelong game. You continue to learn from the game day in and day out, and all along the way, you get better’ -Scottie Pippen.

There’s nothing like a friendly match to liven up a gloomy day! Our residential students participated in a friendly Inter-School Basketball Match against St. Peter’s International Residential School, at their campus. The match saw both teams put their best feet forward, with players combining their passion for the game with the skills and training they have perfected through coaching. Friendly matches like these certain go a long way in fostering a strong sense of community spirit and camaraderie.

Exploring new Territory! Club Meet

Club Meets at DRS International School really push the envelope when it comes to innovation. Our students are always eager to discover what activities and projects their club mentors have in store for them. The second club meet of July saw students innovate with new ideas and new techniques, across the clubs.

Our musicians of the Music Club worked together to create their own composition, while the Cuisine Club carefully put together one of the most delectable desserts- a fruit pudding! Students of the Design and Technology Club, on the other hand, created their own melodies with the software, ‘Audacity’.

The DRSIS Community and Humane Club put finishing touches to their ongoing project of creating rakhi and friendship bands for a noble cause. The Performing Arts Club also made the most of the meet with a refreshing dance collaboration for freestyle dance moves. The Visual Arts Club completed crafting their jute pencil stands, putting passion into both the processs and the product. The MUN Club, likewise, got together to get to know their country a little better, digging up interesting facts and information from the MUN perspective.

Shades of Yellow! ‘Yellow’ Day Celebrations

Every color has its importance, and our facilitators of the International kindergarten encourage children to appreciate each color in new ways. On the  26^th of July, our budding inquirers of the International Kindergarten celebrated Yellow Day with a colourful, day-long celebration.

Yellow is a colour that symbolizes joy and intellectual energy. Our little ones embodied this spirit of energy and exuberance when they took to the stage for their performances. The children of IK I danced joyfully to the music of the ‘Roly Poly’ rhyme, while the kids of IK II wowed everyone with their fun rendition of the  ‘Gummy Bears Dance’. Last but not the least, our tiny tots of IK III danced for ‘Clap your Hands’ and ‘Baby Shark’.

Our students also developed their fine motor skills with preparing their take-aways. IK I students created the ‘Welcome Smiley Emoji’ , while our tots of IK II crafted a yellow, ‘Giraffe’. Not to be outdone, our creative little ones of IK III also showed us their creative side by making yellow chicks and ducks.

Leading our Leaders! Leadership Development Programme

A Leadership Development Programme was held on the 17^th and 18^th of July 2018.The main objective of this two day programme was to support our school leaders in actualizing their own potential as leaders.
Day One of this training saw our leadership team get divided into three groups. The groups were subsequently asked to name their group, give a tagline for the group name and were given an array of activities to help them to get to know each other better. These teams were built for the next two days of the workshop for coordinating various activities.

The workshop started with the team working on defining a leader, though in the true sense of the word, it is challenging to define one, given the myriad shared of leadership. Therefore the various attributes of a good leader were discussed with wonderful anecdotes from the participants being highlighted in the process. The discussions then spilled over to the development of leadership qualities such as leaders being task managers, having the skill for not only managing emotions and rather than being the leaders of people emotions. The need for developing a good EQ (Emotional Quotient), (MQ) Moral Quotient, besides the mere development of IQ was reflected upon.

The participants were made to understand that people skills should be based on two parameters - Character and Competence. The fun activities not only contributed towards building a strong team but also focused on the development of leadership attributes.
Day two the session was a one on one discussion with each participant sharing their experiences and reflecting on their learning from day 1. The spirit was high with participants freely opening up about both good and bad experiences and the trainer (Mr. Nirmal) giving them feedback on ways to deal and tackle with varying circumstances. Positive orientation towards people, communication, giving up on assumptions, dynamism in leadership were few of the discussions that happened across the table.
The day ended on a note of gratitude to the organizers and to each other for making the workshop an open one with everyone being able to benefit from the free expression of thoughts and ideas.

Building our Cambridge Toolkit! IGCSE Workshop

Mrs.Shivani Dhoreliya, our English Facilitator, attended a workshop held for IGCSE English teachers on 20th and 21st July  2018, hosted by the Shri Ram International School, Noida, Delhi. The workshop was essentially held to apprise the teachers of the changes in assessment structure from the year 2020. The 2019 paper pattern was also discussed at length. The various components of the two papers were dissected and the method of correction by the examiners as well as the marking and its criterion were explained to the teachers. The importance of accessing the teacher's hub to stay in touch with changes in the Programme, the significance reading of the examiner's report and the changes in the teacher support format were other things the attendees understood at length. Finally, easier methods for the classroom delivery of concepts was conveyed to teachers through interactive activities.