The Jammu and Kashmir government’s recent decision with regard to the implementation of uniform academic calendar has rescheduled exam session in the Kashmir division. Now the exams upto the class 12th are going to be conducted in the months of March-April which earlier used to be conducted in October-November.The class work for the current academic session has been started way back in November last year and almost all the schools in the valley havecompleted the syllabus. Now when the session has been rescheduled there is a great dilemma how to engage thestudents in the schools when they have nothing left in the given class syllabus. It is because of this dilemma that most of the schools do witness high student absenteeism andthe low enthusiasm in the teaching learning process in these days.
At the moment in each and every schoolthe continuous and comprehensive evaluation is in vogue and the class tests are being conducted frequently day in and day out. It is well known that excessof every thing is bad and hence these tests too have lost the relevance.The schools have to engage thestudents at least for two months more before the winter vacations are announced. The two months seems very tough for the school administration to hook up the students and engage them in the formal schooling onthe regular basis with the existent policies and pedagogies.In order to rejuvenate theenthusiasm among the students forregular schooling the school heads and administration have to redesign theirpolicies and practices say Pedagogical approaches. They have to shift their focus from the traditional mode of teaching to the innovative pedagogies. There is a great need of redesigning of the pedagogies andtimetable in each and every school.
The School heads and administration need to stress on the learning gaps which most of the students have due to the COVID-19 pandemic. They have to work on innovative and result oriented special crush course for these two months so that the students will once again turnback towards the schools which is very essential for their personality development in terms of creativity, socio- emotional learning and imaginative thinking.In this crush course the timetableshould be of at least for one hour for a subject and each subject must get equal number of classes from the subject expert in a week. For each subject in order to make it new and interesting, we have to look beyond theclassroom lenses and have to add new things to it.
The language teachers should move a step forward from the given text books and engage and encourage the students with different activities like reading and writing of stories, essays, dialogues, dramas, poems, phonetics etc which are helpful and develop the required competences of a particular age group. Let there be the speaking crush courses withdifferent accents. More than the class work it is the professional responsibility of the language teachers to conduct the morning assemblies so that the prayers are being prayed in true spirit, with authentic words and good pronunciation and the allied activities ofmorning assembly do have the monitoring, guidance and patronage of the language teachers. This will turn the morning assemblies in to a true teaching learning activity and may serve the student interests to a great extent.The science teachers have to move beyond the theory and give the concepts practical shape in the laboratory. There are always lots of tendencies among the children to seek out the reasons for the various mysteries of life. It is the time to answer them why there is a big sound (Thunder) after the lightning. They are there to ask you many questions when you will encourage them in the class. Let them to answer their own and if they fail correct them in a scientific way with the local examples.
They have to arrange the science classes and try to develop the scientific temper and critical thinking among them through the stories of innovation, science drama etc. Teachers have to design the models for them and encourage the students for designing the models, diagrams and drawings of their own. The child’s scientifictemper isdirectly related to the environment he or she lives in and the company he/she keeps. Therefore your teaching style has a lot to offer towards the development of scientific temper in your student.The science teachershould have a special assignment for the development of temperament for sustainable development hence should work with the students for environmental cleanliness and the health and hygiene within the school campus.
The subject of mathematics isconsidered toughmostly in our part of the world. It is this mathematics phobia, which has led to the continuous decline in its enrollment at the senior secondary level. The concerned teachers have a special responsibility to change the mindset and make it sure that mathematics is not taught but experienced. We are witness to the fact that whenever we have to measure a piece of land we have to call a Patwari irrespective you are a math graduate or post graduate. This time the math teacher has the golden opportunity to practice the menstruation by measuring the total area of school ground, the total area of the school building, the lawns, the paths etc. He has to link and sink the real life problems with the daily mathematics classes.
The teachers are there to develop thereasoning power of the students with the different modes like OMR based reasoning and general aptitude test series and the open class reasoning programmes.The mathematics teachersshould have the design of the school and its ground in his hand and each wall, block and path must have written boardshighlighting the length, breadth and area.It is the times to not teach the mathematics on the white board instead instill the love for the subject byfocusing theirenergy andattention onmathematics through games and practical modes. Games like Sudoku will help them in addition and prime climbe in division and multiplication in addition to addition. There are stories and drama in addition to visual arts though which the mathematics is being taught the only pre condition is to have the courage to move beyond the boundaries.
The social science teachers are there with the tremendous scope to go beyond the text books and the syllabus. The social science teachers are there to develop the critical thinking and sense of argument, the inculcation of democratic temper and the sense of accommodation. He/ she can move the students out of the classroom and engage them in a student shabha, in an open discussion, solution of local social issue, drama, disaster management, election campaign for school parliament, to study the weather etc. The social science teacher must own the assignments like student welfare, school leadership, debates, discussions and seminars, legal clubs etc. The other subjects like computer, general knowledge and many more vocational course too have their field of practical work and they too have to engage the students in the areas which can benefit the student community like food fests, repairment of electronic goods etc.
A lot of time and energy is being spent onimaging that a good education involves only force feeding of more information and knowledge into the minds of students but the reality is that as Plutarch has put it “the correct analogy for the mind is not a vessel that needs filling but the wood that needs igniting “. Hence the teachers have to move and adapt those approaches which will force the students to attend the classes but this is only possible when the teacher is ready and able to give them something new, Innovative and something they are in need of.
(The Author is a Senior Academic Officer at SCERT-KD and can be mailed at [email protected])
