Tuesday, December 27, 2016

Uncle Mushroom - Forest School


Uncle Mushroom was in deep thoughts. He wanted to discuss his thoughts with the king, so that he can get permission to proceed with his idea. Uncle Mushroom presented his thoughts before the king to get the approval. His proposal was to educate the animals and plants of their “Happy Land”. King was very happy
about his proposal and he agreed for that. He wanted his subjects to be civilized. King asked about the teacher of the School. Uncle Mushroom said he has already identified a teacher from the city Zoo: Prof. Tim Tiger. He is a graduate and he delivers lectures in Zoo. Uncle Mushroom said, I have requested him for the same in the Happy Land and he has happily agreed, but before he could proceed he wanted king’s green signal. King said: “Go ahead; I will support you fully in this noble deed”.
Uncle Mushroom said: I will appoint Eci Eagle to pick Prof. from the Zoo to Happy Land and leave him back to the Zoo. King agreed and he said, if you want any kind of support please let me know. Uncle Mushroom and King shook their hands as the sign of approval.
Uncle Mushroom called Eci and told him to get Prof. Tim, so that they can discuss about classroom settings. They discussed about the requirements and agreed on it.
Prof. Tim wanted a Projector, Black Board, White Board, Marker, Chalk Piece, Duster, Benches and Slates for students. He also wanted Abacus to train his students in Mathematics. He gave an Abacus to Uncle Mushroom and said: keep this as a model and prepare Abacus for each and every student.
Uncle Mushroom started his task. He assigned the job of preparing Black Boards to Elephants. He told
them to prepare two big boards of wood with a stand to hold them and he also instructed Woodpeckers to support them in the design.
He called group of Mynas and instructed them to prepare dusters using cotton with the help of cotton plants.
He also instructed Hibiscus, Sunflower and Green Rose to extract their colors and put it into the marker made out of wood. He instructed Mice to prepare markers and finalize markers with the help of flowers.
Uncle Mushroom instructed group of Rhinos to prepare some benches and desks. Task of preparing slates using wood was given to Monkeys.  
Uncle Mushroom told Black and White roses to extract their colors so that those colors can be painted to board and slates.
Uncle Mushroom told group of Giraffe to paint a board with black color and another with white color. He also instructed group of Giraffe to paint all the slates with black color. Uncle Mushroom also suggested group of Giraffe to keep white color in small bowls with a small twig in each one of the bowl. It can be used instead of chalk on black board and slates.

Two major tasks were remaining now: Projector and Abacus.  Uncle Mushroom thought of completing projector first. He told Birds to get a big banana leaf and roll it in the form of a circle and fix it. A circle of banana leaf was ready. He instructed Bees to get the transparent sap of the old Oak tree. If we see through that sap, the objects appear larger. He told Birds to put that sap at one end of the banana leaf circle. He told them to set the projector in such a way that a tiny ray of light from the sun should continuously fall on the sap through the other end of the circle and the light coming through the sap end should be captured on the white board. The settings were made accordingly. He also suggested birds to make a lid and cover the sap end so that white board can be used for dual purpose: sometimes as a board and sometimes as a projector screen. He also instructed Birds to prepare a thin sheet out of sap which will be used by Prof. Tim to project the learning material.

To prepare Abacus, he asked the help of Oysters in the nearby beach. They agreed to give Pearls to prepare Abacus. He instructed Rats to prepare Abacus instrument using wood and pearls. He gave them the model of Abacus for their reference and told them to replicate the same.
The job of decorating the classroom was given to Peacocks and Parrots.
Everything was ready as per the instructions of Prof. Tim. Uncle Mushroom called Prof. Tim to check if everything is proper. Prof. Tim was very happy about the arrangements made, everything was just perfect. He was thrilled at the ideas using which Projector and Abacus were made.
Prof. Tim told Uncle Mushroom that he will be starting the classes from tomorrow. Uncle Mushroom said OK and he told him that the king of Happy Land will be inaugurating the School at 9:00 AM tomorrow. Same circular was sent to all students and they were asked to be present at 9:00 AM. After inauguration there was snacks distribution and that responsibility was given to Bears.
School was inaugurated as per the schedule. Prof. Tim gave a speech on importance of being educated.
Uncle Mushroom encouraged all students to take the benefit of the school to the fullest. King expressed his happiness in this regard. He congratulated Uncle Mushroom and Prof. Tim for their great thinking and he also expressed his desire of being in the School for the first session, so that he can learn something. Snacks were
served to all.
Prof. Tim started his class. He said today is the first day of the School so, we will enjoy and learn. He told: I will be splitting up you people into two groups for a quiz session, in which I will be projecting the pictures of some Plants, Animals, Flowers and etc. Each team has to identify the projected item. If they guess it correctly one point will be given to them, else it will be passed to the other team and they will be given one point if they guess it right. Students were divided into two equal groups. Uncle Mushroom was there in one group, so the name of the group was Uncle Mushroom. The other group was named after the king as he was present in that group.
Prof. Tim started projecting and he was also noting down the points. Both teams actively participated in the Quiz. Prof. Tim used to explain the importance and the botanical names of each and every projected object.
Everybody was enjoying playing with learning. Students got to know about many new things. Before ending the class, Prof. Tim gave them an assignment. He told everybody to draw a flower of their own choice and color it. All students took up the assignment enthusiastically and completed their assignment in slate using extracted colors.


Next day Prof. Tim asked for the assignment. He was really happy at the response of his students. All of them have completed the assignment. He praised everybody for their dedication. That day he started teaching them A, B, C, D and taught them how to write A, B, C, D. That days assignment was to write A, B, C, D five times.
Next morning he taught some of the words corresponding to alphabets. A – Apple, B – Ball etc. and gave them the assignment to get two new words for each letter.
Days passed and he taught them writing letters, words, sentences, speaking English and Mathematics using Abacus, which became very easy for them.

They used to do new Scientific experiments, they used to see the structure of a cell, what is there inside a leaf under the microscope. All students became self confident. They could speak English fluently now. They were confident of facing any challenge given to them.
As the last day of the school an examination was arranged, in which the students of Zoo also participated. There was a competition between the students of Zoo and happy Land.
All students of Zoo arrived at Happy Land. Students of Happy Land were scared as they saw new kind of instruments in the hand of Zoo students which they had never seen. They had different color pencils, pens, books, sheets etc. Uncle Mushroom came near them and told them not to be scared and believe in what they have learnt, then the success will be theirs. He told them to have confidence on what they have learnt and what Prof. Tim has taught to them. Happy Land students were little relaxed now and they were ready for the examination/ competition.
The competition was split into three parts. In the first part students had to find five medicinal plants told in the
given area. Second part was to draw an Orchid flower with the same shades and color of the real Orchid flower displayed there. Third part was Group Discussion to test the vocabulary and their confidence.

Competition started Prof. Tim listed five medicinal plants names and told all students that these plants are available in this small area, all have to get those plants to him. It was very easy to the students of Happy Land as they have seen these plants in real life, on contrary students of Zoo very facing it very difficult because, they have only seen those plants in book not in real.
All Happy Land students finished the task in given time, only few Zoo students completed that.
By this Happy Land students gained one point. For the next part which is drawing and painting competition half an hour time was allotted. Zoo students were very confident of winning this round as they already had all color pencils with them. Happy Land students were scared of the same.
Competition started, everybody put their full efforts to win. Prof. Tim din not disclose the winner of this round. He started with the next round which was group discussion. All students were equally competitive in this round, everyone gave their best. This round was a tie.

The results of second round was about to be declared. If Happy Land students win that round, they are declared as winners else if Zoo students win that, there will be one more round to break the tie.
Before he could declare the winners Prof. Tim told his students not to take winning or loosing personally. Winning and loosing is just a part of the game. All of you are already winners for me. He also said practical knowledge is very important than only the theoretical knowledge. Both groups have drawn wonderful pictures and colored them perfectly. The only this the result is based on is the colors of the shades.
Happy Land students have knowledge of extracting colors from the flowers and Zoo students have almost all colored pencils with them. As Happy Land students could extract exact shade of each and every layer of the flower, they could color it perfectly. Zoo students did not have exact shades, the shades of the color which they had were near to that color but not the same color.
Hence the clear winner of this round is Happy Land group because, of their practical knowledge. As a whole Happy Land group was the winner of this competition.
Happy Land students started jumping in happiness, Zoo students also applauded for them. Zoo students did not get dishearten, instead they asked Happy Land students to give them the practical knowledge and asked them to teach how to extract colors from flowers.
At the end all students danced for the music played by Prof. Tim. Prof. Tim and Uncle Mushroom were proud of the students. 
   

Wednesday, December 14, 2016

Kai Kadabu ( Kai Karigedabu / Coconut Dumplings )

Ingredients (for filling): 

Grated fresh coconut : 1 bowl
Jaggery : 1 bowl
Cardamom powder  

Ingredients (for dough): 

Maida (All purpose flour) : 200 grams

Oil : 1 tsp
Salt : 1 pinch

Oil : to fry

Dough Making 

Filling:

Step 1: Caramelize jaggery using 1/4th bowl of water ( it should be one string consistency)

Step 2: In a pan, put grated coconut ( if you want you can paste it coarsely) and caramelized jaggery (strain it before mixing with coconut).

Step 3: Fry this mixture till it leaves the sides of pan.


Step 4: Take small portions of the filling and bring it to the shape shown below.


Step 5: Roll dough into small roti's


Step 6: Take a dumpling mould 


 Step 7: Put the rolled dough on the dumpling mould 


Step 8: Fill the filling and close the mould

 

Step 9: Press the mould on the corners and open it up  

  
Step 10: Filled dumplings are ready to fry.  


Step 11: Fry them in hot oil till they turn golden brown.