Happines & Tolerance - Jaswinder Kaur

Unhappy Student:

I addressed an unhappy student because she was dissatisfied with the marks allotted to her in two questions. She expressed that the answers were absolutely correct, but the marks were still deducted. 

I listened to her very carefully, and patiently let her vent her anger. After that, I analyzed the question with her help and told her to underline the keywords to be answered in the questions. 

Then, I read out her answers that were out of context. She had not answered the keywords in the questions. She was convinced afterwards and her unhappiness at the mark allotment disappeared. 

My advice to colleagues:- 

(a) First of all, don’t become defensive when you are questioned. 

(b) Listen 100% to the query/ coup of the student. 

(c) Rather than pointing out the mistake at the first instant, be the focus of the student first on all that is correct ( eg. keyword in question).

An Intolerant Student 

There was a student in the third grade who would not be ready to sit with another student during the rotation of the seats. I called the student during recess and tried to probe as to what was the reason for his behaviour. Initially, he did not divulge anything, so I listed out the positive qualities of the student he did not want to sit with. 

The boy listened to me and then said that his parents had told him not to sit with that student. After listening to him, I arranged a meeting with the parents. They disclosed that since the other students were from a different community, they had told their son not to sit with him. 

After a few meetings with the parents, I successfully convinced them that every child must learn to accept others, whether in school, college or the workplace. After that, the boy was able to become more tolerant. 

My advice to colleagues is that you must try finding the root cause of the disruptive behaviour of a child because it may be related to family and home. 

My suggestion to all my fellow educators is to be gentle and calm with students. We should make friendly relations with our students. You have to know your students' interests and weaknesses. Your attitude should be positive in the classroom. With a positive attitude and effort, teachers can achieve their goals and help students achieve success in their lives.

Humility and Appreciation - Saumya RPKM

  

Humility:

Humility is freedom from pride or arrogance. It is the quality or state of being humble. Humility makes people better thinkers and learners, it also makes the person's patience level high.

Humility is exhibited by respectful behaviour towards others. A humble person does not think they are superior to others. That’s why we should make our future generation learn humility.  

Activity:  

To develop the quality of humility in students, we conducted an activity called "Humility Scavenger Hunt"- After giving a lecture on humility, the children had a solid understanding of the topic and its importance in life. We encouraged them to look for incidents of humility in action. The humility scavenger hunt included real-life situations at school, in the neighbourhood or at home. We also included books, our children read or television and movies they had watched. We got the opportunity to discuss behaviour and actions, talking about what people or characters did and the outcome of their humble actions. 

A) Initial responses from students:  

Each student has tried his best by taking part in this activity. They have given happy and healthy responses as they shared their life experience of humility and being humble with others. Sharing their experiences and stories they showed satisfaction and happiness too. 

B) Your role/ contribution: 

As educators, we played a key role in this activity, where we tried to develop the power of humility in our future generation. We tried to make sure that the students see themselves and each other as beautiful human beings who welcome each other's opinions, insights and questions. 

C) Impact on students:  

This activity has made them more open to other people's views. In other words, students were feeling happy (safe) to engage in a discussion in which they shared their experiences with others. It helped them to look beyond the praise and attention of others and focus on learning and personal improvement through realistic views of the self and the situation. 

D) Takeaway/Learning for you: 

Humility is a powerful trait that is often overlooked in our fast-paced, success-driven world. As educators we learnt the role of humility in personal growth, the ability to handle failure, and the impact of humility in the workplace, including improved leadership, teamwork and the ability to handle conflict. 

Appreciation  

"The roots of all goodness lie in the soil of appreciation for goodness."

Appreciation is the highest form of prayer, for it acknowledges the presence of good wherever you shine the light of your thankful thoughts. Students should learn to appreciate the efforts someone makes for them and should be genuinely grateful for it.  

Activity: 

Students were asked to write appreciation notes for someone whom they really wanted to appreciate for what they do and later give them those notes. Another activity was done wherein the students were asked to appreciate their classmates and later go home and express their appreciation and gratitude for them.  

Impact: 

All the students participated in the activities with their full zeal and enthusiasm. An increased sense of brotherhood and sisterhood was evident in their learning. All the students made it their primary responsibility to always be humble and truthful, appreciate one another, and be grateful.  

Teacher's Role: 

The teacher was like a facilitator who guided and motivated all the students to actively come ahead and take part in the activities. 

Saumya @ RPK School Moradabad

Rashmi Wright, Ekta Sharma, Rajni Gupta, Shafali Johri, Asha Singh, Beena Singh, Nidhi Narula

Prerna Rathod: Play, Curiosity and Enthusiasm

Play is an important part of school life. Play is taken as sports or games. Play doesn’t imply to games, it means activities that help in learning. Of course sports and games are important part of education as these help students to remain fit and healthy. Also while playing games, students learn important values like playing a fair game, team spirit, leadership, excepting defeat with courage, etc.

Learning through play-way method is one of the best way to teach the student. For pre-primary students, this method is most suitable to teach them new concepts. Play is not just playing games, but it means solving puzzles, riddles, role play, simple games on numbers and words. These games develop the interest of the students and they start taking an interest in what is been taught to them. This leads to curiosity and they want to learn more. Thus, the students will always be attentive in the class and eager to learn more.

Curiosity leads to enthusiasm. A child’s mind will start to work in many directions. His/her creative and critical thinking will enhance. He/she will start building new concepts. They will try to find more regarding a topic. This will develop their imaginations and scientific learning. Thus, in higher classes, they will be able to understand difficult concepts and try to find solutions for any problem they face and their learning will never stop.

Once the basic understanding and foundation of a child are set, they will become good human beings. They will be ready to face the world confidently and without any fear. They will become independent to take a decision in all phases of their life. But one must remember parents and educators should guide and support the children in their journey. Even if they are a failure at a certain point, motivate them to do better. This will help to build their self-esteem. Also, they will do better in life and take risks in life.

Play develops curiosity and this leads to enthusiasm.

Prerna Rathod

The Fabindia School, prd4fab@gmail.com