my thoughts

  “Educating the mind without educating the heart is no education at all.” Children often complain that they are unable to recall what they need to, especially during exams. The major reasons that are quite apparent are mindless cramming and mounting information which is difficult for them to channelize. In this article, I would focus on the importance of understanding and practice for enhancing the capacity of memorization. Learning is an ongoing process. Every day, a child spends around 6 hours in the school, seeking knowledge, understanding, applying the concepts learnt and showcasing acquired skills. Memory plays a very important part in this process. It plays the key role in the recalling the knowledge acquired; the very first step in the ladder of Bloom’s Taxonomy. “ Short-term memory  acts as a kind of “scratch-pad” for temporary recall of the information which is being processed at any point in time whereas working memory refers more to the whole theo...

DON’T LET EXPECTATIONS KILL CREATIVE PASSIONS As written in earlier article, Central Board of Education has taken many revolutionary steps in the recent past, for the benefit of students, focusing on their holistic development. It has laid special importance on sports and extra-curricular activities, considering them as an integral part of school life. While the policy makers are experimenting to enable the students flourish in all spheres of life and make an informed decision based on their interests and forte; the ground reality portrays a totally different scenario. For most of the parents, school is a place to acquire specific subject based knowledge and a means for their kids to become capable and qualified for a lucrative and main stream job opportunity in future. Aspiring “secure and prosperous” lives for their children, parents turn towards coaching centres. I have stressed upon this matter numerous times that as soon as a child reaches class XI, he is enrolled in a coac...

Recently, while welcoming the students to school after the summer break, the students of class XII raised the issue of Brain Drain during the assembly. This left me thinking that in spite of the fact that India is such a patriotic nation with people firmly attached to its roots; brain drain has always been a significant setback for us. How can you imagine a nation to grow and prosper if its people are ready to become an asset to a foreign country? Some people still often say that they would like to work in some other country. When probed for the reasons they accept that they are not happy with how the policies are implemented in India. “Over the years, millions of young talented Indians from various disciplines have left their soil in search of better opportunities. This is what is termed as “Brain Drain” and policymakers have been grappling with this issue for a long time. It is well known that the consequences of brain drain are severe, especially for a developing economy li...

I feel fortunate being in the company of thousands of wonderful children and hundreds of teachers every day. Children, who aspire, dream, try, fail, achieve and excel, and teachers who give their best to help these kids, realize and achieve their goals. Each child is an individual full of dreams. I should mention that parents are also playing their part in shaping these individuals. They are doing their best to stand by their kids through thick and thin. We also teach our kids a lot of values, we ask them to be positive and count their blessings. Amidst all this we often forget to remind them that they are privileged. Yes, it is indeed a privilege to able to attend a school. From the clean water they drink to the very fact that they have clean water to take a shower every day, is a privilege. With all these facilities being provided to them, kids often confine their world to themselves. They become indifferent to the fact that they are a part of a community, a society and a nati...

A school may have a wonderful curriculum policy and a sophisticated approach to assessment, but a child’s holistic development depends on effective teaching and balanced parenting . A child’s world revolves around his parents and teachers. Together they make, shape and guide him/her. Indeed, they mean the world to the kids. “ You Your Child and School ” by Ken Robinson and Lou Aronica discusses effective teaching and parenting in a comprehensive manner. This encouraged me to share its interesting insights with all my readers. BEING TEACHERS… Robinson describes teachers as the “ source ” of the teaching and learning process. Teaching basically includes instructing and explaining. But a teacher’s role is not confined to it. “There is more to education than proportional knowledge.” With this comprehensive insight Robinson explicitly discusses “ The Roles of Teachers ”. According to him teachers have four major roles to play: 1.     ENABLE : Robinson compares...

LET THE KIDS PLAY AND THRIVE ON THEIR OWN CBSE  has directed all its schools to reserve one period daily from 2018-19 academic session for physical education for  Std. IX-XII , because it wants to ‘mainstream’ the subject for holistic development of students. The Health and Physical Education (HPE) program will be a mandatory for all schools and CBSE will be releasing details about the curriculum in the near future. The board’s chairperson wrote to schools that, “CBSE has decided to mainstream HPE with the aim of holistic development of the child, leading to a well-balanced individual in all walks of life”. The letter added that the aim of mainstreaming HPE is also to enable the students to attain an optimum state of health. (Source TOI) Although this step is hailed by Principals everywhere but the question remains that where is the time in the timetable to accommodate HPE? It also poses a challenge for CBSE schools that have integrated coaching tie-ups in Std XI and X...