Textbook turbulence

As part of my work as Curriculum Specialist, I had to look at the contents of a few textbooks published by the NCERT yesterday.

As many education professionals would know, NCERT textbook contents need to raise well above their current quality levels including in their use of English language.  For example, Chapter 8 of NCERT's Political Science textbook for Class 8 explains about the need to provide basic amenities to  all people, using case studies. This chapter is titled `Public Facilities'.



Screenshot of Chapter 9 of NCERT Political Science textbook for Class 8

I think that `Basic Amenities' or `Common Amenities' would be a better term for the title of this chapter.  I think that any textbook writing should involve the most appropriate use of language.

Chapter 8 entitled `DEVOTIONAL PATH TO THE DEVINE' in the History textbook prescribed for Standard 7 mentions about Adwaitaa and Visishtaadwaitaa schools of Hinduism but doesn't, about  the Dwaitaa school.

Excerpt from NCERT History textbook for Std 7

However, when we consider the quality of photographs and diagrams in general, NCERT textbooks seem to be pupil friendly. I wish that the same goes with textual contents as well.

(When I worked in the editorial division of Macmillan India Limited a few years back, there was a very good textbook series entitled `Exploring Science', meant for Primary classes. The only problem with the books was that they were expensive. When I was asked to suggest cost cutting measures, one of the ideas which I gave was to use a lower quality paper similar to the one used in NCERT textbooks and bring the cost down. But my suggestion was ignored by the then GM Publishing at the Country Office in Bangalore, as it was `not practical'. Hope that the lady knows about NCERT text books and how they are very affordable). 

World Teachers' Day 2012

In spite of rapid advances in technology in general and educational technology in  particular, it is obvious that teachers' role will continue to be crucial in our classrooms (and beyond).

In my pressure of work, I  had completely forgotten to remember World Teachers' Day which was celebrated on 5 October this year too. 

Let me share a short informative video developed by the global NGO Teachers Without Borders with you this time. Hope you like it.   

Immensely Spiritual Internet Radio

This afternoon after lunch, as I was browsing through my favourite Madhwa websites, I came across Internet Radio Station maintained by Uttaradi Math. Let me share the joy of listening to this great immensely spiritual round the clock resource, with pranaams, to our Swamiji and his dedicated team at the Math.



Demo classes on digital demand

It is quite natural that our sparetime interests change as we grow older. It is several years since I listened to softrock music, got into a weekend outing or engaged in DXing with passion. These favourite pastimes have given way to more intellectually stimulating activities of which browsing the academic net is one.

As all dedicated teachers would know, teaching is one of the most rewarding professions if we continue doing our work considering each school period as a `new' one with possible classroom problems and prepare our lessons and teaching methods in the most student friendly manner. I thank God for having blessed me with years of experience such that my students and teacher colleagues liked the way in which I taught (using a range of resources from textbooks and simple locally available materials to digital technology).

A South African website and an MIT website which I browsed a few minutes back took me back by a few years, including 2006, when I used to teach `Momentum' using simple toys to my Class 9 students in a large city school (of which I was the Principal). As you can see, the first one is a revision material (with just 27 minutes running time which is not adequate to include experiments and activities) and the second one, a demo lesson taught by Prof Walter Lewin.       

The videos made me  remember also as to how my mobile phone camera had been very useful in recording simple student friendly processes and activities related to lesson concepts (sometimes shot by students themselves) for use in my classes.

(It is amazing to experience the advantages of digital technology today. We have come a long way from VHS videotapes, 16mm films and audiocassette tapes in our classrooms).

I think that our corporate organisations should strive to partner with government departments of education so that all children can access such quality oriented digital lesson materials to support what children learn in their classrooms.

Hinduism in Trinidad and Tobago

In my earlier posts I had mentioned as to how Hindus of Indian origin living in very distant countries continue their customs and traditions. Let me take you on a virtual journey to Dattapeetam, founded by Shri Ganapathi Sachithananda Swamiji in Trinidad. (Local Hindus consider their River Aripo somewhat like how we consider our Holy River Ganga). Hope you like it.

Hope you like reading my posts.

I'll be joining the India Office of  a US based K-12 Educational Software Company in the coming week. Though I'll be working at home office setting from my residence in Madras (Chennai), I'll be at my PC full-time (usually longer than 9 to 5 as expected by my employer so that I and my MD can interact via video conferencing etc, which is quite normal at Senior Management positions). This means that the only spare time available would be during weekends. I like to use significant part of  weekends in performing Pooja in our Pooja room (besides daily Sandhyaavandanam/s and Japa) and the remaining part in reading my favourite newspaper columns and watching my favourite TV programmes (which are really very few) some times using my datacard and trustworthy notebook .

(I think that my new job would probably be strenuous to some extent).

I'll continue writing whenever I find time. Thanks. 

Para Olympics 2012

It was a delight to watch the inaguration of Para Olympics last night on TV. I usually watch Para Olympics more eagerly than Olympics because of two reasons: (i) The events prove that physical disability is not a handicap in any way if we handle it properly and (ii) I am considered to be physically handicapped by some people (though many of my friends and dignified aquaintances tell me that I don't look like someone with a handicap).

Well, the fact is that I do have a slight handicap (due to polio in my right leg) though it is not very visible. I, my parents, siblings and my well wisher relatives and friends never considered me as one with a handicap, as after all polio never affected me in any way (physically and psychologically).

At a school sports meet with Dr Daisy Dharmaraj and Dr Jacob D Raj, an adorable couple, who run PREPARE, a Chennai based NGO, 1996 

Well, this year's Para Olympics will continue reassuring that disabled people are not what they are wrongly perceived to be. Let us watch the events and share our joy with participants from 165 countries which are represented in the mega event.

Best wishes to all these differently abled sportsmen and sportswomen.

Power of photographs in physics classrooms

As someone who is not interested in political issues and contemporary cinema (except good movies without violent and vulgar scenes) , my morning newspaper that I read as I drink my cup of coffee, isn't actually some thing which I eagerly await. But occasionally I do find very interesting stuff in the paper, about some of which as you may know, I keep writing in my posts. One such is a photograph as shown below, published in Metro Plus supplement of the newspaper (Reasonably high resolution of the photo seems to be due to the technical level of the camera or the brilliance of the photographer or both) :

My reflex reaction on seeing the photo was imagining myself as a physics teacher in a middle school physics classroom showing this photo on a large screen and eliciting student responses for questions such as "How many sources of water ripples can you locate in this snapshot?" "How will you explain the non-uniform inter ripple distances?" etc. (When I taught `Wave motion' many years back I have used similar resources, but they were not usually locally developed).  

Onam Greetings

Onam greetings to all my Malayaalee friends, particularly Jos (in Maldives), Mini (in Chennai) and Sreejith (in Kollam). 

Digital Classroom with Defective Content

In my previous post and some of my earlier posts I wrote on issues related to K-12 elearning/multimedia industry in our country. This morning I happened to visit the website of a Chennai based elearning company claiming to stand out from the rest in terms of quality. When I browsed through its webpages, I found the contents with a lot of mistakes, contrary to what they advertise. Following are screenshots of a few of its webpages:

As we can see, each of the above webpages contains at least one grammatical or conceptual mistake (for example disproportionate sizes of animals) in its content.

Instead of being satisfied with mediocre and substandard products, elearning companies should strive to develop quality products that can compete in the global market place.

In their turn, K-12 schools should get digital products thoroughly evaluated for quality by a team of competent professionals with extensive experience in technology backed teaching before buying the products. This probably needs drastic changes in job allocation of staff in most schools today. For instance, HODs should be given less teaching workload so that they can contribute not only in mentoring their colleagues but also play lead roles in evaluating educational technology backed lesson resources. Such changes can go a long way toward quality education.