COR’14 Event 6: Visit to Waterfall Student Care Centre

Our fifth outing is yet another exciting one as we went down to the Waterfall Student Care Centre and interacted with children from the lower income families. As it was our final outing for the semester, we were met with overwhelming support from both our COR members and HI volunteers! The itinerary of the day was to give a brief exposure of the deaf culture to the children through the teaching of basic sign language and also interaction through our planned games and balloon sculpturing activity. We were welcomed by the center’s representative, Miss Raja, who shared with us the things to look out for when interacting with the kids. “Always use positive words of encouragement” Miss Raja pointed out that the children may have lower self-esteem due to their family background. Nonetheless we were determined to make their day with our awesome line up of activities!

What is more important than fun and games, of course, is homework!! The children were ushered into the classroom to complete their assignments before joining the activities. Our volunteers were there to help the children with any questions by acting as their tutor for the day. It proved to be a challenging task for some of us who had already relinquished our primary school knowledge back to our teacher!

  Miss Raja briefing the kids on the activities.

When the children were done with their homework, we headed out to the void deck to commence the activities! We were first split into smaller groups to get to know each other through ice breaking games. The COR members and their HI friends was then paired with a child to be their partner throughout the activities. Age and hearing impairment is not a barrier as the volunteers and children were able to relate to each other through fun and laughter.

The volunteers and children were then gathered together where they were given a brief exposure to the deaf culture through an alphabets signing session. The signing session was led none other than our awesome HI volunteer, Jack, who ran through the 26 letters through clear and guided demonstration! *Jack ~ whoosh!*

 Jack in action.

Coaching the children on the hand sign was an simple task for the COR members who had previously attended a course on basic sign language, however, the true masters were the HI volunteers who finger spelled with poise and ease.

One of the children, Dini, showed us her courage as she went up to the front with her buddies Jia Yi and Yong Qing to demonstrate the finger spelling of the alphabets. GOOD JOB to the children for their enthusiasm in learning!

 

Moving onto the favourite segment of the day - its balloon sculpturing time! The children were given a balloon colour of their choice where they can request their buddy to help them create an object of their desire. Having watched YouTube tutorials on balloon sculpturing, our volunteers were well prepared to take up this task.

Small act of giving brings a smile to the kid's face.

Check out our balloon warriors with their swords and helmets!

 

As the saying goes, all good things must come to the end. With the conclusion of the balloon sculpturing session marks the end of our year long of effort in reaching out to the HI community. Special thanks to the CGL who planned the outings relentlessly and acted as a bridge to bond the committee members together with the HI volunteers. YOU GUYS WERE AWESOME! Not forgetting the continuous support from the HI members – Thank you guys for coming down to our planned events, it was always heart warming to see familiar faces. 

Though we have reached the end of our outings for COR’14, do stay tune for our adventures in Nepal where the PnPs will be detailing each step in our journey!