Education is an important platform for nation-building and it starts in the school. Primary education is one of the most important educational sectors of any nation as it is the building block if our future citizens. Most highly developed Western nations spent a significant amount of their annual budget for the smooth running and operation of their primary education system. According to most Western educators, different primary education administrators, policymakers and scholars of educational research and development; the primary education system needs the most robust functional support and initiatives for securing the educational future of any nation.

On the first day, ‘connect to science with fun and colour’ workshop was organized in collaboration with Miraloke (Kolkata) and Howrah Suparna in a primary school named Sri Ram Krishna Sishu Tirtha Nursery Vidyamandir (established 1991) at Khejuri, East Midnapore, West Bengal on May 27/2023. The gala workshop was attended by 50+ students along with their teachers, administrators, and executive body member of the school. The students have not yet been formally exposed to science and hence was a challenge to bring science to them directly.

Resource person, Saikat Kumar Basu made a colourful slide presentation appreciated by the students on the importance of the conservation of wildlife, forests, and biodiversity and how it impacts our life. Then next session of the workshop involved the use of simple nature-based chemicals and vegetables like beet, carrot, potato, chili, and turmeric to understand the concept of acidity and alkalinity, ph range as well as the importance of macro and micronutrients in our daily diet through simple wet chemistry experiments and hand on presentations. The children enjoyed the basic nature-based colour reactions and appreciated how science helps them in understanding their surroundings better with logical thinking and experiments to establish facts. 

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