Chintan Girish Modi
When I was on a Peace and Conflict Studies fellowship in 2013, I often found myself bewildered by the term ‘conflict zones’. The tendency to reduce certain parts of the world to the conflicts they were struggling with seemed to deny people and communities the other human experiences their lives were filled with.
Category: Cover Story
Identify, listen and empathise
Sunita Biswas
That a teacher wears many hats is, of course, old hat! Among the many hats, one is being used more frequently today. And that is the hat of the teacher as a negotiator, as a mediator, a moderator and as a referee. A non-judgmental, unbiased, objective interlocutor who must, when required, pour oil over troubled waters and build bridges over them.
Barriers within build barriers without
Rahee Dahake
One of the first few words, often used by a baby starting to speak, is ‘No!’ Before the verbal expulsion of refusal, she has also mastered the art of flinging the toy she doesn’t like, refusing the spoon when the food doesn’t appeal to her palate, contorting her body into a stiff arch when she doesn’t want to go or be picked up while doing one of her favourite activities and as a last resort, howling her guts out.
All knotted up inside
Jayagowri Rangarajan
An intrapersonal conflict is within us. It demands recognition, acceptance and resolution. Each of these is interlinked for unless we recognize the existence of a conflict, resolution cannot happen.
Breaking it right
Gita Krenek
Some time ago I attended a workshop for teachers, on conflict resolution. During the programme, several typical conflict situations – such as one child trying to snatch a toy from another, or two children pushing and shoving over who should go first – were acted out, with adults playing the parts of children. Participants were then asked to deal with the situation.
Constructivism: A pedagogical conundrum?
Rohit Dhankar
Constructivism is a pedagogy that is gaining in popularity among educationists and practionists of today. But constructivism as defined and explained by theorists does not take into consideration the practice of the pedagogy or keep in mind the ground realities. This is quite evident in the way constructivism is defined as the theory of practice in the NCF 2005 document. In this article the author analyses constructivism as mentioned in NCF 2005 and tells us why while what the document says is worthwhile it cannot be taken as the complete truth.
Why Ulta Pulta?
Aditi and Ratnesh
This issue of Teacher Plus, to mark Teacher’s Day on September 5, stands apart for being different in its approach to the content published and hence the title, Ulta Pulta. Conceived in the spirit of inviting a school/community of teachers to take up the challenge of creating one issue of the magazine, the articles here give us a glimpse into the learning and teaching journey of teachers, parents and children.
Learning from one another
Meeta Sengupta “When children teach each other, they learn better.” I remember hearing this from a teacher in a simple school in a small town. Then I heard the same last year from Vicky Colbert, WISE Laureate. Indeed this is Read More …
Ideas are for free
For this anniversary issue, Teacher Plus asked its contributors to share one ‘Big Idea’ that could transform education, an idea that could be implemented, or an idea that teachers have lived with for long but have not seen it take shape. So, here we offer 25 ideas, big and small, which can be put to work in your own spaces.
Why here and why not there?
Dyuti Basu
Geography is concerned with aything and everything that is related to the Earth and people. It is a very vibrant and exciting subject. But in schools it ends up being dry and boring. Geography needs to be redeemed in schools and for that teachers have to show students how the subject is interwoven with all other disciplines and our lives.