CO-CURRICULAR ACTIVITIES
Every student is talented either in curricular, co-curricular or extra-curricular activities. This needs to be explored through the promulgation of such activities in the school premises. Al-Beruni Model Secondary School has paid colossal attention towards it to the materialization of co-curricular activities in the school and to dig out the latent talent in every student. English learning through activities and competitions is a great contribution towards this aim. A number of English competitions throughout the academic year are to be held to foster a love in students towards learning English.
i. MESSIC Award :
Every month witnesses one selected student from each class as the Most English Speaking Student in class. All the designated students are awarded with MESSIC Badges, Certificates of Appreciation and some cash prizes to invigorate them to keep conversing in English and to motivate other students to make efforts to speak in English to earn this award.
ii. Spelling Bee :
A Spelling Bee is held with an objective to help students improve their spelling, increase their vocabulary and develop correct English. It consists of two phases; initial phase and final phase. The initial phase, in each class, selects two best spellers, who then participate in the final phase, which comprises team round, individual, round and buzzer round; it brings out the best speller team and the best individual speller.
iii. Debating :
Public speaking skills, reasoning and researching are just a few of the many benefits that come with learning to be good debaters. We train our students from planning their arguments, whether for or against a motion, to choosing their words with care. Debating prepares our students to take on any challenges life may present to them. Events of such magnitude nurture talent, showcase the potential of young minds and allow them to express their individual opinions for or against a motion.
We prepare our students for internal and external debate competitions as debating helps our students develop critical thinking skills that are essential in daily life. Critical thinking is the ability to make well thought out and reasoned arguments while also questioning the evidence behind a particular conclusion or stance.
iv. Extempore Speech:
Our students are trained and prepared for the eloquent and extempore speaking skills so that they can speak on any topic at any time without prior preparation. An extempore is a speech given at the spur of the moment without any prior preparation. Extempore speech is intended to reveal a competitor’s ability to develop a point of view on a general topic and to deliver an impromptu speech within limited preparation time. Each participant is given 3-4 minutes to speak extempore on a topic picked up by him.
v. Essay and Story Writing Skill Development:
It is our primary objective to develop our students’ writing skills; particularly essay and story writing ability so that they do not lag behind in any English writing exam. In this regard, a contest is held every year to foster among Al-Berunians a love of English writing and to develop and fine tune their English writing skills through such entertaining and challenging contests to meet the future challenges. ......
vi. Vocabulary Enrichment:
Vocabulary is considered as the building blocks in a language. Likewise, a learner of English language can not be proficient unless they have a repertoire of English vocabulary at their command. In this regard, we aim to conduct vocabulary contest in our school every year.
Vocabulary contests help students learn to think both analytically and metaphorically. The vocabulary contest challenges students to complete analogies based on relationship among words they have learned. It bases the analogies on special vocabulary lists, developed for each grade and difficult level by our experienced teachers, which participants are encouraged to study before each meet.
vii. Skit / Drama Skills:
Skit competition is a contest of short plays or piece of writing that is funny. We ensure that the script is original work of the participating team and maximum time allowed is 15 minutes. A team presents the skit in English / Urdu and one team can present only one skit.
viii. Scrabble Contest:
One of the most captivating competitions is Scrabble Competition in which a player forms any word on the board that an opponent believes is not in the agreed-upon dictionary, the opponent can challenge the play. If the play is valid, the challenger loses his turn. If the play is invalid, it is removed from the board, and the person, who played it, loses his turn.
Al-Berunians participate in the scrabble contest held in our school. This contest not only enhances their vocabulary treasure but also ameliorates their English language skills to a new height.
ix. Miming:
Miming is the art of portraying characters and acting out situations or a narrative by gestures and body movements without the use of words. Miming contest is held in our school to increase the students’ abilities to empathize, to build confidence and to boost concentration. This competition has been organized for all the grades. The students perform on diverse topics;
• You are tired while trying to climb a tree
• A doctor is trying to inject a terrified patient
• A child handling mother’s anger
• A sales person trying to convince customers
Young Al-Berunians participate in this contest with zeal and enthusiasm and present
their part with lots of confidence. This completion is a great success and gives
platforms to our students to display their talent.
x. English Quiz
Our English Quizzes are up to date and contemporary. While they are aimed at a comprehensive understanding of the English language, including its grammar, vocabulary and sentence structure, they are extremely useful tools to help students revise for their exams. In this regard, we daresay that while our students participate in this competition, it will help them to improve their grades.