Season 1 Episodes

Episode 12: Understanding CPD and Classroom Management

Why is Continuous Professional Development (CPD) important? How can we retain good teachers in the classrooms? Can you look at your large classroom as an opportunity? And how soon should we introduce English in our schools? Teacher Plus met with Rod Bolitho, Academic Director at Norwich Institute for Language Education, and Prof. Geetha Durairajan, Professor, Department of Testing and Evaluation, EFL University, Hyderabad for the answers.

Episode 11: Tackling learning difficulties

These days we are more aware of the learning disabilities that some children may have. We know the different names and to a certain extent what these difficulties are. But how aware are we of learning difficulties in children in our own classes? As teachers how aware should we be of these issues that our students maybe facing? Do we need to be professionally trained to spot learning difficulties or can we look out for certain signs that children with learning difficulties may give away? Once we realize that a certain child maybe facing a problem, are there ways in which we can make the learning process easier for them to the extent that we can as teachers? How do we help? Seetha Anand, Early childhood curriculum developer and Remedial therapist tells teachers of the simple steps they can take to identify and then help children with learning problems.

Episode 10: Creating conducive environments for primary school

Primary school teachers or caregivers who handle children between the 0-6 age group perhaps have the toughest jobs. These years are extremely crucial in the life of a child; the ‘formative’ years when they are growing both physically and mentally. So how do you take care of these children? Can you teach them? Is the practice of introducing academic learning (including ABC and the numbers) at such a young age advisable? How do our regular practices impact children? How do we improve our skills to take care of them better so that they grow up learning and curious and not stressed? Seetha Anand, Early childhood curriculum developer and Remedial therapist talks to Teaching and Learning Moments with Teacher Plus.

Episode 9: Staying motivated

Motivation is the most important element that should be part of every teacher’s make up. A demotivated teachers means disinterested students. There will be no learning in the classroom. But then year after year when you have to teach the same textbooks to students who maybe difficult, unwilling, and unruly how does one stay motivated? A teacher also has to deal with a school administration that maybe unappreciative and a demanding family. Despite these truths, it is necessary that a teacher stays motivated because there are 30-60 students looking up to her, eager to learn. Seetha Murthy, Director, Silver Oaks School tells us how teachers can manage this.

Episode 8: Welcome back after a break

It is inevitable that students will take breaks—short or long—during the school year. Perhaps they were sick, the parents took them on a short holiday, they had guests at home, or maybe a wedding in the close family. Missing school even for four days means missing out on all those classes, all the work that got completed, all the activities and therefore when a child comes back to school it maybe with a slight apprehension. Yes there is the excitement of the holiday or relief if the child has been sick but there is also a slight fear of ‘what if I don’t understand what is happening now.’ So as a teacher or even as a parent how can we make it easy for the children to get back to school work? Manaswini Sridhar, Education consultant and Advisor shares a few tips and ideas that can make it easy for both the students and the teachers to be ready for the day again.

Episode 7: Tech savvy teachers

When it was realized that technology is here to stay and that it will play a big role in the lives of students, computers were brought in as one of the several subjects studied in schools. Today the need is to optimally use technology—the different kinds—in the various subjects learnt in school. From the plethora of possibilities that technology offers how can teachers sieve out what is best for them? Seetha Murthy, Director of Silver Oaks Schools, talks to us about how we can be tech savvy teachers.

Episode 6: Settling in as a substitute or new teacher

First days are always scary. Whether you are a new teacher, or new to a particular class, or a substitute teacher it is never easy to plunge straightway into the job you are meant to be doing. There are lots of things that could unsettle you—your own nervousness, the students, the school administration. So how do you settle in? How do you make things better for yourself, so that the students don’t get the better of you? Take a few deep breaths and follow these simple yet effective tips that Education consultant and Advisor, Manaswini Sridhar shares with us.

Episode 5: Aunty or Teacher?

This is perhaps a very common situation that most teachers have to go through—having a fellow teacher’s child in your classroom. A situation like this can sometimes upset the dynamics of a class. How should you as a teacher treat your colleague’s child so as not to seem biased in anyway? What should you do to allow the child to handle the situation rationally? This particular child should in no way be different than the rest of your students for you, but then with a lot of variables at play—your relationship with your colleague, your relationship with the child outside school, the rest of the class and their views, etc.—it can be a difficult problem to deal with. In this episode of Teaching and Learning Moments with Teacher Plus, Manaswini Sridhar, Education consultant and Advisor, talks about how you can best handle this situation.

Episode 4: The parent-school-teacher partnership

Educating a child is serious business. The parents’ responsibility should not end with their child’s admission to school. The school should not close its doors at the parents after the fee is paid. And the teacher should not see a parent’s enthusiasm as interference. The parents, the school, and the teacher should work in tandem to achieve all round education of the child. Listen to Manaswini Sridhar, Education consultant and advisor, answer questions on how parents, schools, and teachers can achieve a healthy working balance and contribute to a child’s development.

Episode 3: Increasing productivity in class

A teacher’s job requires him/her not just to teach children but to engage them in the process of learning. The teacher has to create an environment of learning in the class. The textbook cannot be the one and only tool he/she uses to engage the children. It has to be one of many tools. Learning today has to be engaging, relevant, and active. Here are a few suggestions by Manaswini Sridhar, Education consultant and Advisor, on how you can increase the productivity of your class.

Episode 2: How to bring your workshop learnings into the classroom

Workshops are a part of every teacher’s life. However, for various reasons most teachers leave what they learnt at the workshop at the workshop itself. Teachers come back to their classrooms and carry on as before or they attempt a new idea for a couple of days before giving it up. Workshops are held so that teachers grow in their profession and if that is to happen that teachers have to bring back to their classrooms what they have learnt in the workshops they have participated in. Education consultant and Advisor, Manaswini Sridhar shares with the listeners how teachers can make the most of the workshops they attend.

Episode 1: Dealing with stress

There is a lot of talk always about the stress that students have to go through in school. But what about the teachers? Teachers too are under a lot of pressure these days to perform. Bogged down by expectations from the parents and students and an overload of work from the school management, the teacher is getting more and more stressed and unable to fulfill properly her/his primary responsibility–to teach/facilitate. It has become necessary that every teacher equip herself/himself with skills to de-stress. Listen to Manaswini Sridhar (education consultant and advisor) to find out how you can shake that tiredness off.

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