The Space In Classrooms,Not The Physical But The Cognitive

Few days back I was wondering and pondering over a thought on ‘creativity and prior knowledge’.I had posed this question to my fellow people,”Prior Knowledge –Does it rule creativity?”.Today I am sharing with my readers on what I have perceived as zone for originality and how it can be nourished by us as educators.

‘Think Out of the box’-The moment a teacher tells this to the learner, somewhere unknowingly it subdues the child’s risk taking factor in thought process.By defining a boundary called  ‘box’ and then thrusting saying ‘to go out of the box’ there is ambiguity as to where to start and what is acceptable!

Why define a boundary in first place? Creating an imaginary boundary that cannot be internalized and on top of  that provoking them to move out of it!

There isn’t any box. It’s all “in there or out there”. Any reply that has never been told by others in a group or in a classroom. An answer that never came out so far, a word being replaced by its synonym,an illustration that has something different from others OR any two pictures that are not same…Doesn’t it mean creativity has surfaced? An expression that says a lot more than words…Won’t we accept them as creativity?

As teachers we have always learnt pedagogical approaches that are proven to establish sound connections and lays foundation for knowledge gained. It is indeed essential. Does it stop there? In case it does, then the child is definitely ‘successful’ at the end of formal education obtained, but seldom turns himself or herself in to a decision maker later in life. It is apparent because throughout out the formal education time he/she has always perceived something out of what existed already and what will happen next lies in the predictable  horizon. At times during academic sessions of Science or performing Arts, the inherent quality of not being rationale, emerges out but again in a safe zone of predictability.

We raise our chin saying we are always rationale. Being rationale means building our own ideas based on what we observe /heard previously and to create our own perceptions about something. Being rationale falls in safe zone. No one can point out our errors. That’s because it has foundation.

What is more difficult is to prove something that has no foundation. And to develop that sense in learner, it needs practice for the mind, an urge and spontaneity to overlook prior knowledge sense and yet define the unknown.

This ability to create and nurture the same to certain/marginal extent lies in our hands as an educator.

It is extremely crucial for educators to “Exploit the learner Potential” as I would term it to be. It is known that as educators we find that fear of failure is reduced or never exist in the young minds. So why not exploit their potential then, Rather than cribbing about learner not being creative enough in later years!

To avoid this I personally feel educators at class room level should avoid defining or proclaiming… ‘The correct answer is’. During last week, post my experience in setting assessment paper and answer key to that, I was sharing my views to one of my colleague on answer keys created.

I realized off-late, the vast and expanded our answer keys are prepared, we are practicing being a risk-taker and in turn it would reflect in the mind set of learners we handle.

As teachers we always believe that any reply that is given by or told by learners has had a thinking process and it reflects later. So unless we take the initiative to figure that process behind every reply we are unknowingly curbing creativity.

Coming to prior knowledge’s role in grooming creativity…it is purely in the hands of teacher who handles to transform and translate the prior knowledge as a base for creativity. It doesn’t have to be a clean canvas for new painting to be created. The existing painting can be modified or redesigned too.

It is not that easy to connect abstract ideas and henceforth develop new ideas.It becomes imperative to support the foundation with some amount of knowledge. We need to be conscious that we limit it to an extent and thereafter proceed the further sessions towards instilling problem solving skills and critical thinking  ability.

Of course, an airplane came in to existence looking at the flight of bird.

Can we deny that? Don’t we enjoy remixes of popular tunes? 

As teacher we need inputs, training and exposure on “Questioning Skills” practiced in class room to make our classroom transaction more enriched.

Check out my previous article on ‘Questioning skills’ that enhances academic sessions.Questioning, A skill to acquire

Please find below few more ways to kindle diversified replies from the learners.

Keep them ignited.

I always believe in the quote, “I have not failed 10,000 times but found 10,000 ways it won’t work”-Einstein

  Using Precise Terminology to Encourage Thinking

Instead of Saying:	Say:
‘Let’s look at these two pictures.’	‘Let’s compare the two pictures’
‘What do you think will happen when …’	‘What do you predict will happen when …’
‘What do you think of this story?’	‘What conclusions can you draw about this story?’
‘How can you explain …?’	‘What evidence do you have to support …?’
‘Let’s work this problem.’	‘Let’s analyze this problem.’

Adapted from: Costa & Marzano (1987)

Courtesy: http://iteslj.org

Encouraging Learners to Think About Thinking

When Learners Say	Teachers Say:
‘The verdict is, guilty as charged.’	‘Describe the steps you took to arrive at that answer.’
‘I don’t know how to solve this question.’	‘What can you do to get started?’
‘I am ready to begin.’	‘Describe your plan of action.’
‘I like the large one the best.’	‘What criteria are you using to make your choice?’
‘I am finished.’	‘How do you know you’re correct?’

Adapted from: Costa & Marzano (1987)

Please find below a link from ted.com.It’s need of the hour in education system across the globe.The speaker shares what lies in future and why  there is a necessity to change the entire outlook of public education.

The Journey or the Destination

In this article I am sharing my thoughts and experiences on “A student driven session“- delivering what you planned for them takes a shift and moves on to “What They want to learn”!!! Do we have to anticipate it all the time…or it just occurs 🙂

When a teacher turns in to a facilitator  he /she facilitates sessions driven by students.

In the initial stages of teaching, Lesson plan acts as a back bone for our sessions. It’s is like a Google navigator which would display every small curve we would possibly encounter in our travel. This is to ensure we direct the session carefully and purposefully.

In my initial years, when I had just started planning using Skill Knowledge and Understanding as base for every session, it took two hours of planning time for every one hour session plan. Checking on resources took a major time, anticipating what the replies would come from the students for every question you pose was mind-boggling. Actually it still is!

Every teacher starts to realise (must realise!!!) as years pass by that the plan which is made for one set of learners will not be the same next time. Apparently, the questions you pose might remain unchanged but definitely replies will change.

We must get comfortable with  situations like …

While using Lesson plan as a navigator remains unchanged in teaching practice, but things that get refined over years would be, more time allocated on reflection in our sessions.

Most importantly, teacher starts allowing the side trip during the main trip.  When you travel, sometimes getting to your destination is the most important consideration. Sometimes the interests of the other people in your car are most important, and you stop to see sights that they’re interested in. There are even times when the ultimate destination becomes incidental to the trip itself.

I mean, depending on the factors like grade we handle, topics we introduce or deliver, students would expect us to stop by at every extra detail that can be discussed, while the main route remains undeterred.

A need arises, we sense the pulse of class and try to go for short trips around the main topic but ensure the main aim is achieved affirmatively. There is more scope for a silent spectator or a passive participant to emerge out and add on to the topic and surprise us.

Ignoring all of the steps from the early lesson plans is not advisable, but we need to internalize them. Out of planning, practice, reflection and review we become so familiar with the various routes for this particular destination that we seldom need a navigator any longer.

Here is when we start looking for many “Aa-ha!” moments and get more open to learn with learners. There would be more occasions where we would not hesitate to say, “Let me get back to you on this.”

I have personally had many such sessions and I am sure many of my readers would also have had too. Here’s when we actually are involving students taking the owner ship and accountability for what they want to learn.

Recently, in one my session in Science for grade one, one of my session plan was to do a survey on waste around in the immediate neighbourhood and sort the waste in categories. Post the outdoor activity we( My students and myself) tried linking it to Math Data Handling and made a bar graph with all groups’ inputs.

As I was trying to ask questions to check inference an idea struck me and I encouraged learners to frame their own question and pose those questions to their peers based on data collected. I realized the session was moving from Lower order thinking of understanding and comprehension to the higher order of Analysing and Create.

While they started using the questioning words (Language Arts skill –applied) appropriately to frame question, I was left wondering Was this a science session?

Students showed complete engagement in framing questions and asked each other. Session of science connected to Math and ended with Language Arts skills. Although the initial starting point was decided by me as a teacher, it took the short trip on the way with the display of students’ own skill, knowledge and understanding.

I remained a facilitator which was more productive than the former role.

This realization in us allows us to travel the path -student driven session.

Be systematic, enjoy the small curves and pleasures that will definitely keep us on our toes resulting on meaningful transactions in classroom.

Let the teaching learning sessions be not like this…

 acknowledgements: Pics  google images

Teacher,student and the ratio

       

  Classroom management and effective plans go hand in hand. While the curriculum is laid out to be covered in a given span of time, it wholly becomes the teacher’s responsibility to teach effectively.

As there are many factors that influence teaching-learning cycle, whenever I ask this question about what hinders the effectiveness of teaching to peers and colleagues across schools, one common thing that rises as issue is “Number of Students” in a class.

Often times when some teaching strategies or techniques are shared with other teachers they end up asking, what is your class strength?

Whilst, it is true that number in class influences learning outcome at the same time, it is also a fact that as a teacher it is possible to plan and handle such situations.

#1 It is Okay to be Loud…

Accept that the noise level will be higher during discussions and group work. Don’t panic. It is not you who is at fault in the classroom management. It is expected that when students are brainstorming there will be open minded talks and it will increase the overall noise level in the class. However, we can try few ‘quiet symbols’ or use ‘colour codes’ to keep reminding them to reduce their voice level but we cannot make the noise fade away completely.

#2 Know your students’

Unfortunately, the main issue with larger size of students in class is getting to know them personally. Find new ways to move with them during feedback time, by writing small notes on their assignments or giving turns to every group to sit in front of teacher’s eyes during sessions. Create opportunities for ‘exit slips’ ( as feedback) where they can write a sentence or word about the session or using of “Likert scale” (invented by psychologist Rensis Likert) to survey the class sentiments to get to know about the students in easy ways.

#3 System first,teaching next

Laying down class routines crystal clear from day one turns out to be a magic wand in future sessions. We will wonder later on the power of how systems and routines enable us and empowers them.

 # 4 Don’t give up

Don’t give up on Collaborative activity. Instead reduce the frequency or plan it out with another teacher by creating a cross subject link in any session. The Student: Teacher ratio is managed well this way.

Collaborative session always enhances students’ skill and at any cost negotiations on this should be avoided by the teacher blaming the size of class.

Apparently, it is not students’ choice to be in a larger group. Hence the responsibility lies on us as teachers to facilitate them and not deprive them of proven learning methods.

 # 5 Pairs are collaborative too!

Try to maximize pair work if there is less moving space. Keep revising partners as “SHOULDER PARTNERS” to be paired up once or DIAGONALLY OPPOSITE PARTNERS can be paired up next time.

#6 Realistic plans

Be practical in your lesson plans. Of course, what we had planned with a batch of less number of students will not work in larger group. Hence allocate more time for process, instructions, feedback, transition and the content to be taught. Usage of multiple teaching aids like flow charts, posters, videos, using of microphone to be audible can be employed to ease out teacher burn out.

#7 Job manager

Making students being a part of sessions will save our time too. Assign jobs to students. Sharing chores for distributing note books and other essentials, collecting the finished work and for passing on supplies, it will save our time and extends teaching time.

The above shared thoughts are my own experiences and shared experiences from my colleagues as well.

If you have handled larger groups and found new ways to be successful please share it with teaching community.

For more student engagement techniques refer my previous article Effective Teaching Techniques

 

Differentiation-It Needs To Be Embedded

It dates back to 2012 when I was pursuing my studies (Professional Diploma in teaching, CIE), I came across this word “Differentiation” for the first time in one of the sample assignment that was shared with me. I was doing my module one where I had to write a lesson plan to conduct one session accounting every minute of the session and every learner of the class. The moment I read that word I mistook it to be “How a teacher can show partiality among her students?” “Isn’t it unfair?” Believe me most of the teachers in my study batch also took it in the similar way.

With more and more examples analysed about how students learn in class, the more profound was my quest to research on this. The attitude to try and employ the “differentiation” added meaning to my teaching job.

Let’s look in to what is this all about.

First of all ‘differentiation’ is not a teaching strategy! Uh oh did I make it complicated now?

A strategy is defined as planned actions to achieve your goal. Whereas, differentiation popularly termed as DI is an approach in teaching practice.

Every strategy used in teaching can be differentiated to make the learning effective.

Differentiation, in lay man terms, a lens that a teacher should use to diagnose students and to identify which best tool can be used to enrich their learning experiences. ‘Giving choice’ is a powerful differentiation tool.

Differentiation can be well understood with examples and by demystifying some misconceptions.

A few of real life examples…

This advertisement is often found in women magazines! The salad and green tea that your friend eats makes her loose lot of pounds whereas it doesn’t do the same magic to youJ

To quote one more example that we come across, one person stays fit doing power yoga while another cannot afford to have that stamina. One gets a lot of calorie burnt just by taking his dog for a walk while another spends an hour and half in gym workout!!!

I hope these simple examples give you an idea on what I am trying to explain as ‘differentiation’.

We need customized plans for substantial learning outcome. It need not be always special and individual plan to address one at a time. Similar to personalised training work out and diet plans for individual or a group of people, even in a classroom scenario DI is inevitable. DI can be employed for small groups or large groups by finding a common pattern in their style.

Some popular DI’s

When a teacher uses different tone and different pace while explaining her content it falls under differentiation by dialogue. Here the role of the teacher is vital. This is one of the most widely and unconsciously used approach by the teachers in almost all classrooms. She facilitates the learner by identifying through her experiences, whoever may need detailed explanation, which learner needs sophisticated language and which set of learners may need simple steps etc. This is purely achieved through experience in classroom transactions.

The second most popular differentiation used widely in almost all classrooms is by grouping learners. Although it remains a bitter truth that many teachers do not follow a plan to group, due to which the outcome of learning doesn’t get maximized. Still to a larger extent grouping learners, is an effective DI.

It is a myth that DI means only individualized teaching. DI is an approach to address larger group of learners. It is purely based on LEARNER READINESS to absorb the concept.

There could be some assumption that by practising DI in your classroom you may leave a child behind while the rest are scaling up. But DI is actually based on the idea of “Keep Up” while “Catching up”. DI bridges the gap between basic skills and advanced skills.

The most important fact, DI is not Multiple Intelligences. ( MI by Howard Gardner)

In this field of education as theories keep piling up due to researches, as teachers in practice we need to somehow and somewhere catch up with latest topics of discussions.

Few DI’s that can be employed in classrooms:-

Differentiation by task: This is one of the core methods in DI. By this method teacher sets up different tasks for different learners with main objective being grasping concepts from basic to advanced. The teacher needs to plan different worksheet, activities, group work to assess learning. If the teachers feels burn out for setting this it can also be done as same worksheet or activity where the level of difficulty slowly grades up. As advanced learners may progress and move faster towards later part of worksheet easily while some learners are using their own time to concentrate and complete the basics.

Differentiation by resources: Some learners may need simple resources like books and reference material. Some may need sophisticated resources like apps. Some learners may need multiple materials to work on with. Learners may feel comfortable with visual aids, word wall and sample work display also as a support. Resources used for one year may or may not be the same with next batch of students. DI is always based on underlying principle called LEARNER READINESS. To learn about learners style of learning look in to my previous article Teaching style->Learning style->Student attainment

Differentiation by content: Content comprises of knowledge, skill and concepts. A teacher can share this by any means such as using videos, picture books, printed material, non-fiction texts and even in audio form. This is at teachers’ discretion to decide how she may want to present it to her learners. The font size used in texts can also be a differentiation.

Differentiation in learning outcome: This is again the core of DI. Now you may have a doubt how to differentiate the output as there is expected milestone to be achieved by all learners in a given time frame. Here is where Formative assessment and on-going assessments come in handy. When we have used the lens to identify the advancement and short comings in any set of learners through experience we need to plan and accommodate several ways of assessing the learner for the same objective.

For e. g concepts of geometry in identifying the angle can be assessed in multiple ways such as

1. Printed pictures on sheet which is 2D
2. Going around in classroom and asking students to look for right angled objects or objects with acute angles.
3. Provide resources to construct something in 3D and explain the different angles found in that model

Their learning outcome can be verbal or written form. Finally the learner has given you evidence on his/her understanding of angles in geometry.

The main benefit in doing DI in learning outcome is, a teacher does it systematically at regular intervals until the topic is completely covered and she has enough evidence though various forms that her learner has got the concept right.

DI by learning outcome is based on the on-going Formative assessment and not on the end of unit Summative assessment.

Well DI is by itself a broader area of discussion. The DI’s can be shared with one another but it is up to the teacher to use appropriate and suitable ones that will benefit his/her set of learners.

DI will continue in my next article too. I will share some examples of DI that I employ in my practice and few lesson plans where DI has been embedded.

Differentiation is nothing but regardless of a learner’s ability an approach used in teaching which provides a learner multiple avenues to showcase their learning.

If World’s a laboratory,what are the catalysts in learning?

          Let me start this article listing out few commonly heard and extensively used terms…

Attention

Concentration

Understanding

Grasping

Motivation

Organisation

Listener

Success

Responsible

Leader

As you read the above list, who is the first person you can link these to?

1. Students
2. Teachers
3. Parents

Well, it is often related to students as there is a set of expectation from them stage by stage. It is assumed that, for a student to be successful, achieving and an efficient individual most of the above said attributes are a must.

No matter what their age is, the physical atmosphere where learning takes place,their health, the school surrounding and above all, the educators with whom they transact, society always expects students to possess all from the above mentioned list.

As educators we need to know that factors that influence learning and skills may be divided broadly as

1. Factors that influence learner
2. Factors that influence learning.

Factors that influences learner might be

General health-Physical & Mental health

Ability – focus, attention, will power

Aspiration & Motivation to achieve

Maturation –age appropriate readiness to learn

The above said are factors that are closely associated to each and every learner individually without any influence of external factors. These factors contribute majorly towards learning process and their success rate.

Factors that influence learning might be:

Curriculum design- encompassing proven pedagogical approaches

Feedback to learners as a part of learning process

Spaced out learning process

Teachers & teaching methods

Now let’s see some common factors that influences learning

Besides these there are few more factors that influences learning process negatively such as:-

1. Noise

A parent and teacher should consider the fact that, raising their voice to gain control over learners/children is a futile effort. It can only be employed as a technique to gain attention momentarily. A teacher or parent must not resort to conversing with learners in the same loud pitch, as children tend to lose focus quickly when handled this way.It is ironical yet true that many a times a deafening silence with a teacher look has been found most effective than a raised voice in a classroom atmosphere.

It is also teacher’s responsibility to have a control over noise level inside classroom among students ,as many learners gets distracted or cannot think in sequence due to loud noise made by other learners.Being aware of multiple classroom management techniques will come in handy during such time.

2. Demotivating factors like comparisons between siblings or friends

3. Setting a bench mark that is way deviated from expected milestone-

It is essential that learners need to be motivated to reach goals set by the teacher for that grade as well by parents for that age, only if they are reasonable and linked to their ability and age.

Let’s look at factors that affect learning positively such as:

1.  Safe environment: an environment that is safe for exploring, at home and school
2. Healthy breakfast: This has direct link to cognitive skills like attention span, memory and active state of mind.
3. A growth mind set possessed by the teacher as well as parents that conveys a message to the learners that efforts and process takes priority over academic results

Hope some of the above thoughts will act as stimuli for my readers as well.

Happy teaching:)

 

 

Progress Report-Just As a Thumb Print

One of the pivotal document that records the growth of a learner in their journey of education is a “year end or term end” report card.

I would even say this document is as important as a first year  growth chart of the new born. The journey of the student in acquiring the knowledge, applying it and exhibiting the expertise all of these needs to be carefully and cautiously recorded by the teacher.

Nevertheless to say a report card is a hard copy of the imprint that a learner had created in the past. This is how as a teacher, I look at it. Just as how thumbprints do not match, every student’s report card must be ‘unique’.

 No matter how many ever children we have in our class, preparing a report card needs investment of teacher’s time supported with professional outlook while presenting the same.

A teacher has to take up the responsibility of highlighting “scope for improvement areas” at the same time should not hesitate to mention, ‘the student always like to do chart work to decorate the class during the school project day’. Many a times, the former comment takes precedence the latter comment is conveyed as a complaint or short coming of the student.

I personally feel a report card should be as colorful as their world, with a picture of the possessor and highlighting their social skills apart from academic milestones.

A report card reflects the culture of the school too. If the school believes in holistic growth of a child then parameters such as emotional intelligence take priority over academic intelligence. Even though many schools have moved forward in recent past by giving importance to grade social skills of a child, it is yet to capture the moments that showcases the growth mindset of the child. Teachers might, for example, intentionally praise student effort and perseverance instead of ascribing learning achievements to innate qualities or talents—e.g., giving feedback such as “You must have worked very hard,” rather than “You are so smart.”(Source: http://edglossary.org)

How nice it would be to showcase the potential of the child, just not use mere positive adjectives as starters of sentences. But, explain it with child’s his/her own words  quoting instances .This way the student also is made accountable for his/her personal growth.

From a parent perspective, a report card should not be the first instance when a parent gets to know of any thing about their child. Things that are recorded /displayed in there should have enough back up moments prior to the report card.As teachers we can be pioneers by customizing it according to the age group as well.

Recently, I saw in of the school report card a space for the student to write his/her dream.This was the most attractive part in that report card that caught my attention. A parent gets to know right from middle school years( even primary year of school) how the child plans. Quite possible that their goal will keep changing year on year (may be not), still it gets captured in words.

To get these most basic, yet vital information about the student a log book can be maintained for each one of them. A student should be encouraged to fill in the data such as hobbies, best moments in last term, skill that the student had mastered or learnt, any new sport learnt etc. There is a good share for the students themselves in creating their report card. The skill they learnt could be even “making friends this term-How good are you at that?”

Imagine a parent gets to read all these at the end of year 🙂 It’s a complete summation of their child and your student at one shot ,in one year span. Even if there were any area of concern, parent and the student might take it in positive stride and will work towards it.

The report card should not merely  be a formal document with printed material packed with information rather it should be mixed with emotions and incidents that brings the life of the student in front of the parents’ eyes.

To summarize, a report card should have:

• Health information ( eyesight/height/weight)
• Emotional aspects /social concerns effecting performance
• Behavior as individual as well as in group
• Work habit as independent person as well as in group
• Level of support currently being provided to the student( if needed)
• Future plans that might assist the student to help improve in concerned area(s)   (curricular and co-curricular)
• Solutions to parents to facilitate that improvement from home front whether it be academic concern or behavior concern
• Space provided exclusive for their strengths, achievements, dreams, goals/ambitions/ hobbies and interest. The data for this must be provided by the students themselves. These are different from the specialist sessions like arts or music.
• The report card structure must align with the schools motto and vision.
• If the institution believes in creating an empathetic human besides an individual achiever then those parameters should take the prime space in the report card.

It’s definitely worth the time to plan a report card because we never know when the student will take a look at it later. When a student reads his/her kindergarten report later at the age of seven, they  will possibly try to compare how far they have traveled. They might also feel proud reading ‘what kind of a person they were at the age of five’ and how the teacher then had adored them for being like that.

Things that can be avoided in a report card:

• General comments like “work hard to score more”
• Cut and paste similar comments by grouping them as average, below average and above average performers.
• Spell/grammar errors
• Concerns that were never told to parents earlier but gets printed on the report card for the first time( academic issues or behavior issues)
• Incorrect grades ( grades to be supported with data)

To help with some positive way of writing report comments, kindly look this link given below.I have sourced it from scholastic and felt it would be very useful for us as teachers.

http://www.scholastic.com/teachers/top-teaching/2012/11/101-report-card-comments-use-now

 We all are aware, we are the sculptors of young minds. We play a major and inevitable role in constructing their future too. Begin with a positiveness.

In Language teaching…Accuracy follows Fluency

If you have been reading my articles regularly, you would have realized by now , I strongly believe in sharing of classroom ideas with co-teachers. This approach, according to me vitalizes teachers, who may  at times run out of ideas or resources. Many a times teachers might come across similar kind of learners in her/his class.Hence I reiterate the same thought once again here, teachers need to develop the habit of sharing for mutual benefit.

It is necessary that we teachers showcase open minded attitude,absorb things,apply the appropriate ones to maximize learning in students and minimize our effort. Most of the teacher training workshop that we attend during our service enhances our skill.

As I mentioned in one of my previous articles(Teaching style->Learning style->Student attainment) ,though the content may remain the same, the style in which we teach needs to be revisited often to suit the learner group that we handle. I have personally experienced this and realized that there is always more than one way to reach the child.

In this week’s article I am sharing with all of you, what I had observed and absorbed from a language teaching workshop held in Chennai. I have tried them in my class sessions as well, with 30 learners in one class.

Have a look at the presentation.Click the link below

Learnings from ELT workshop (1).

Do share if you have tried any of these in your classrooms. Also would like to hear from all of you whether you could employ some techniques.

Power point  created by Sudha Mahesh; Image courtesy: google  

Nostalgic Moments We Cherish…

Every teacher will have some amusing moments  they always cherish in their memories.This week, I wanted to share a few of those which will bring back a smile in your face.

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It’s those moments that make their day lighter despite a physically and mentally demanding job that they do.

There are few events that all of us, as teachers can relate to that are vivid in our memories. I’m sure as you read, you will recall those events which made you smile or laugh out loud. There is some common gene that runs in all of us which makes us behave similarly in any of the given situation.

        Sharing a  few of those moments here…

1. The moment we receive an informal message from our colleague, “SCHOOL MAY DECLARE HOLIDAY DUE TO INCLEMENT WEATHER…. I am sure we will all be waiting for a confirmation from the school that assures holiday for Teachers too 🙂

And we plan to do The REST of the grading;The REST of the housework;The REST of the laundry, etc 

2. When we were really involved in transacting with the children, some one enters with a school circular with a few sentences printed on it. They seek your signature on it after reading it. As you would  want to ward them off, you sign it as quick as possible without noticing it’s content. Finally, you get to know at the end of the day , “you have accepted to do an OUTDOOR DUTY IN PLAY GROUND OR MAINTAIN DISCIPLINE NEAR SCHOOL CANTEEN FOR THE REST OF THE WEEK!!!” After all, your read it and accepted. Isn’t it ?!?!

 

3. While we land up on our own student  during our weekend shopping ! Well, here is a small twist. If the student is a high school student, they would act as if they never saw us or simply they don’t recognize us. If it’s a primary school kid, the scene is different. They shout at the top of their voice greeting us good morning or good evening with much delight. We end up having a mini parent conference with ‘that’ parent whom we always had in ‘that’ special list.

4. Then, there is this moment when the admin says ‘there are new set of resource books at the library, you may check out  for your reference’. As soon we hear, we wish no other teacher is aware of it. We try to grab that opportunity immediately to make our job easier for the rest of the year. We scroll through pages, book after book and we think, “I can prepare better worksheet for my students”. Then, we don’t mind others grabbing it. At times, we even volunteer to go and announce it to every body.

 

5. That moment when it’s the SCHOOL DAY coming up in a few weeks, Oh My God! Any song that we hear, in any tune, in any language , we think it’s  composed for our kids only! Tunes keep lingering and we start imagining our kids in to those scenes. We try matching every child’s face in the roles and then image after image flashes in our mind. We choose the best of the best song, best of the best costume for our kids .. or so, we think :-). We think, we own the best theater group in the world during those days. And to top it all on that day of program, we don’t mind doing dance, performing actions and even speak the dialogues and all from where??? From the back stage and on the sides… If only some one video taped that and showed us, we would laugh out loud for the rest of our lives.

6.That moment when we decide DRESS CODE FOR TEACHERS, for the school day event. That’s the spirit in teachers. We want to enjoy the special day when our kids are going on stage to perform. The best part in this is, ALL TEACHERS WORK BACK STAGE, WHERE THERE IS NO SCOPE FOR VISIBILITY OR to even receive compliment for that special attire.

7. That moment when we write on the classroom board without noticing a mistake in spelling or a grammatical error. Sometimes, we even miss a word as we talk and write simultaneously.That one child whom we always have kept in control, points it out clearly. I am sure most of us will manage that scene too. If not try this technique, “I knew it was an error, I was waiting for one of you to find it out!!!”

 

 

8.That moment when teachers have to take help from the student to go out and fetch some thing from another class. You realize it’s almost 30 minutes since you had requested. Finally, the class turns out be story time, listening to all that happened to that student “on the task” of helping you!

The list of “Teacher’s special moments” goes on and on.

There are occasions when we encounter weirdest doubts like this…

Haven’t you had such experiences ? Well,I am sure we all would have had and cherished them too.If any of you want to share with all of us those special feelings and moments, which makes  us posses that special “Teacher’s Gene”, please leave your comments. Let us share those memories with each other and get nostalgic.

Effective Teaching Techniques

Recently I was having a casual conversation with a newly appointed teacher in my school. We exchanged few details about the classes we handle and the subjects we taught. We shared some things about our families too. She asked me, “How many kids do you have?” With lightning speed I answered, “I think I have 23.Last year I had 20.”

She was startled for a second, gave a blank look at me. I tried to recollect, what was her question? (Did I answer it right?) After a momentary pause we both burst out into laughter. She was asking me about my own children whereas I mapped it to the children in my class.  I realized it once again like any other day, ‘the moment we enter the school premises, we forget our own world that is outside the school compound and school becomes our family’.

I am sure most of you must have had or shared lighter moments with a peer that makes your day. Like many of you, I have always believed in having a cordial relationship with teachers at school, irrespective of whether they teach primary or high school. There is always some thing we have in common that we figure out in due course of time, it may be about our teaching methods or classroom management techniques.

Informal discussions and talking more openly about the issues we face in class, will fetch us solutions very easily. But there has to be a genuine thought- process and concern in all these discussions, else it may unknowingly turn out to be ‘branding a child with specific issue’ kind of a talk.

In these years of classroom transactions, I have experienced being an assistant teacher in my initial years of service. Apart from those learning, I have picked a few cues and nuances in handling students by observing many of my peer sessions and through visits to other schools.

I realized, just as how every child is unique, every teacher is unique. But there needs to be a constant supply of ideas and resources shared so as to avoid stagnation of thoughts and teaching techniques. This vests purely in a teacher’s hand.

In this article I would like to share some of the practices, which I think were effective classroom techniques and teaching methods that made ‘learners to learn’.

1. Science session on ‘light’

The teacher wanted to make her students realize the importance of ‘light’ in their life using senses. Instead of just beginning the session by defining light or asking questions, ‘do you know what is light?’, she darkened the room to an extent and gave every student a sealed carton box (something like a cereal box) with ‘small hole’ on top. She asked them to peep in through the pin hole and to share if they could see any thing. As expected, students replied there is nothing in the box. Then she gave them torch light and asked them to repeat the same procedure. Students were excited to see a strip of paper inside that closed box. The paper had words written on it “I can see with the light”. This experiment took 20 mins of her session but the realization of importance of light and the conceptual learning of light was amazing. They were easily able to define what is light and absence of light is called darkness.

A concept can be introduced in anyway orally/writing the definition on the board or even reading it out from the book as simple as it sounds. If it’s planned with much care then the session continues to sail smoothly and effectively with utmost engagement.

I started believing more in kinaesthetic learning than ‘chalk and talk’ method

2. Reciting poems loudly

This was an English teacher who had cultivated the habit of reciting poems just for fun and rhythm. But she made use of it wisely for student engagement in such a way that whenever students know that it is English session, they start reciting the poem one after the other (whatever they have learnt so far). By the time teacher reaches the classroom, the whole class would settle and get ready for English class with books and note books while reciting the poems simultaneously. There was complete focus when teacher arrives. The loud recitation created a good vibration in class atmosphere and that was pleasant for their ears as well. The teacher would seamlessly continue her sessions as planned. This happened every day without fail and I never saw that teacher spend time in settling them after she came in.

I realized how music and rhythm enhances student focus and engagement

3. SWBAT –Students Will Be Able To_________________________

Few years ago, I had a chance to visit one of the elementary school in USA. I went around the school and entered few classrooms and dining area as well. One thing that impressed me was, the teachers there always had the habit of sharing the objective of every session with their students. They had mentioned it on the white board as an acronym ‘SWBAT’.

For instance, she wrote Students will be able to …solve the addition problem worksheet independently. She tells it orally as well.Students are clear of what their aim is and what they need to do that day. This was written in Grade 2 classroom.

After implementing the same practice in my sessions I found them to be more engaged.It prepares the students to be present in the class mentally.

E.g. SWBAT: Students will be to -read the passage and find answers for given questions.

SWBAT- Students will be able to recite the poem from the book loudly with rhyme and rhythm

SWBAT-Students will be able to write adjectives to describe the given scenery

I understood that students need to be aware of the objectives at the beginning of every session

4. In Art class

You must be wondering what I would have observed from art classes. It is the place where all their senses are involved. After PE class, the most sought destination could be the art room in every school. What I had learnt from the teacher was the effective time management besides following routines. I observed that though there was enough work planned for the day, the teacher ensured enough time was allocated to train the students to put all stationery back to places wherever it belonged. At the end of sessions, the classroom appears as neat as it was before the students entered. She would also ask children to tell the name of painting technique they had learnt that day before they exit the room. Again, I observed that this practice is done in every session of hers so that the system is well established and students get tuned to their teacher’s expectation.

I learnt, by using time wisely, a teacher can teach the content and skills simultaneously

5. A worksheet with difference

As teachers of this decade most of us are aware of using worksheet based on the topic taught. This is done for revising or for more practice .Now a days it is done with ease with so many free resources available online. But in this process, we need to be careful to customize it for our learners.

 A math teacher( middle school USA) had designed it in such a way that student’s arrive at the correct answer by eliminating all the wrong answers. They were expected to evaluate all the choices and justify why they were wrong. This way the teacher ensured students are clear with the concepts in totality.She had also given some tips and formulas in a box separately as support. Even though there were only four or five problems given in the sheet, I found students were working out more to find the right option .Though they were taught the right way of solving such problems the approach expected from the students were to validate all options before arriving at the result.  Since then, whenever I discuss with my co-teacher on worksheet for math, I have emphasized this method of ‘Eliminating wrong’ as one effective way for student engagement.

I make use of this method even in my English class by writing sentences that are grammatically wrong and ask students to identify errors. While they were at this task, I was able to identify some of their misconceptions too. Based on their responses, I have even altered my sessions to revisit the concepts again.

Even a standard method like using worksheet as teaching aids/tool can be made interesting if a teacher plans carefully.

 

6. Extensive and appropriate usage of walls in classroom

Once a science teacher was asking her students to write the aim, procedure, materials to be used and their guess/prediction on what will happen in the experiment on small chart paper. She put them carefully on pin up boards of classroom in the same order. The next session she made use of those data and their predictions. I found that this was her practice and all soft boards /notice board in class showcased every bit of students learning and their progress every day. It was helpful for students to recall what happened the previous day and make connections to further learning.

This practice of gathering their thoughts on soft boards has helped students to recall and remember concepts taught in math and science session.

 From all these observation sessions, one major take away for me was, “Connect with kids and adapt to make your session lively and to enthuse students”

Few other things that impressed me…

• Playing music in the back ground to create an ambiance, relevant to the topic taught. This I learnt from a social science teacher.( I am sure that teacher is reading this blog!)
• Plan to invite a group of older students to teach the younger students for a change. Believe me, it works wonderfully. There is so much of excitement and fun involved in this method. The session becomes a memorable one, for both the younger and the older students. I also observed that older students are so careful and organised when they teach younger ones.

It is proven that we learn the maximum only when we teach. So why not employ this strategy often in our classrooms?

I agree that all these takes effort and careful planning but it’s definitely worth a try!

 Please share your experiences, if you can map any of these techniques in your classrooms.

 

Teaching style->Learning style->Student attainment

The multiple intelligence and it’s influence

As I started writing this post, a thought loomed…will the readers be hooked on to reading this article till the end?

May be few of you will look for images associated to the topic, while others might look for some video link related to my post and a few might look for catchy phrases highlighted in bold words to obtain the main idea of this article. Some of you may scroll down to see if I have included any activity that would interest your students. I think, I should even explore the idea of including an audio version of this content.

Why should I consider all these possibilities? Well, this explains the theory of multiple intelligence and the learning style of every reader who reads this article.

I would like to begin this week’s article with a virtual handshake to each and every teacher out there in the field. I look up on teachers’ as …

Talented,

Enthusiastic,

Ambitious,

Charismatic,

Holistic,

Energetic and a

 Resourceful person who makes a difference in students’ life

With all these qualities inbuilt in them, over a period of time through experiences and knowledge gain, there is always a vacuum some where in the heart and mind that doesn’t  allow them to completely take the credit of the value add they do through teaching.

If only I knew how to make him understand that multiplication is just repeated addition!

If only I knew how to make that girl focus during this video session?

If only I knew how to help her in learning to balance that chemical equation?

Often a teacher feels guilty of not being able to figure out, why some children can’t attain maximum potential. When will these children reach the threshold of self- learning?

Let me digress to another scene which is just like our own class room the only difference being we listen and some one else conducts that session. Yes, it’s nothing but the teacher training workshop that we attend as a part of professional development programme.

(Anna university teachers at ‘dealing with stress’ workshop)

Have you ever wondered when we attend an in-service workshop conducted at school or elsewhere, there is a standard flow of events during the course of the workshop.

• A talk by renowned personality
• PPT with visual clips and /or audio
• There is a group discussion and presentation, it could be a group presentation or individual the choice is given to the attendees,
• Finally, there is feedback or brainstorming on how this could be applicable in our classrooms

An adult workshop is planned so carefully keeping in mind that, in a huge crowd of teachers there could be people with different learning styles. Some will verbally read and learn newer things, some pick cues from visual aids, a few who will participate only during group discussions( and are not comfortable to speak in the crowd) and last but not the least there are individuals who may take away the crux only towards the end of workshop during the summation.

It is apparent that “Each of us do learn, in one way or the other”. “Each of us possess one or more intelligence as innate quality”

Well I am sure you can link this with our own student group too!

To represent this pictorially,

As teachers, we need do a bit of self analyzing of our own learning style first to maximize the learning outcome of students.There is a valid reason behind this. It is obvious that the way we are comfortable in learning, influences to a greater extent in our lesson planning too.If you can associate yourself to any one of these styles given above, you know how most of your sessions are going to be.You could even share the lesson plan you make with your colleague to check if there are variety in approaches and in testing.

Some tips that can help you maximize your learner’s learning is to work in collaboration with other teachers. It can be planned as,teachers who handle other subject areas for same grade or teachers who handle same subject area in other sections. By allowing other teacher of same subject expertise to take few of your sessions, students will benefit from different teaching styles.This idea of exchanging sessions can be done either at the introduction stage of the new topic or towards the end while revisiting(revising) the topic . In my experiences I have seen students come up with some points that you may not have taught them.They even mention how and when they learnt it.This implies there was another method from where the student learnt it.

You could be an expert in content delivery (linguistic/verbal intelligence), well your peer could be excellent in conducting a quiz or a game based on the concept(kinesthetic or logical intelligence).An art teacher who has the artistic intelligence can motivate a child to illustrate their understanding based on the academic topic where as an English teacher who has linguistic intelligence may help with framing sentences for definitions or give a better choice of words for explanations. An art teacher can even motivate children to include comic strips and cartoons in a creative writing session.This might interest student to write. I am only suggesting few changes here and there which we tend to over look or even assume its not our zone of teaching.

It’s a community of students, so we too must attend to them as community of teachers and not as an individual who is solely responsible for his/her growth.

When we as an individual possess one or more intelligence by nature, it is inevitable in an organisation like school where there are thousands of children, with different intelligence pooled together, I suggest that we initiate a different learning process for that child, tapping the right intelligence.

It is true that children blossom at different pace and to go by the saying,’ One Size Doesn’t Fit All’, let there be enough scope for various approaches in our teaching style.

Too much of play-way method will not satisfy a logic-smart student and repetitive problem solving methods  may not interest an art-smart student.

There is so much of thinking that happens and effort that goes in to every teacher’s session plans. A teacher must be conscious while making lesson plans, to provide scope for teaching the same concept in different styles to maximize that ZPD.

Though the underlying principle is same when it comes to MI and different learning styles there is a difference conceptually.

Please check the following link to get more insight in to Multiple intelligence Vs Learning style.

http://www.edutopia.org/multiple-intelligences-research

All these research, established hypothesis are to support the teachers to be more successful in her/his aim of reaching students with ease.

My suggestion to teachers would be to plan their  formative assessment and every day task providing scope for MI concept. This will enable teachers to actually get proof of their student’s learning on whether they actually got the idea behind the lesson.

• Are they good in concept ?
• Is it only their ‘writing/presentation’ problem?
• Can they represent it in flow chart or an illustration?
• Will they explain it verbally in an organised fashion?
• Can they depict their learning in a chart?
• Will they be able to use concrete objects to express their understanding?
• Will he remember the math tables if I encourage him/her to recite it?

Also think about collaborating with other teachers to share the sessions so that the different teaching & learning styles are considered.

Above all, “A teacher who teaches the student is preferred than a teacher who teaches the curriculum”.

Be smart. Be efficient. Be a continuous learner.