The Interhouse Logical Intelligence Competition 2014-15

The theory of multiple intelligences was given by Howard Gardner in 1983. Gardner originally gave seven criteria for a behaviour to be considered intelligence and Logical Intelligence is one them. Logical intelligence is the ability to quantify, carry out complete mathematical operations, analyse and rationally approach a given problem. Individuals who have good logical intelligence are interested in patterns, arithmetic problems, games, puzzles and experiments and would thrive in careers as mathematicians, scientists or detectives among many more. To encourage students to further develop their logical skills, an inter house competition was held in Atmiya Vidya Mandir on 20th December 2014.

 

 

For the competition, students were divided into four groups as per their age. Following is a brief description of the group wise events:
 

Group 1: (Std. 1 to 3)
The participants from Std. 1, 2 and 3 were dressed up in three different colours, to form different patterns. Each colour was given one alphabet, so accordingly they were supposed to make a pattern. For instance, the colour green was for A and orange for B, white was for C. Calling for the round of pattern like - AACBB, students were supposed to stand as per the called pattern.

This competition was further followed by arranging note-books, long books, pencil boxes and plates, spoons, bowls in different patterns.

To add music to this competition, Jal Tarang was asked to be played again in a given pattern.

Group 2: (Std. 4 to 6)
Standard 4 to 6 participants had to attempt 20 questions based on number patterns, geometrical patterns, colour patterns and sequences on ixl.com.

Group 3: (Std. 7 & 8)
Students from this group had to solve an online quiz based on logical reasoning.

Group 4: (Std. 9 & 10)
For standard 9 and 10, the competition was held in the Mathematics lab. There were five rounds in which the participants solved number puzzles, matchsticks puzzles, tangram puzzles and logical puzzles racing against the set time limit.

The participating students showed a great amount of zeal and curiosity in solving the questions presented to them and worked quite well in teams to put their respective houses in as much a winning position as possible.

The overall result of the competition is given below:

Submitted by: Prabhumagna Sir

Success comes with responsibility: Sundaram House assemblies on the outstanding companies of the world

At AVM, flourishing with their inherent talent and growing with clarity of destination and vision for future, students aspire and strive to become entrepreneurs, industrialists and business giants of tomorrow. Quite considerately, these young aspirants (students) are being taught to live up to their dreams. Up against the fact that the high-tech entrepreneurial world is living through a time of high temptation and ethical morass, Sundaram House was all set to explain the students that integrity, values, trust and social responsibility comprised the much needed ethical bedrock of a successful company.

By presenting the success stories of outstanding companies of the world, Sundaram House members traced the small steps of these companies which led them to greater heights. The week started with exploring the secrets of success of the world’s fastest growing company: Google. Purvesh Sir explained the students that great organizations like Google are comprised of people who have a passion for what they are doing. Students were explained that thrill and challenge lead to success and merely putting in time to collect a pay cheque leads nowhere. Students learnt in this day’s assembly that people who made this company successful are excited, driven, and they believe that their work and efforts can make a difference.

On Tuesday, Mukesh Sir told the success story of Amul, the company which is the largest producer of milk in the world. Root to wings, the flying success of Amul brought the insight to students that in a world where temptation and competition are the driving forces, for a company like Amul, professional ethics and standards are of greater importance in establishing the necessary trust and integrity in the delivery of its services.

Wednesday brought yet another learning lesson from another big business giant of the world – Amazon. It was interesting for the students to know how good ethical behaviour reflects smart business practices and the secret of success of Amazon.com. Inc. Through the illustrations of Amazon’s success story, these young students were made to believe that people who rise above the crowd should be morally, ethically and socially accountable.

Yet another business giant, which is better known for ethics, integrity and trust is the Indian conglomerate – the Tata Group. Students learnt from the success story of this company that persistence should be tied to passion and a belief even when results are not in match with expectations.

In the junior assemblies, young tiny tots learnt about the values, ethics and quality-based output of companies like Mapro and Balaji. Though these assemblies were much fun filled, yet presentations and speeches and other activities brought many learning lessons for these tiny tots.

Thus, these assemblies of Sundaram House instilled the very quality of social responsibility in students where students find themselves accountable for fulfilling their civic duty while living onto their dreams. Students were encouraged to be innovative and foster a habit of thinking “out of the box”. Students learnt from these outstanding companies that safe paths never helps to grow and prosper.

Interhouse Football Competition 2014-15

The most nail-biting and fantastic football inter-house competition kick started on 15th Dec 2014 as the “football fever” took over the students of AVM. One could clearly see the enthusiasm and excitement in the eyes and body language of all students.

 

 

In the Sub Junior group (Std 4th, Std 5th & Std 6th), the first match was played between Satyam House and Sundaram House. It turned out to be a thrilling match and ended with penalty shootouts. But it was Satyam House who won the match by 4 goals against Sundaram House. The latter managed to score only 1 goal. The second match was played between Shivam House and Suhradam House. Aarinbhai scored the goal for Shivam House in the first half. In the second half, Suhradam House could not score any goal. Thus, Satyam House and Shivam House made it to the finals.

Sundaram House and Suhradam House competed for the third place. There were no goals in the first and second half. The match was then taken to the penalty shootouts, which to everyone’s surprise, also ended in a draw. The decision then remained hung upon the golden penalty! Suhradam House eventually won the nail-biting match.

The final match was played between Satyam House and Shivam House. Satyam House won the match with Anandbhai scoring the only goal of this very competitive and nerve catching final.

The most delirious group was the Junior group (Std 7th and 8th Std). Players in this age group played some of the most arousing matches at the football ground. This exciting experience started with the first match itself: Satyam House v/s Sundaram House. Satyam House had an advantage of an experienced goalkeeper but Sundaram House had the best defence and a powerful attack. Satyam House won the match in the end. The second match took place between Shivam House and Suhradam House. The match was very breath taking and Suhradam House took the lead 2-1, with a spectacular goal from Karanbhai and won the match.

The third place match was played between Shivam House and Sundaram House. The match was evenly set until the Shivam House defence faltered, crowning the victory to Sundaram House. The finals was the main event: ‘Sundaram v/s Suhradam’. There were many heart throbbing moments, which increased the excitement and thrill of the audience. In the end, Suhradam House, which put up a very tough fight and sealed the victory with 1-0.

In the Senior group (Std 9th, Std 10th and Std 11th), the first match was played between Shivam House and Suhradam House. The first half was very tough hence it ended with no goals. But the second half favoured Suhradam House, they scored 3 goals and won the match. The second match was played between Satyam House and Sundaram House. In both the halfs, both the teams made many attempts but the match ended to the penalty shootouts. They were exciting moments for everyone, but Sundaram House made it to the finals by scoring 5 goals to Satyam House’s 3 goals.

Now, it was time for third place. The match was played between Satyam House and Shivam House. In the first half, it was Jilbhai who managed to score a goal on behalf of Satyam House, which was equalised by Manhilbhai of Shivam House. With both the teams scoring 1 goal each, it was the time for penalty shoot outs. Shivam House scored 3 goals against Satyam House’s 2 goals to secure the third place. And then it was time for the most exciting and electrifying match, ‘Sundaram v/s Suhradam’ for the finals. A huge round of applause and loud cheering followed the entry of both the teams on the ground. The match stood at a balance with Arpitbhai from Sundaram House and Deepbhai from Suhradam House scoring one goal each by the half time. But it was Sagarbhai from Suhradam House who scored a wonderful goal in the second half. Ultimately, it was Suhradam House, which won the first place in the group.

The overall results were as follows:

• Pleasantly surprising, there was no one finishing fourth.
• At the third place, we had Shivam House and Sundaram House with 14 points each.
• At the second place, we had Satyam House with 18 points.
• And the first place was secured by Suhradam House with 26 points.

This exciting football competition was organized by a very hard working team of Dhiren Sir, Tejas Sir, Ritesh Sir and Tarun sir. All the volunteers also worked very hard on field to make the competition so enjoyable and successful. Last but not the least, the electrifying, yet disciplined audience, which was cheering and motivating the teams all the time and boosting their team’s confidence, had filled the ground with a lot of thrill and excitement.

Reported by: Sports Team

આત્મીય યુવા મહોત્સવના તેડાં

न गुरु: अधिकं तत्वं, न गुरु: अधिकं तप:।

न गुरु: अधिकं ज्ञानं, तस्मै श्रीगुरुवे नम:।।

અર્થાત્: ગુરુથી કોઈ શ્રેષ્ઠ તત્વ નથી, ગુરુથી અધિક કોઈ તપ નથી; ગુરુથી વિશેષ કોઈ જ્ઞાન નથી એવા શ્રી ગુરુદેવને નમસ્કાર.

પરમ પૂજ્ય ગુરુહરિ હરિપ્રસાદ સ્વામીજી આત્મીય વિદ્યા મંદિરના ભૂલકાંઓને આશીર્વચન આપવા અવારનવાર આત્મીય વિદ્યા મંદિરમાં પધારે છે. જ્યારે જ્યારે સ્વામીજી આત્મીય વિદ્યા મંદિરમાં પધારતા હોય છે તે દિવસનું વાતાવરણ દિવ્ય, અનેરું તથા અલૌકિક જોવા મળે છે. તેમાં આ વખતે ભૂલકાંઓને તથા આત્મીય પરિવાર જનોને આત્મીય યુવા મહોત્સવનું આમંત્રણ આપવા તારીખ 12/12/2014ને શુક્રવારના રોજ સ્વામીજી પોતે પધાર્યા હતા. 

આંગણીયે શુકનવંતા પગલે લાગણીઓ પથરાય જાય છે,

આવા અવસર ઉજવવા માટે ચોઘડીયા ભૂલાય જાય છે.

આત્મીય વિદ્યા મંદિરમાં પણ સ્વામીશ્રીના આગમનથી ભૂલકાંઓ તથા હરિભક્તોના મનમાં આવીજ કંઈક લાગણી જન્મી હતી તથા તેઓ સ્વામીજીના અમૃત વચનોની આતુરતાથી રાહ જોઈ રહ્યા હતા અને આવા ભક્તિમય વાતાવરણમાં સભાની શરૂઆત થઈ.

સભાની શરૂઆતમાં તરૂણ સરે શાળામાં થતી વિવિધ પ્રવૃત્તિઓનો અહેવાલ સ્વામીશ્રી આગળ ટૂંકમાં રજૂ કર્યો તથા ધોરણ 12 ના સમગ્ર ભૂલકાંઓ વતી તન્મયભાઈ, પાર્થભાઈ અને સચીનભાઈએ પૂજ્ય સ્વામીજી સમક્ષ પોતાની પ્રાર્થના રજૂ કરી આશીર્વાદ પામ્યા. પોતાને દેહે કરીને ઘણી તકલીફો હોવા છતાં તથા તેમના અત્યંત વ્યસ્ત કાર્યક્રમો વચ્ચે પણ સ્વામીજી આત્મીય વિદ્યા મંદિરનાં ભૂલકાંઓને મળવા આવ્યા હતા. આ દિવસે સ્વામીજીની આનંદમય અમૃતવાણીમાં ભૂલકાંઓ અને ભક્તો ભાવભીના થઈ ગયા હતા. સ્વામીશ્રીએ વિવિધ પ્રસંગો દ્વારા ભલકાંઓને સમજાવ્યું કે આપણી પાંચેય ઇન્દ્નિયોને પૉઝિટિવ રાખવી. તેઓએ સંત સમાગમનું મહાત્મ્ય પણ સમજાવ્યું તથા જીવનમાં સ્વધર્મ પાળવાનું વિશેષ જ્ઞાન આપ્યું. 

કોઈકે સાચું જ કહ્યું છે કે....,

જે કાંઇ થઇ શકે તે કરી લે આ જનમમાં,

આનાથી રૂડો બીજો અવસર નહીં મળે.

આ વાતને સમર્થન આપતા સ્વામીશ્રીએ તેમની પરાવાણીના અંતમાં સૌને આત્મીય યુવા મહોત્સવનું ભાવભીનું આમંત્રણ પાઠવ્યું.

- ગૌતમ સર

Wisdom and Teachings of Gunatitanand Swami ni Vaatu

“Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed and some few to be chewed and digested.” said Francis Bacon.

Books are our best friends, but according to the above quotation only a few books show us the true north and become the guide of our spiritual life because we are not human beings having a spiritual experience but we are spiritual beings having a human experience. Books like Gunatitanand Swami ni Vaatu, Shikshapatri, Shreemad Bhagvat Geeta, Ramayan, Ram Charit Manas, Purushottam Bolya Prite and Vachnamrut are the kinds of books that one should chew and digest. Life is full of challenges and in the midst of these challenges we seem to lose track many a times. However the people who have made these books their constant companions are the ones who smile their way through adversities and remain happy.

So, with a desire to introduce to our students with one such companion for life, Suhradam House celebrated the teachings and wisdom of the book Gunatitanand Swami ni Vaatu in the very first week of the month of December. During the week, Suhradam House teachers shared various vaatu in order to help students understand the glory of God, how to gain spiritual knowledge and how to attain peace and happiness.

To simplify the meaning of vaatu for students and to help them relate these gems in their life through a real life example, Suhradam House presented a drama on Saturday in the morning assembly: "જો બકા! આપણે દેહ નથી, આત્મા છીએ.". The drama was inspired by a true incident from respected Vijay Sir’s life, the Principal of Atmiya Vidya Mandir. Vijay sir has been a voracious reader of Vaatu since childhood. He has chewed and digested the book in true sense. Students have been learning from him about vaats from time to time in his assembly talks.

The drama narrated a challenging situation from his life and how Swami ni Vaatu helped him overcome his challenges despite extreme adversity. The incident was taken from the time when Vijay Sir was doing his PhD in Physics at Stony Brook University New York and he was working on making a micro-chip in the one of its kind state of the art lab. He had worked tirelessly on this invention for 3 months and was successful in making it. However, on the day after he made it, he broke it accidentally. He saw all his hard work done in vain. At that time, he was invited by Param Pujya Swamiji to attend a shibir in India. He had two choices – to immediately start working on his life time achievement and get the chip done again or go to India to attend the shibir and meet Swamishree. In such a time of difficulty he remembered Swamiji’s word to seek solution from Swami ni vaatu, so, with a prayer in his heart, he took help of Swami ni vaatu. He came across two teachings from the books:

1. The unwavering faith in God enables a person to remain stable in any adverse situation. The faith is to believe that whatever happens, is the wish of God and God never does anything wrong to His child.
2. Whenever one faces any perplexing situation and when it seems difficult to take decision, one should do bhajan – take the name of God and pray to Him to show the way.

These vaats helped him decide to go to India and he found peace in his heart being in the divine company of Swamiji and he forgot all his worries. After coming back to US, to his greatest astonishment, he found the chip in working condition. This experience strengthened his faith in God and in vaats. Gunatitanand Swami ni Vaatu is his favorite book and his constant companion.

After enacting, seeing and understanding this incident of the person who is a role model for all at Atmiya Vidya Mandir, students got a very convincing insight about the need to regularly read such scriptures as Swami ni Vaatu. Our former Head Boy, Sachinbhai Verlekar, now in grade 12, shared his favourite Swami ni vaat in the assembly: the one who wants to study, should never expect any pleasures or conveniences. Not only him, but the entire batch of class 12 students live this vaat day in and day out. They work close to 15-16 hours a day and sometimes more than that, without getting tired and they do it rather happily. Such is the impact of practicing Swami ni vaatu in their lives.

It’s a matter of great pride and honour for the students and teachers alike, to have such an accomplished and yet humble individual in Vijay Sir, as a School Principal, whose invention of making the fastest chip in the world has still not been made better by anyone.

Suhradam House was further honoured to have had this humble opportunity in attempting to learn lessons for life from a great book Gunatitanand Swami ni vaatu and help students lead a happy life without worries.

Written by: Nirali Ma'am

Inter House Table Tennis Competition 2014-15

After a long journey of practice, finally the stage was set for the school’s inter house table tennis competition from 25th to 29th November 2014. The very enthusiastic efforts of the school table tennis coach and sports teachers and the perseverance of students helped build great anticipation for this competition.

The competition was held in a group wise manner as per below:

• Sub Junior Group (Classes 4th to 6th)
• Junior Group (Classes 7th & 8th)
• Senior Group (Classes 9th to 11th)

For each group in the competition, there were four participants from each house.

There were two events as part of the competition:

1. Team 
2. Individual

During the matches, one witnessed the sub-junior players brimming with confidence, the contagious energy of juniors and the support and encouragement of the seniors.

The competition would have almost ended with a tie for the first place but to the credit of the Shivam House players, they managed to take a tiny and yet significant leap against the Satyam House team and ended up as champions of the competition.

The final score card was as below:

Reported by: Devang Sir

Interpersonal Intelligence Competition 2014-15

"It's not how smart you are that matters, what really counts is how you are smart." 

-by Howard Gardner

We all are supreme creation of GOD and HE has gifted all of us with the skills we cannot even imagine. So it doesn’t really matter to know how much smart we are. But it is important to unleash our potential and to introspect and find out how we are smart, what is that one or few skills which we have that make us different and successful than others. That is what really matters. This concept is very well explained by Howard Gardner in his theory of multiple intelligences. So in continuation with the school’s theme of developing multiple intelligences in the students of various age groups, the Interpersonal Intelligence Interhouse Competition 2014-15 was held on 29th November at Atmiya Vidya Mandir.

Interpersonal skill is one very important skill required in this day and age. We are social animals, we have to interact with other fellow members. So, the main motive of this competition was to make participants work as a team and to make them realize the importance of developing interpersonal intelligence.

For the competition, students were divided into four groups as per their age. Following is a brief description of the group wise events:

Group 1: (Std. 1 to 3)

The participants from Std. 1, 2 and 3 had to solve the jigsaw puzzle in a team of four. For teachers, it was a memorable event to see their youngest rising stars to work in a team and solve the puzzle.

Group 2: (Std. 4 to 6)

The participants from Std. 4, 5 & 6 had to work in a team to think & design a logo for their respective houses and explain its meaning.

Group 3: (Std. 7 & 8)

For Std. 7 & 8, there was a poster making competition on the theme of “Recipe of Success: Hard work + Earnest Prayers + Company of Good Friends”. Participants, in groups of 4, had to work as a team and make a poster. All the participants (total: 16) demonstrated a good ability to work in teams and also showed their creativity by making very nice posters that were rich in content.

Group 4: (Std. 9 & 10)

There was a dialogue writing competition for the participants from Std. 9 & 10. They had to work in a team of four and come up with the dialogues for given situations like conversation between father and son, husband and wife, two friends, teacher and student, and guru and disciple.

All the participants and non-participating students enjoyed the competition and mesmerized their friends and teachers with their teamwork and creativity.

The overall result of the competition is given below:

Written by: Priyavadan Sir