Vijoy Prakash

(Excerpt from the book Creative Learning by Vijoy Prakash)

Family is said to be the first school, but we have done little to develop it as the first school. Swami Dayanand had identified father, mother and teacher to be the three pillars of education of a child. In Satpatha Brahman it was said,

matriman pitrimanaachryavan purusho ved
(A man is knowledgeable, if he is under the guidance of  learned mother, father, and teacher.)

Unless all pillars are equally strong, the child cannot be said to be properly educated. Today couples get married. They also have children. But, they are never trained in the methods of rearing the children. They are never told how they should steer the child in the elementary stages of learning. It has now been established that about 90% of the development of brain take place before the end of 5 years. Since couples do not know how to take care of the child, they depend mainly upon hit and trial methods. Thus, children may not attain full development of brain as per their own potential.  As such, they are not fully prepared to take advantage of the learning system, when they enter the school system.

There are many games you play in your due course of activities. But have you ever thought about learning with games?

For example, there are many children love playing cricket.

Is it possible to learn from Cricket? Let us see…

In this game learners are divided into two groups. One group asks questions whereas the other group is supposed to tell the answer. As in cricket the baller is given chance to ask 6 questions in a row. Rules have been framed for getting boundaries and sixes based on the complexities of the problem and nature of answer.

Learning Science

Learning through Games

In this game learners are divided into two groups. One group asks questions whereas the other group is supposed to tell the answer. As in cricket the baller is given chance to ask 6 questions in a row. Rules have been framed for getting boundaries and sixes based on the complexities of the problem and nature of answer. Children enjoy the game and learn the lessons as well. Similarly, children play the game of puzzles as well as carrom. If we improvise the game for learning laws of motion, laws of friction, laws of reflection, chemical combinations etc. it would be much easier to understand.

It can also be used for developing imagination by asking learners to arrange the coins in different shapes and patterns and give them exciting names.

As floor games are quite popular among the village children, they can arrange lot of floor games to learn mathematics, grammar, science and social sciences. In fact, in all classrooms 10X10 squarish pattern can be drawn. In the corridor various patterns 3X3, 4X4, 5X5, 6X6, etc and other geometrical patterns can be displayed.

These activities are new to both teachers and learners, but can be an interesting session of learning.

When children do not get good grades in any subject or are not able to perform up to our expectation, we often chide and goad them to work harder in the subject. Is it the right way to assess and motivate the child?

Experiences at School of Creative Learning have shown that the issue of failure in the examination may be a product of various factors like physical ailment, emotional distraction or disturbance, lack of proper motivation, etc. However, even if there is no such problem a child may not do well in the examination due to different learning style or lack of proper mental competencies. For example, if the child is not doing well in mathematical competencies, one must also look whether the child is of different learning style than logical and/or is deficient in

• Concentration
• Memory(logical)
• Rational thinking

If the child is really deficient in these competencies, the child should be asked to perform exercises to develop those competencies. For example, if the learner’s learning style is different, the teaching learning strategy has to be different. See A short note on Multiple intelligence and How to identify the Learning Style of Your Child for details. Further, if the child does not have good concentration, he should do exercises to develop it. Once concentration is developed, a bit of hard work may do wonders. Following chart may help in diagnosing the basic problems in a child. For appropriate solution consult Creative Learning Volunteers or write to us. The table here shows the reasons for poor performance in the following categories (You can click on them to take you to related matter directly):

Abhivanchiton ka Shikshadhikar : Educational Rights for Underprivileged

The book Abhivanchiton ka Shikshadhikar - Education for Underprivileged, authored by Vijoy Prakash and Prof Shailendra Kr Shrivastava has been published by Rajkamal  Publication, New Delhi.
 
About the book
Modern education system serves the needs of upper and upper middle class only. Confined to their own world realities Lower middle and middle class children don’t get anything get anything except imitating others. We have tried to take education to underprivileged and marginalised, but we are yet to assess the real impact of this education system on them. This book tries to develop parameters of assessment of nature, quality and quantity of education to different communities. At the same time it provides the assessment of education in different communities based on the detailed census of one Panchayat.
 
Based on the action research the book also suggests a practical model for making positive intervention empowering underprivileged to take better advantage of the education system.It also underscores that underprivileged children are as much valuable capital as are children from well off families. What is needed is an honest and  sincere effort to bring them into mainstream. For this purpose the book also suggets modalities for broadsteaming of education for mainstreming of children.