Hariom Parents,
We had a great start to Sunday morning with all the children yesterday. Here is a recap for you about the session.
We started class with 3 Oms and then followed it by chanting the Opening Prayer Om Sahanavavatu.
1. Chanting Slokas- Vakratunda Mahakaya (Ganesha shloka), Saraswati Namastubyam (Saraswati shloka) and Gurur brahma gurur vishnu (Guru stotram)
2. Dhyana Shloka - Buddhir balam
3. Hanuman Chalisa chanting – We did 6 slokas in class. (Shlokas 10 to 16 of Hanuman Chalisa) We added something to the mix. It was done more like an action song. So, children enjoy the shlokas more when they understand the meaning and as Hanuman Chalisa tells us about the stories of Hanumanji. We first made them pronounce each word then the whole shloka followed by the meaning/story of the shloka. We started this format and plan to continue this for the rest of the year.
Please practice chanting but our love for Hanumanji grows as we listen to his stories. So, encourage all children to keep the Hanuman Chalisa book as a reading book. The stories of Hanumanji are delightful and instills his virtues. The best way to enjoy it is by listening to his qualities. Parents you may also have fun listening to the stories.
4. Practise Aarti and Pledge for next Sunday session. Our class children are scheduled to lead Aarti and Pledge next Sunday. So we ensured all children can sing along with correct pronunciations.
5. Bhagawat Gita chanting: We learned and then chanted along with Swamiji Bhagawat Gita the shlokas 15 and 16. Please play the video and chant along with your children. This will encourage your children to chant. (13) Verses 15-16 Ch.3 BG - YouTube.
6. Games - Rama Says. (Same as Simon Says children had a lot of fun jumping but they were focused and very few kids got out. But this made the children have some fun.
7. Meditation – We followed with our meditation exercise that is Counting Coins in silence. It was a wonder to see all kids had counted the total number of coins correctly. The kids are in the middle of this year's session and children are now more engaged and focused.
8. Likhita Japa : We then proceeded to write rama rama in our likhita japa notebooks.
9 Aarti and Pledge : Then we proceeded to the temple for Aarti and Pledge.
We had a fun class with all your children. Thank you for working with them in practicing the shlokas. It was so good to see so many of our children are regularly practicing shlokas. We would like to encourage each and every child to participate in shlokathon, gita chanting and annual programs. It will be a rewarding experience to see the children do well as we will have these programs start March. Hanuman Chalisa is normally always part of Shlokathon. It would be great to see some of our children try to say the whole of Hanuman Chalisa for the shlokathon (some families chant Hanuman chalisa and we can see those kids able to sing along with familiarity they might be able to chant all 40 shlokas by shlokathon). Wishing everyone good luck practising.
Pranaam,
Meena Rajan and Ramya Belavadi
