Respect is the Word

At Paathshala, we believe in teaching through activities so that learning is sustained for a long period of time. Originally the activity is for a classroom of students and is a part of SeTU, our value education program. We have tweaked to suit a family.

One generally understands the meaning of ‘respect’ but what one perceives as respectful may not be viewed in the same manner by others. Respect is dependent on a mixture of culture, customs, contexts, beliefs and personal values.

Here, we have described one such activity which helps explain the contextual meaning of ‘respect’ to children.

You will need: Pen, paper for chits, 2 bowls to keep the chits, a separate page to keep the score, a great family get together where everyone wants to have some fun

Here is how it works,

1. Pick a family member who will act as the Organizer of the game.
2. Split the group into two, one will be ‘A’ and the other ‘B’.
3. Give one bowl and papers to each group.
4. Ask each group to make 5 chits of respectful actions and 5 chits of disrespectful actions. E.g. being teased, being helpful. Give them 5 minutes and then request them to put the chits in the bowl. Take the bowls from them.
5. Once both the bowls are handed over, shuffle the chits in them. Keep the chits received from Group A in front of Group B and vice versa.
6. Group ‘A’ goes first and picks up a chit.
7. A member of group ‘A’ stand sin front of his/her group and picks up a chit from the bowl. Now the process is like the game of dumb-charades. He/she acts out the action mentioned in the chit. Time limit is 1 minute.
8. The other members of group ‘A’ will try to guess the action. If they are not successful then group ‘B’ gets a chance to guess but they only have 15 seconds to do so. If both groups are no successful, the actor says what the action was.

Let’s get down to the nitty gritty

1. The team that guesses the action correctly gets points.
2. Remove used chits from the bowls.
3. Take turns between groups to act out the actions.
4. Repeat until all the chits in the bowl are exhausted or as time permits.
5. The winning group is the one with the most points.
6. Reward the winning group with their favourite dessert.

We hope you have a great time with this activity!