The school of life

Manasi Karthik

Going to school everyday, learning from prescribed textbooks, working within the confines of a system that is not very flexible. Is this your idea of the education you or your children are having? This author was courageous enough to step outside the system and experience learning in an entirely different and wholesome manner.

Ridding ourselves of the rod

Sonali Kusum

Corporal punishment is no longer legal but that hasn’t stopped some schools from meteing them out. While there are laws and systems in place to deal with those who indulge in corporal punishment, their implementation is still wanting.

Developing a concern for the environment

Stella Pauline Punitha

How blue is our planet? Is a book that can beautifully supplement the EVS/science textbooks in school. Through its 16 short stories the book succeeds in bringing out in children a concern for their surroundings.

Linking geography with life

Susheela Raghavan

Geography in schools stays in the textbooks, the globes and the maps. If the subject has to appeal to children it is necessary that you pull geography out of the textbook and bring it into the lives of your students. Here are some activities that show you how you can achieve this.

Fulfilling Gandhi’s ideology

Arun Elassery

Apart from fighting for India’s independence, one of Gandhi’s pet projects was Nai Taleem–a new way of looking at education. This time Alternatiview features Anand Niketan, a school started by Gandhi himself in 1940. Although it was shut down in 1975, Anand Niketan was reopened in 2005 and has been functioning successfully since then carrying on with Gandhi’s idea of learning through craft.

With love and care

Radhika Mitter

‘Special children’ are often considered difficult and a burden. But treat them with love and care and see how much you can teach each other.

Laugh out loud… with affection

Rohan D’Souza

Which of us doesn’t like a laugh now and then. And children, with fewer tensions and problems, laugh unabashedly. When we all enjoy a little humour, is it worth looking at how we can make use of our ‘funny bones’ in pedagogy? Also how important is it to inculcate in children the ability to laugh at themselves and others without denigrating them?

Generating humour in the classroom

Kamakshi Balasubramanian

When one talks about using humour in the classroom, the onus of being the source of humour automatically falls on the teacher. But what if we tell you that this needn’t always be the case? You can facilitate the generation of humour in the classroom, which will come collectively from the children. Read on to find out how.