r2i forum

What are the extra curricular activity options available for kids in Madras. Something like Karate, Swimming Pool, Horse riding, Gymnasium etc.

What kind of question is that ? Extra-curricular ? Where do kids in India have time to pursue extra-curricular activities ?
:emsmilep:

Vivek: Okay since you ask for so much here it is:

First of all I agree with Going_Nowhere, that kids in India do not have time for all these. But the primary reason is Parents and Social pressure, and our nature to focus only on academics.

My nephew in 6 std has 1 final exam, 1 half year exam, 1 qurterly exam, apart from this there are 3 mid term exams, and all these exams are taken seriously and weighted accordingly. That makes 6 exams in a period of 10 months, which means they have exam every 1.5 months. So everytime I call they are either preparing for exams or writing exams. With this schedule where do they get time.

Inspite of this if the parents are not particular about their kids being in the top 10 ranks in class, they can give some breather to the kids and get them in other activities.

Hey we do have Sachin's and Sania's.

Well for the list of extra curricular activites:
listed by you
- Karate
- Swimming
- Horse riding
are there and also you can get them in
- Music vocal (classical)
- Musical instrument
- Dance
- Painting
- Other sports (Tennis, badminton etc)
- Field and Track events (hey we can produce another PT Usha)
- Foreign languages
- Yoga
- Pottery
- Skating

are all options and for these there are classes available, depending on which area you live in.

There are lots of extra curricular activites for kids here like Ravi has said. Of course one needs to find out the ones that your kids like best. In chennai you have almost everything. Many schools have it as part of their curriculum itself.

For smaller kids you have all the usual ones that we have in US at fraction of the cost!!
Eg. Story telling, swimming, arts classes are plenty, bead making, jewellery making, painting, crafts, keyboard, western dancing including salsa, hip hop, jazz etc etc.. There is also roller skating , karate, yoga (music, yoga and dance class are part of most schools). Then there is the traditional carnatic music, vioilin, tabla and drums. And then there is tennis and Chess as well. The kids have lots of fun that way. You can pick the ones you like and of course manage.

What else do we want!!!

Well, there are lots of after school activities in Chennai. How old are your kids, that is, in what age group are you looking for?

Vajras: they are 9 and 4
poofygoogle: There are no good Swimming pools in Madras. I knew of Marina, MCC, YMCA. I dare you dive into these three. There will be like 500 people at any give time.

Vivek, i am really surprised - why wd you want to choose Marina, MCC, YMCA ?

What makes you think that your 4yr and your 9yr kid will like that ? As far as your 9yr kid and 4 yr kid is concerned you are bringing them to a foreign land. You are bringing them from a clean place to a not so clean place ( to be politically correct ) and you are asking them to adjust which by itself is a tall order as far as they are concerned.

On top of it, If you opt for low cost providers ( be it anything, not just swimming pool etc ), you can be 100% assured that your 9yr and 4yr kid are not going to be happy and will want to R2A at the earliest available opportunity - may be as early as the next flight :)

Go for at-least 3 star hotels or other posh swimming pools in case of swimming and take them to places where there is not too much crowd - for eg. Prarthana open air theatre, or theatres and malls in OMR / ECR and so on. Come on man - cough it up :-) R2I is not that simple - It is a challenge and we all should be prepared for it :-)

- Nags

thats correct. An indoor type pool is little difficult to find but there are other private ones that does cost more but they offer good private classes. I am waiting to enroll my kids in summer though..