Month: August 2023

A bit of spring cleaning for the mind?

Usha Raman
As humans can we be free from biases? How deep are these biases? How well do we know our biases? With experience do these biases taper off or is it the other way around? As teachers, how do these biases play in our classrooms?

The ABCs of early learning

Surabhi Agarwal
Teaching is not easy – especially when it comes to preschool children. This can be ascribed to more than a few reasons. For some of the children it is the first time they interact with peers, pedagogical practices that work well with elder children may not work here, visuals are crucial and so on. So, what works with these children aged 3 to 6?

The myth of the unbiased teacher

Kavita Anand
We all carry biases and many times are unaware of these biases ourselves. Teachers are human too; they not only have biases but carry them to the classrooms! Is this a matter of concern for them? Textbooks the teachers use too carry biases – those of the textbook writers. In what ways can these biases affect the students? How can teachers get rid of these biases? How do biases play out in times of artificial intelligence.

Just Imagine

Chintan Girish Modi
Sir Ken Robinson’s TED talk made him a wellknown name in the education circles. After his passing away, his daughter, who describes her father’s work as ‘a love letter to human potential’, has brought out this book. It is meant to be a concise introduction to Sir Ken Robinson’s key ideas and propositions, developed over a lifetime.

Students as Futurists: Imagination in the classroom

Ketaki Chowkhani and Kushal Sohal
What happens when a group of students is asked to imagine a utopian scenario vis-à-vis gender and sexuality; asked to move beyond text books and get creative. To let their imagination run wild as they envisaged a better world. Can the students think beyond the immediate? Can they bring a shift in the way they think?

How correct is our correction?

Jwairia Saleem
Correcting notebooks many a time brings to mind a picture of a tired teacher hurriedly going through notebooks. Let us go beyond the cliches and explore whey we check the notebooks in the first place? And, whether our actions help the students to improve?

Integrated approach to enhancement of students’ speaking skill

Tenzing Rapgyal
Many students are keen to learn English. They invest time and efforts to improve their English. However, most of them do not get the opportunities to converse in English. As a result they cannot express themselves and end up suffering. How can teachers handhold such students and help clear their mental blocks?

Fostering engagement with learning materials: a collaborative approach

B. Ajitha
Teacher training especially when sessions are conducted in a lecture mode are a challenge. It is neither easy to retain interest levels of teachers not to get them motivated to bring change to the classroom. Collaborative learning strategies like Jigsaw strategy and Reciprocal Teaching which encourage teachers to participate actively can be a welcome change for these sessions.

Our journey to Kaziranga National Park

Lakshmi Mitter
Books can introduce us to people we have never met and places we have never visited. They help us to question and to attempt to understand a world different from ours. For this we need to engage with the book. The writer shares her experiences with a book – from how she got to know of it to how the children she read it with reacted to the book.