WANT TO DO A GOOD DEED
THAT WILL SPREAD THE MESSAGE OF NEOHUMANISM ALL OVER THE WORLD AND THAT WILL BENEFIT MANY GENERATIONS TO COME?
THEN SHARE A VIRTUE BOOK.
IT’S SIMPLE.
JUST POST YOUR FAVOURITE STORY BOOK WHICH TELLS ABOUT A GREAT VIRTUE SUCH AS COURAGE OR HONESTY OR HUMILITY TO AN ANANDA MARGA SCHOOL WHERE THE CHILDREN CANNOT GET SUCH GREAT BOOKS. YOU’LL BE HELPING TO CHANGE THE COURSE OF THE WORLD.
Share a Virtue Book
By Didi Ananda Gaorii
During the last NHE Global Conference in Maleny an idea came up for a kind of book exchange or book donation programme. These should not be just any books but books which illustrate virtues such as courage, honesty, generosity, humility, etc. We thought that it would be a simple yet valuable service project for people in those countries where there are resources and also funds available for acquiring such books to pass on new or second-hand virtues books to our schools in countries where these kinds of books might not be available or might be too expensive to buy. This could be done either individually (by maybe kids in our schools or parents or anyone who’d like to participate in this programme) or collectively (e.g. it could be a class project).
As the teaching of moral principles and character building are essential aspects of our NHE system, the rational distribution of books containing ‘virtues’ stories would be a wonderful maximum utilisation of such types of books. They would provide invaluable teaching aids in those places where it’s difficult to get such books and also such a scheme provides a meaningful service opportunity for anyone to contribute to the spread of good virtues or values in the world. The programme could also work with a kind of ‘pay it forward’ feeling to it i.e. you’ve had something good done for you or you’ve realized something new so ‘pay it forward’ and ‘share a virtue book’.
As postage is sometimes expensive, especially if there is a heavy package containing a stack of books, it is important that this ‘share a virtue book’ idea is spread around to as many people as possible. It is not so expensive for a person to post one book. Or maybe people who want to be part of this programme but who do not know which book to send could offer to pay the postage for sharing a virtue book; this would need to be organized on a local level though. For the programme to be successful and to grow from maybe just our projects to reach out into the community it’ll require some PR from the sponsoring school or unit. Again this could possibly be done as a project by some of the older kids at our schools.
The Ananda Marga Global Liaison Office will coordinate this project and keep a list of recommended books and also try to keep track of which of our projects already got which books or which of our schools need what kind of book, so if you are mailing a book, please also inform the Liaison Office
At the conference there was a sharing of the names of such great books. A few of these are included below with more posted on our NHE Resources site.
TRIAL RUN – SEND A VIRTUE BOOK TO LAOS
It was suggested that as a trial run we could ask our young and older brothers and sisters who are connected with our schools in English speaking countries to share a virtue book with the Laos school. There are not many children’s books available in Laos and the school in Laos already has a system of pasting a Lao translation into English language children’s books; sometimes other languages as well if we can find translators. As a result of the ideas that were shared at the conference, the Laos school has a plan to assign books illustrating certain values to each class next year as part of the morality and English language study approach of the school. So we will really need some good books to get this important development in our school underway.
As English is a (very) second language in Laos, where the main language is Lao, we need quite simple books with less text and more illustrations around the level for kids from kindergarten to grade 3 in an English speaking country.
If anyone would like to post a book and would like more information about our school or would like to discuss what kind of book to send or if the kids/parents or anyone connected to your school/unit wants information in order to advertise or get involved in the ‘share a virtue book’ programme, feel free to write to me:
Didi Ananda Gaorii: sunshinelaos
gmail.com
Our postal address is:
Sunshine School , PO Box 7411, Vientiane, Lao PDR
A Story Book List has been prepared by Didi Anandavitandra and Rukminii from the Vistara Primary School, Australia
Here are some books from that list
The complete list can be found on NHE Resources
www.nhe.gurukul.edu/reources.htm
One Smile
by Cindy McKinley
This book shows that a simple act of kindness, smiling to another person, even it is someone you don’t know, has a profound impact on society. This act of kindness started to change the world. This child’s smile has a positive ripple effect on the society and world. This book is part of the Pay It Forward foundation.
Activity: Give the children an assignment where they smile to other people and ask them to record the difference in the energy between each other, the interactions they have for the rest of the day. You may also wish to continue this activity for a week. Make a chart. This activity promotes the awareness of positive microvita.
Refugees
by David Miller
Refugees relates the adventures of pair of wild blue-billed ducks whose home is destroyed when their swamp is dug up and they have to find a safe place to live. The difficult and dangerous journey they undertake seems doomed to failure as they try unsuccessfully to settle in different environments, including an ocean, a busy river port and a swamp where duck shooting is allowed. They are close to exhaustion when the intervention of an unknown person changes their fate.
-This is a human rights story. Australia like other countries around the world, attracts thousands of refugees each year and their journey and experience is often a traumatic one. This story is to open up the awareness of refugees. This story can lead in many different directions, Socio Sentiment, Geo Sentiment, Universalism etc.
Activity to follow story: Write to a children or an adult in a detention centre, collect small gifts, colour pencils, paper, soft toys for the children in the detention centres.
