Olympics and learning

“Citius, Altius, Fortius – Faster, Higher, Stronger” – The Olympic Motto

“The most important thing in the Olympic Games is not to win but to take part, just as the most important thing in life is not the triumph but the struggle. The essential thing is not to have conquered but to have fought well” – the Olympic Creed

The Olympics is a spectacular event showcasing sporting excellence and competition. It has now evolved into a major international event with great cultural, political, economic and social importance. With our country’s best performance (Six medals overall) in the recently concluded London Olympics 2012 there is a lot of interest and positivity on how to improve it further. The focus is shifting towards early years, usually the time spent in schooling, for identifying talent and taking them to the next level. So, not only can the Olympic creed and motto be used to help our children build a sound value system but other wonderful facets of the Olympic Games can also be used to enhance the teaching-learning process.

The kind of public interest that has been aroused by the recent Olympics has led to a lot of media bytes. If we keep an eye on such articles in magazines, newspapers and the internet and make a collection, then they can be a very handy tool. Information gathering could be the starting point and then classroom integration can happen in different ways.

Some of the ways in which they can be used in our classrooms are:

Mathematics and Sciences: Any sporting event can delight Math teachers, because it leaves them with a lot of data. To develop data handling skills, practice is important. There is a lot that the Olympics can offer for such practice. Data handling is possible right from the Tabular representation of data to pictorial representation in various forms, viz., Bar graphs, line graphs, pie graphs, etc.

The article has been contributed by Butterfly Fields, a company working in the domain of innovative teaching-learning techniques. To know more about the work the company does, visit www.butterflyfields.com or call 040 2771 1020.

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