Aditi Mathur and Ratnesh Mathur
Most teachers and parents swear by textbooks and insist that children should follow them. But what if you are not the textbook sort? Supposing you want to travel? Will your trip be driven by the textbook or would you like to plan your own fun trip? Here are some interesting tips on how you can take that fun trip to anywhere using not a text book but a travel guide.
Year: 2017
Getting students on to the career path
Lamia Bagasrawala
Students in high school are faced with life changing decisions. Many students are at the crossroads during this crucial time while trying to decide on their future course of action. Parents too, have limited awareness and are unable to guide their wards properly. How can schools facilitate the career- guidance process? If this is integrated with the school curriculum, it makes the task that much easier. The author highlights some activities and processes that can be initiated when students begin high school.
The power of reading
Neeraja Raghavan
The power of the word and an individual’s ability to read and understand can be awesome. This article in the RIA series takes us through the journey of a teacher, a student and a life- changing friendship. This deeply moving book is a story of Michelle Kuo– the teacher and her student ,Patrick Browning and how she steers his literary awakening. And how does she do this? She gets him to read, read and read! A must read book for teachers too.
Unfolding content knowledge for teaching
Joyita Banerjee
Can anybody teach? Is proficiency in a subject at college level and a desire to teach enough to enter into the practice of teaching? With professionals from different fields entering into teaching, it is imperative to find out what separates a subject graduate from a qualified teacher. What is the content knowledge that a person must have apart from his or her passion towards teaching?
The holistic circle of living and learning
Arun Elassery
The Sri Aurobindo International Centre of Education in Pondicherry cannot be called a school in the sense that we understand the term. Here one can find seven generations teaching at any one time and all of them have lived and learnt here , which is what makes this place unique.
Making a civic connection
Bhakti Bhave
Are your students aware of the civic issues that is present in their surroundings? How can you as a teacher get to engage them to take a healthy interest in issues that concern their own livelihoods? A project – based learning approach around public issues help students relate civics to their real life situations and it also underlines the role that both the State and the citizen are expected to play. Here is three- fold approach to how a civic action project can be taken up.
Which book to go b(u)y?
Shweta Sharan
The CBSE’s attempt to mandate NCERT textbooks across India has received mixed responses. While the Madras High Court has stayed the HRD Ministry’s order, there is every possibility that NCERT books may become compulsory at some point. If it does, the impact on the publishing industry will be significant. But will it impact teaching and learning outcomes too? Teacher Plus spoke to several school principals, teachers, publishing experts and parents to get their views on this. While the poor availability of NCERT textbooks is cited as the reason for schools prescribing textbooks from private publishers, many parents suspect that private schools and private publishers have an unholy nexus of sorts. In the midst of all this, there is an urgent need to introspect on the widely prevalent textbook culture itself.
Do textbooks have a gender?
Chintan Girish Modi
“Twelve years old when she went to her husband’s home, Manga gave birth to a boy, Krishnaswami, on the day following her thirteenth birthday. In less than two years, another boy, Ramaswami, was born. That Manga had to endure the pains of childbirth at so early an age would embarrass C.R. all his life,” writes historian Rajmohan Gandhi in Rajaji: A Life.
Contention and Competition
Karthik Venkatesh
Earlier this year, newspapers were agog with the news that the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) had mandated that textbooks prescribed in schools affiliated to it had to be sourced from the National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT).
Textbook tales
Sujata Bhonsale
A few weeks into the new term in school, my daughter came home one day in an unpleasant mood. On probing, she burst into an angry tirade about her history lesson – in particular an assignment that the class had been given based on the first lesson they had just completed.