Mihir Pathak

What I’m doing now

I live in Vadodara, India.

• I spend time with my parents and my partner Nidhi.

• I regularly write weekly notes and occasionally write blog posts

• I am working on my health nowadays. I am trying naturopathy diet + fix routine + daily yoga (suryanamaskar, basic stretching, back exercise, evening walk. I want to start pranayam, meditation, cycling / running)

Reading :

I am reading (Oct 2024)

• What did you ask at school today (Book 2) by Kamla V Mukunda
• Some different issues of Bhoomi Magazine
• સાચું ધાર્મિક જીવન જીવવાની ઝંખના by વિમલા ઠકાર
• Respectful Parents, Respectful Kids by Sura Hart & Victoria Kindle Hodson

Work / Projects :

1. Workshops with young people :

I am working with teenage (8th to 12th grade) children at sai’s angel foundation.

• we recently did project based learning program called local khoji
• Khoji Club : I tried helping children to start their own self directed projects / learning new skills. We were meeting every Sunday. But because of other work or office trips my Sunday is getting busy. Children also can’t come on other days. so I am planning to discontinue / Pause this idea.

I occasionally take session at Ramkrishna Mission with young people on different topics like climate & Consumption, Futurology, local civic problem solving and more.

(you can read details on the page called projects)

• Next plan is to do residential camp during diwali vaction to explore theater-drama-dance & movement. Apart from this I want to do monthly sessions with children

2. Nature Education workshops : Nidhi got ‘Teach for Nature Fellowship’ from Bhoomi Collage, Bangalore. She is facilitating nature education sessions with children at 3 places. I am helping her with facilitation tips, planning the session and brainstorming new ideas.

3. Child Development, Learning and Special needs (Course for educator and people working with children run by Eklavya Foundation & Institute of Home Economics - Delhi University) : I am part of faculty team since last 5 years. This year also I am part of the team and announcing the 7th cohort in Oct 2024.

4. Earth Educator fellowship - 4th Cohort at YouCAN :

• Part of fellow selection process

• Mentoring group of fellows (being learning partner) throughout the fellowship

5. Unstructured Studio :

I am part of team from very beginning. Doing Bio-weekly meeting with them to find out new possibilities to implement creative learning programs in different location of India.

6. Helping to start a podcast : Impana and Satvika (teenagers from BeMe) want to start their own podcast about the people who made offbeat choices in their life. I am helping them to get mentors, doing research for the interview. We meet every Thursday evening at 9pm.

7. Work with Faculty of Family & Community Science - MS University, Vadodara.

In coming months I am going to take guest workshops for students from following courses :

• Master of Science in Human Development Family Studies - Life Span Development
• Master of Science in F.C.Sc. in Human Development Family Studies Child Development and Education
• B.Sc. F.C.Sc (Regular) Human Development and Family Studies NEP 2020

These workshops are part of their subject ‘Value Education For Sustainable Development’.

I am going to share :

• my learning journey
• philosophy and experiments of nature education
• Experiments of Dance and Theater in education

Apart from these I am planing to work with children and teachers at chetan balwadi (kindergarten part of the faculty)

• Project based learning
• Documentation
• Theater
• Nature based activities

Mentoring PhD student for development a curriculum based on environmental stories from Indian texts for adolescents (13-17)

8. Work with Nature Classrooms (Nature conservation Foundation) : Tanaya from Nature Classroom got a grant to develop open sourced nature education assessment tool / framework. We are trying their ideas in our work in Vadodara and giving feedback.

9. Work with Reap Benifit : During local khoji program I collaborated with reap benefit folks to design final workshop of children. I want to keep in touch with them to do carve out new possibilities to enage our children.

10. Unifly Collective : They are facilitating project based learning in Gov schools. My work will be evaluating projects done by children in theme of environment & sustainability.

I am working as senior content developer (environment domain in learning for life team - PraDigi / Pratham Education Foundation ) : My work includes Writing scripts, making videos and other digital content for topics related to climate / nature / environment education.

Creating digital content for children age 10 to 14yrs to foster creativity, collaboration, communication and problem solving

(I left this work on 15th Nov 2024)

I am helping Project DEFY to do capacity building of team working in self learning spaces at Meghlaya. (It is 3 month long remote assignment. Starting from 25th Nov 2024 )

• Now → On this page I keep an up-to-date list of the things I’m focusing on and what I’m doing NOW.
• About → On this page I have put my offerings & my personal educational philosophy
• Projects → On this page I keep an up-to-date list of all my projects + sessions / workshops with children / teachers.
• Writings → Educational Writing, Classroom Experiences and more
• Notes → Occasional short notes on education system / learning / tech & many other things

Inspiration: nownownow.com | last updated on 7th Dec 2024