I have been promoting in my school that students should work without erasures. I find that children are addicted to erasures these days. Some teachers are listening to this. A Class-I teacher asked me to step-in her class where she is been practicing this for a while. So I sat through a number-names activity for couple of periods.
Firstly, age 5-6 yrs children should be considered entirely different species compared to middle school children. It's harder to teach kids this young; at least I don't have that talent. The task was to write five number-names (between 1 to 10). The teacher started by giving out worksheets and pencils. And a bowl-full of erasures were also kept in a corner, just in case someone wanted one. All were ready, with their pencils in hand.
As they got into the work, what struck me the most was how very dedicated they looked as they wrote. Each one was almost carving each letter systematically on to the line. No one looking here and there. The slow children took longer time, some children had wonderful hand some didn't. There seemed much larger spread in their abilities to write number-words. Yet, they had one thing in common, they were serious about getting it done well. They all were writing with absolute dedication.
I wished I could achieve that kind of focus on 'task at hand' in my middle school children. May be as children become aware of their own standing in rest of the class they tend to take the tasks lightly. Sometimes they do focus however as in this Class, the ability to put your mind to a single and simple task was amazing. One would want to preserve that attitude as children grow older. So that is what I learned in my visit to Class-I.
What about the erasures ? A few children did walk-up to the front to borrow the erasure, but most didn't. They were willing to work more diligently rather than rush for an erasure. Not having an erasure handy, may be, helped in focusing on the task. I don't know if this is wishful thinking, time should tell.
Update : This great dedicated teacher left the school recently. So the experiment couldn't go for long. Alas, that is how teaching and learning proceeds these days.
Firstly, age 5-6 yrs children should be considered entirely different species compared to middle school children. It's harder to teach kids this young; at least I don't have that talent. The task was to write five number-names (between 1 to 10). The teacher started by giving out worksheets and pencils. And a bowl-full of erasures were also kept in a corner, just in case someone wanted one. All were ready, with their pencils in hand.
As they got into the work, what struck me the most was how very dedicated they looked as they wrote. Each one was almost carving each letter systematically on to the line. No one looking here and there. The slow children took longer time, some children had wonderful hand some didn't. There seemed much larger spread in their abilities to write number-words. Yet, they had one thing in common, they were serious about getting it done well. They all were writing with absolute dedication.
I wished I could achieve that kind of focus on 'task at hand' in my middle school children. May be as children become aware of their own standing in rest of the class they tend to take the tasks lightly. Sometimes they do focus however as in this Class, the ability to put your mind to a single and simple task was amazing. One would want to preserve that attitude as children grow older. So that is what I learned in my visit to Class-I.
What about the erasures ? A few children did walk-up to the front to borrow the erasure, but most didn't. They were willing to work more diligently rather than rush for an erasure. Not having an erasure handy, may be, helped in focusing on the task. I don't know if this is wishful thinking, time should tell.
Update : This great dedicated teacher left the school recently. So the experiment couldn't go for long. Alas, that is how teaching and learning proceeds these days.
No comments:
Post a Comment