Deepak
SAY GOODBYE TO MUGGING (LEARNING BY ROTE) IN SCHOOL
The same old boring classes! Having to memorize and reproduce the life of a King in 600 B.C., theorems, formulae..... Deepak (fictional name) was sick and tired of it all. It didn't matter whether he understood the concepts, nor could he fathom why he had to learn all this. Ingenuity being discouraged, there was no challenge or joy in going to school.
Deepak was very quiet during class. He was interested in everything but academics. The teachers when asked, said that Deepak was unenthusiastic about everything and did not enjoy any of the classes. They felt that he had a mental block against school, and had long since given up on him.
Suvidya was conducting a maths lab in the school during that year.Games, puzzles, cutting, sticking......the class IX students were enjoying every minute of it, and learning maths in the process.They would enthusiatically ask for more models. Though they could quit the lab any time, for the more lucrative nutrition class where they'd get food, their enjoyment was evident from the fact that they chose not to.
But Deepak was the challenge! He would never participate in any of the activities or show any interest. The Suvidya teachers paid him extra attention at first. Told him stories of mathematicians, of the origin of different concepts. But there was no reaction.
Towards the end of the year, preperations were on for an exhibition. Deepak had almost been given up on as a lost cause. It was then that Deepak surprised everyone. Deepak went up to one of the Suvidya teachers, and said he had been particularly impressed by one of the models. He was trying to share it with a friend, but was having some conceptual difficulty, and therefore needed some assistance. Deepak not only solved the particular problem, but went on to take part in the exhibition. His interest in learning had been revived through the innovative and participatory teaching methods used by Suvidya.
It is this joy of learning in general and maths in particular, that Suvidya is trying to initiate and motivate in children. Making the abstract more real to their everyday lives.Interestingly enough, by the end of the lab the teachers said that they would like to implement models etc. into their regular teaching method.
