Illume- Discovering the Miracle called “The Child”

There is a climate of high expectations, which includes the core belief that all students can learn and the teacher has the capacity to teach all children – KIDZEE schools.

Illume is an approach that helps parents and teachers spot the potential in children, one on one. Illume facilitates them to spot the unique quality in each child and helps them unleash that infinite potential within and strive with all their might to help the child realize it. Every time they spark a new insight, a new ray of hope, however small it may be Illume helps unfold the miracle.

Illume is a competency based curriculum with the end in mind. For every learning outcome expected from the child, there is a well-defined objective in place. For example, to facilitate children’s encyclopedic knowledge on the concept of elephant – the facilitator will show the poster of an elephant, introduce a puppet of an elephant who interacts with the children, a song about the elephant for the children to sing and creative movements for the children to imitate. This will be followed by an art activity / game on the following day to reinforce the concept combined with a field trip to the zoo.
This way most of the concepts across the curriculum are delivered in what Glen Doman would quote as “the joyous, honest and factual manner” covering the different learning styles of children thereby reaching every child through his / her way.
Mission of every teacher in Kidzee is to “Reach each child everyday” in his / her unique way. Illume ensures that the teachers have the knowledge of child development as well as the skills in teaching young children through Illumnaire. (Illumnaire is an exhaustive 60 hours training program through which every teacher (2000+ at Kidzee schools across India) learns the modalities of executing Illume. This is the corner store on which the edifice of ILLUME rests.
The program has an early childhood environment that enables children to learn according to their own development and learning styles. Every child is given adequate opportunity to master the required concepts and those who struggle are given more time as needed for example, a specific concept for instance an apple is taught on a particular day. The children are then provided an opportunity to reinforce and revise the same concept through puzzles, books, games, rhymes, art and craft, stories on apple during free play the following day
The ambiance of the classroom nurtures the children’s innate need to enquire and discover in their own unique ways. It thus facilitates the children’s quest for identifying their learning style. .
The play and learn equipments are carefully chosen with specific objectives in mind and what is most important teaching a particular concept. These equipments reinforce the competence for manipulation and recapitulation of concepts by the child. Relationships, memories and connectivity are a big part of what children take away from KIDZEE schools and are a vital contributor to the child’s achievement and an integral part of Illume.
Illume fosters a positive Home- School connection through a structured, well planned, face to face sessions, be it a Parent Teacher Meet, workshops, seminars, open forums where parents discuss not only the development of the child but also the contemporary issues in child development.
Continuous, comprehensive and competency based evaluation is much more than the usual annual standardized testing. It is an ongoing review of the child’s progress accompanied by timely feedback and appropriate intervention. Illume thus ensures that no child is left behind.
KIDZEE puts its ear to the ground and listening to what stakeholders wanted in our schools provided valuable insights into what needs to exist to make it an efficient and an effective system, which is realized through e-KIDZEE. e-KIDZEE enables us to have greater accountability with respect to data regarding logistics, enrolment, fees, and other administrative activities.
Each school must place its own signature on its strategy to make it a success. And the signature of KIDZEE schools is ILLUME.