INTRODUCING YOUNG MINDS TO THE FUTURE OF TECHNOLOGY!
It all started with the grandkid of our CEO Mr. Avinash Kulkarni, where he would watch his granddaughter play and handle Alexa and truly enjoy doing it so much that it would give her so much joy and happiness. Seeing his granddaughter have fun with Alexa, motivated our CEO to bring this same joy and enthusiasm to the kids in India. And so, the journey begins ….
The first character in the story I would say is the Driver Uncle of our CEO, who loved this idea of inculcating technology in young minds. He insisted on starting or sowing a seed of this idea in a school in his village-“Pirangoot”. This gave us a kickstart to-“If we really want to implement this, then how will we show this to the world? How will we present it?”. The thought was simple to introduce Alexa to small kids, make them excited about getting to know Alexa. Also show how they can use Alexa in their curriculum, in their daily fun activities in school and much more.
Due to some reason, we could not implement or present this in the school in Pirangoot. But Avi sir came up with a notion to present this in a school nearby us, as we can go and talk them into this vision too.
Pune Vidyarthi Gruha (PVG) was the first school we approached and they loved the idea and thought behind the whole concept. Now all we had to do was prepare ourselves to present the idea to the kids, teachers and faculty members of the school. For this purpose, we would need someone who knew Alexa well, who could add the skills in Alexa for presentation.
Here comes the second character, a girl named Pornima- who happens to be an intern in our company, working on the scheduling of medicines in another project called “Panhealth”. Pornima got assigned on preparing the presentation and activities that we will be showcasing to the kids, she willingly showed equal excitement and joy in doing all the work.
She was given a good span of time to prepare for the presentation. As she was working on it, we had Avi sir in the office with us too. Avi sir would daily check on her progress, ask her updates ,give her exciting inputs, and encourage her to give her best in this project. Avi sir asked her to prepare fun activities to do with Alexa, which the kids would really love. One of those activities was “Alexa changing the colors of the light bulb”, now this might sound ordinary to the adults, but when the small children would see it, they will surely be amazed, this was the thought that went behind the activities. All the imagination was done on the kids perspective of using, playing with Alexa.
As days went by, on 19th of April 2023, Our Team approached the Chairman of PVG school, we presented the presentation on this idea. We had already given various names to this idea, one of those names was also “Smart Toys”. The meeting with the chairman went exceedingly well. He agreed on allowing us to present and put up a show infront of the kids.
On the very next day i.e., 20th of April, our team including Avi sir, Pornima, and Yukta(php intern), and the supporting first character Driver Uncle. They all reached PVG school at sharp 8:am. The chairman welcomed all of them, and as the chairman was having a chat with our CEO, pornima and yukta were prepping to start with showcase of activities and games. The event was supposed to take place in the auditorium, but there was a temple in the school and it was very open, pleasant with winds flowing. Avi sir said let’s just call the kids here, and while the girls would do the setup, an interesting story of the temple was narrated to our team by the members there. It was a temple of “Rama-Lakshmana” depicting their childhood days, before they got married.
The setup was done, the children came with their teacher, there were around 55 children all ranging from 5 to 8 years old. We were all excited seeing them, Avi sir started with the Introduction. The kids were pretty excited and were eager to know more about Alexa. Then Avi sir handed it over to pornima and yukta. They started with the activities.
The First Activity was “Alexa changing colors of the bulb”, pornima started first and when Alexa changed the colour of the bulb from her voice command, the kids were in awe and surprised to see it happen. Their reactions were totally worth it, and they wanted to try it for themselves. So, we asked the kids to come and give Alexa voice commands to change the colors and every time the color would change, the kids would enjoy it so much, the happiness on their faces was all this was about.
The Second Activity was to guess the animal voices, as we all know how kids get scared or fascinated by the animal voices of tiger or lion. The same took place here, the kids were enthralled by the animal voices we played, they insisted on wanting to hear the animal voices of their choices too.
The Third Activity was to guess the animal, the kids had to decide an animal and ask Alexa to guess the animal. Alexa would ask one description of the animal, and ask us to confirm. This would go around for a while for a few number of descriptions, and then Alexa would conclude with an animal name close to our answers of “yes”/” “no”, if the answer is right Alexa would say “Wow, fantastic” or else she would say “oh! I’m sorry”. The kids loved the activity as Alexa guessed the most animals right.
The Fourth Activity we took was “Spelling Bee”. Alexa will say a word and the kids had to spell that word and tell it to Alexa, if the word was right Alexa would appreciate the kids and move on to the next word. Children were bouncing over each other to spell and say the right word, the enthusiasm was amazing to watch, they were engaged in the activity throughout.
The Fifth Activity we did was we played a few poems for the kids, poems they would love, poems they were familiar with. Like “humpty-dumpty”, “Jack and Jill”, “hickory Dicory dock” etc.
The Sixth Activity was we asked “General Knowledge” questions to the kids, easy and simple which they could answer. For example, “Give me the name of states in the south”, “Tell me which is the orange city” etc. The kids also asked information from Alexa about certain places and things.
We were done with all the activities, no one realized how and when so much time had passed with all the fun and games. Towards the end we played a song frothe children,their favourite song from “Taare Zameen Par” –“Bam Bam Bole”. All the kids, teachers, our team including Avi sir, danced with the kids on the song and gave a perfect ending to this event.
Before we would leave, we called upon each kid and asked them his/her name and gave them a chocolate, for their complete participation and positive energy.
For the vote of thanks, the teacher thanked our team, loved the idea we went there with and insisted us to visit again. She also felicitated Avi sir and team with a flower bouquet.
Further, Avi sir thanked all the faculty members, teachers and kids and we came back with an experience and a story to tell to the world.
Overall, the event was all smiles and giggles, fun and laughter, insightful and rewarding experience for us. The goal is to be able to implement this and introduce Alexa to young minds in as many schools as possible, and further in as many states as possible.
We look forward in making this vision successful and create a story like no other.
