MAKING STUDENTS RESPONSIBLE FOR THEIR LEARNING

Introduction

Teaching is a reflective profession that involves serious planning and preparation. Before teaching any lesson to my students, I take time to structure my instructions and test the lesson-related activities so as to avoid facing any confusion during the execution. I try to have a dialogue and involve my students in the classroom transaction, rather than having a mundane one-way exercise of delivering lectures. I also try to incorporate various strategies while teaching in order to enrich the teaching–learning experience.

Why is preparation necessary?

In order to help the students recapitulate what they have learnt previously in lower classes and help them identify the difficult topics in the lesson, the students are asked to read the lesson fully before coming to the class so that the topics can be discussed. They are asked to note down the areas in which they face difficulty. To improve their understanding of a topic, the students are made to come up with a list of sub-topics and concepts that are dealt in the chapter (it is instructed that their notes should be different from the sub-headings in the textbook). In order to connect the textbook learning to the applications of the same in real life, the students are asked to procure relevant articles, newspaper cuttings, and pictures related to the lesson or their topic of interest.

What happens in the class?

We usually start a lesson with a set of questions that I prepare to test the already known facts about a topic. Every student shares the areas in which they face difficulty. Following this, I try to find out whether one of their peers would be able to explain their problem. If that does not happen, I write down the problem on the board and go on to the explain it. Here, the objective is to note down the areas in which the students face difficulty so that greater emphasis can be given to these topics through activities.

We do all the activities that are suggested in the textbook so as to better understand the concepts. The students are divided into groups, and each group is assigned a particular group activity or project that is related to any of the sub-concepts taught in the lesson. The students are asked to complete the activity or the project and write a report on it.

We also try to include certain activities and experiments in the class, based on the availability of the resources and time. Following this, another round of reading the text is done in order to summarise the lesson.

In the process of summarising, certain focus questions are asked to check whether the students face any difficulty at any step of the lesson. Questions are also asked while winding up the lesson.

Reflections

Asking students to prepare beforehand, especially to read the text, helps them to understand certain simple concepts of the lesson, ponder about the difficult aspects of it, and think of the doubts they can get clarified in class. This favours the class in the following two ways:

• It helps in facilitating rich discussions in the classroom, especially regarding the topics that the students find difficult.
• It helps to save time, since simple topics can be more or less comprehended by the students. The time thus saved can be used in facilitating rich discussions, debates, activities, and other things which are relevant for having a better understanding of the concepts.

The students can also prepare a list of difficult words and scientific terms, which can be discussed in the classroom in detail. This helps in addressing the literacy and language barriers that affect the learning of the students.

Challenges

Most students find it difficult to read and write. The list of words that they find difficult keeps growing longer and longer. The students face difficulty in reading and writing due to which they tend to get demotivated. Hence, the students require constant motivation and guidance while learning.

Another challenge is the issue of revision. Although, revision is a must for the students so that they can remember the concepts, I find it difficult to find time and create interest among students to revise the concepts again.

Way Forward

The planning should happen well in advance so that the students have sufficient time to plan, execute, and revaluate their strategy and make necessary changes to their approach.

The students often come up with a lot of questions. However, not all of them can be addressed or answered. I need to create more opportunities for my students and work in small groups so that I can address their queries and showcase their learning.

I will continue to take systematic efforts to address the literacy issues among my students.

Author: Ramesh, GHSS Thavalakuppam