The children living at the Public Rental Scheme blocks of Kebun Baru are extremely talented individuals filled with immense potential. They are quick learners and are also very helpful to those around them.

However, they lack social engagement and report feeling bored whilst staying within their 2-room flats. Their circumstances are challenged because of a lack of personal space, especially as they are growing up, since they often share the space with their siblings, parents, grandparents and extended families. Some turn to digital technology to immerse themselves in it and close themselves off to the world around them. Others spend a large amount of time outside their homes in 3rd spaces such as void decks, staircase landings, corridors, parks. These serve as an extension of their homes where they seek meaning and safe space from.

Thus, 6th Sense programs come in to meaningfully engage the children. We seek to provide them the space and opportunities they deserve to be children once again, to express themselves freely, and to immerse themselves in various activities with us.

How the funds will be used:

Building confidence with Speech and Drama

Last December holidays, we brought 3 of our children to Sago! Theatre’s Beginner Speech and Drama camp, a 5-day workshop which aimed at building a foundation in speech and confidence, through the mastering of verbal and non-verbal communication, creating and performing their own scripts.

The trio absolutely enjoyed it and we couldn’t help but notice how much they have matured in their confidence and self-esteem over such a short span. They feel so much more at home in expressing themselves, interacting with one another, and even performing in front of others.

Learning a script, telling a story, improvising – these build up their memory, creative resourcefulness and problem-solving capacities — valuable lifelong skills we hold at the core of 6th Sense and want to continually nurture in our children in Kebun Baru. We plan to send our children at least once to the camp for exposure, and to allow those keen to attend regular sessions.

Partner Organisation Link: https://www.facebook.com/sagotheatre/?_rdr

Unleashing creativity in the kitchen

In February, our children attended a baking workshop organised by Ngee Ann Polytechnic students at The Bake School. It was the children’s very first hands-on baking experience and they were ecstatic – every child that came out of the kitchen had only one question, “When are we coming here again?” The entire process of gathering ingredients, putting them together, and enjoying the delicacies afterwards, was such an enriching and empowering experience for these children.

Moving on, we want to further develop their creative potential by challenging them to source ingredients from the supermarket and make something of their own, all within a given budget. We are planning for 3 more sessions in the kitchen to build up a good baking foundation for these children. Volunteers who would like to teach our children to bake are welcome!

Partner Organisation Link: https://www.thebakeschool.sg/

A whole new world on wheels

After we bought a pair of roller-blades for a pair of siblings, it began to have a domino effect on the rest of the children. Roller-blading may be a recreational sport to some of us, but to these children, it is being mobile, it is finding their personal space, building confidence, and staying active beyond the four walls of their flat.

Last Christmas, the children were so grateful to receive their own pairs of roller-blades from With Love GIC, and were very encouraged to pick up roller-blading on their own, through lots of practice within their own homes and in the void deck when their parents allowed. Amongst themselves, they have even invented their own games on wheels and found new ways to communicate, play and express themselves. Skating has undeniably become a big part of their identity.

We are deeply inspired and want to further develop these children’s skating abilities by sending them to regular inline skating classes at Bishan-AMK Skating Rink, which have generously given us a 50% discount per child. We are looking at minimally 5 sessions for the children to learn the basic techniques. We would gladly open our arms to volunteers who would like to roller-blade with our children and even teach them some cool tricks!

Partner Organisation Link: https://skateline.com.sg/pages/skate-lesson-venues

Target Amount

Any extra funds collected will go towards other programs targeted towards the children. In the event that more funds are needed, we will also top up from our existing grants.

About 6th Sense

6th Sense is a volunteer-run Ground Up Movement serving the children of Kebun Baru. We were set up in April 2019 and have befriended a total of around 20 children between 7 to 14 years of age through our Saturday sessions. Our interactions with the children consist of introducing the children to different art materials, nature walks and having conversations with them to practise their emotional expression. The sessions alternate with bake school, roller-blading, and other opportunities brought through our collaborations. A part of our session also involves free play with simple games such as block catching and playing in the playground.

Our children have been exposed to various themes and art forms overtime and the children have developed a liking towards certain modalities. This evolves with time, especially as they age. For example, some children like to express themselves with arts & craft, digital art, photography, science experiments, amongst others.

Moving on, we want to give these children the opportunity to further themselves in their chosen forms of craft by deepening their capabilities. Thus, based on the children’s feedback we have chosen 3 verticals (roller-blading, speech & drama, baking) which we would like the children to delve deeper into. The hope is that by this year’s end the children would have chosen one of these, or any other vertical, and we would have given them opportunities to reach the Intermediate skills level in each vertical.

Contact: Abhishek Bajaj  <bajajabhishek92@gmail.com>

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