Free play in early years

Isha Anand
Are children getting enough time to indulge in free play? Children have an innate urge to do things on their own without any adult coaching or guiding them. This helps them to relate to their inner world of feelings, ideas and lived experiences. Play helps children to improve their motor skills, enhances their imagination and also builds creativity. Educators must try and facilitate an environment where children are able to practice free play.

Bottles, brains and butterflies

Nandini D
In our next article on gardening, we bring you tips on how you can use plant materials to give vent to your creative side. Ranging from terrariums to dried flower petals and leaves to even a small water pond with lilies and fish, there are umpteen things that you can make to improve on your garden’s design.

Children as self-directed learners

Richa Pandey
How do children learn when provided with the opportunity to decide what, when and how they want to learn? Aarohi Life Education is an informal learning centre which provides a stage for children to learn by directing their course of learning themselves. A profile.

Drama can make the difference

Unnati Ved
Teachers are always looking out for strategies to improve and enhance students’ learning experiences. Drama as a teaching tool not only helps a learner’s language proficiency but also builds confidence in children and makes a lesson more active and meaningful.

Library: A place to begin and a place to be

Proma Basu Roy
The author recounts her journey of starting a small book corner in a school which did not have a library at all to establishing a full scale library for the entire school and a library period for each class once a week which has been integrated into the school timetable. The wheel had come full circle. Read on to know how this magical experience came about.

No more tense moments in grammar class

B. Ajitha
English has always been a difficult language to master, especially grammar. Teaching tenses is problematic as students keep changing tenses while writing. This is especially so among high school students. In an ‘action research’ initiative, an online poll consisting of pre-determined set of questions was designed using digital tools to find out how much students knew about their tenses. The findings show how blended learning resources can be used to help students.

Habitats: Forest-floor

Geetha Iyer
When we think of forests, we think it is made up of only trees of different kinds. But, in actuality, the forest ecosystem is much more than just trees. Forests are also habitats for a host of other species of plants along with animals and microorganisms. This article dwells on some habitats within the forests that have a significant role to play in harbouring diversity.

More power to teachers

Simran Luthra
The everyday challenges faced by a group of teachers working at a public school that lacks funding and the comical situations that arise every day is what makes this show interesting. Teachers will find the show highly relatable.

What’s it all about?

Brendan MacCarthaigh
This article throws light on some of the discoveries made by the author at a discussion session organized to help overworked and stressed teachers.

Bringing the lab home: OLabs

Subhadip Senapati
Online laboratories are based on the idea that science experiments can be taught online effectively and inexpensively. Science is a subject where very student must be able to perform basic science experiments. How was this challenge met when students were learning from home?