Teaching
Who is the greatest teacher of the world?
(Winners Announced!!)
If someone asks me, I would respond with three simple letters – Mom. Indeed this was the most popular theme amongst the 300 students of the 700 who participated in the ‘Who is the greatest teacher of the world’ Essay competition by ASSET Scope (monthly newsletter for schools by EI) With Teacher’s Day just round the corner, the competition was organised for students across the country to encourage them to discern learning outside the classroom.
“It was a joy to come across entries by young learners expressing ‘life’ and ‘experience’ as their greatest teachers”, says Bindu Pillai, Editor – ASSETScope. Nallari, a class 9 student writes, “Every time we experience something new, we learn something new. When we look back at our experiences we realize that these experiences made the person we are today.” For Shrishti Pal, there is no greater teacher than the all powerful nature, “Nature’s caprice makes it fatherly sometimes and motherly at other times. It teaches us to be tender, patient and understanding as a mother and to be bold and strong as a father.” “There were some touching entries that took me back to my childhood where children talked about how much their grandparents had influenced their lives”, adds Bindu.
And then there were some very unconventional teachers like the omnipresent computers or the 8 legged crawlies-spiders! and the winners are:
First Prize winner – Swaha Sinha, Bai A. F. Petit Girls’ High School, Mumbai
Second Prize winner – Reetica Pattanayak, Global Indian International School, Singapore
Third Prize winner – Somya Kumari, St Xavier’s School, Hazaribag
First prize winner has been awarded a 3D T-Shirt, second prize winner will get Magic Mug and third prize winner will get artistic pen.
To read the enteries click here
Student Misconceptions in Learning
Every student has a unique way of thinking, learning and making sense of what he/she hears or sees. Their active imagination is constantly building new connections and assimilating new information. Research shows that these thought processes contribute to how a child learns. However, some faulty ideas can lead to several learning gaps. These learning gaps need to be identified, questioned and corrected before they result into what are called alternate conceptions or misconceptions.
Educational Initiatives and Wirpo Applying Thought in School will be launching a Video Series on the Student Misconceoptions on the 29th of November 2008.
Do leave your comments about this video and watch out for this space for more videos.
Lesson Study: The Core of Japanese Professional Development
Every principal who has tried implementing a change in teaching culture and methods in her school knows just how difficult it can be. With the pressures of running and teaching in a school, comes a natural resistance to new and alien ideas. And yet, it is this resistance that the leader must overcome to create the Art of Transformation. Lesson Study, a widespread practice in Japan brings hope to leaders who aspire to create a masterpiece in their schools.
Our View: There are several web and print based resources available for teachers these days. As described in this article there are new methods being used to developed lesson plans. An interesting point discussed here is recording classroom sessions and using the student responses as leads to creating new lesson plans. Do teachers make use of these research-based tools?
Are classrooms a monotonous delivery of textual content?
Do teachers look at themselves as resources or facilitators who help students discover new material available outside the classroom?
Catherine Lewis, a leading educational researcher, has studied the practice of Lesson Study in the Japanese school education system. She was introduced to the practice when she realised that teachers all across Japan are very effective at teaching Science. When she asked a large number of teachers where they learnt how to teach Science, she got the same answer: “jugyou kenkyuu” – lesson study or research lessons.
Research Lessons, as Lewis describes them, are actual classroom lessons which share the following characteristics:
1. Research Lessons are planned for a long time.
2. Research Lessons are observed by other teachers.
3. Research Lessons are designed to bring to life a particular goal or vision of education.
4. Research Lessons are recorded.
5. Research Lessons are discussed.
In essence, the practice of lesson study involves a group of teachers carefully planning a lesson on a particular topic with the aim of bringing to life a particular goal or vision (for example, a student-centered classroom). These teachers actually conduct the lesson which is both observed by other teachers and recorded for future reference. This is followed by a seminar in which the teachers discuss, dissect and share the learnings from the experiment.
As an example, Catherine Lewis describes in detail a research lesson on levers from the Komae School no. 7 a normal public school. The vision that was being implemented in this lesson was “letting students value friendship and yet build their own perspectives and ways of thinking.” In this context, the teachers chose to “introduce levers in a way that really motivates the student’s desire to learn, and that encourages and emboldens them to develop their own perspectives.” In the process of planning the lesson, the teachers share various ways in which they have taught the lesson before and discuss which ways will help them reach their goal. They decide to challenge students by asking them to lift 100 kg bag of sand, and then group the students with similar ideas together to put their thoughts into practice. The teachers have never tried this before, and wish to find out if this will help promote individual thinking.
On the day of the lesson, many teachers from the school are observing. While the plan is put into action, teachers take note of how it goes, and record student interactions, questions, etc. After the lesson, a colloquium is organized where the teachers who planned and conducted a session speak about their experience and then open the forum for discussion. In this process, the lesson gets discussed in detail, and different points of view about what students learnt get shared.
1. Individual Professional Development
2. Teachers learning to see children
3. Spread of new content and approaches
4. Honouring the Central Role of Teachers
This is an abridged version of Lewis C. “Lesson Study: The Core of Japanese Professional Development” – Invited address to the Special Interest Group in Mathematics Education – American Educational Research Association Meetings, New Orleans, 2000.
(The transcript of the original talk can be found at www.lessonresearch.net/aera2000.pdf)
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