Heart
to Heart
Participants Speak
The
Academic Staff College is in constant touch with the teachers
who have attended its different programmes. It seriously views
the suggestions given by the participants. It also collects
teachers' views about the extent of the application of different
skills and conceptions learnt during the programmes. A number
of teachers send their opinions about the utility of the programmes
and also share information about the experimentation of various
techniques.
In this issue, we are including the experiences and views of
teachers who attended different orientation programmes and refresher
courses. We further welcome such responses from the teachers
and would happily incorporate in this column.
THERE IS NO SHORTCUT TO SUCCESS
This is what I have gained in the orientation programme at ASC,
HPU Shimla. Be prepared for hard work and I assure you the end
result will be sweet. The efficient team of ASC, Shimla will
help you in attaining those objectives which will help us to
make a difference in our respective lives. First of all, I thought
that the team at ASC, Shimla is very intelligent by getting
all their work done by us for instance submission of daily reports,
editing, evaluating ourselves and the resource persons, preparing
charts, maintaining decorum, making questions for our test,
refreshments arrangements etc. etc.. BECAUSE we thought, we
all know it and it's a waste of time, but eventually when we
performed our respective allotted work, we found to our surprise
that this exercise actually helped us to know where we lacked
and gave us the opportunity to improve upon them. And as far
as I am concerned, these exercises helped me a lot by giving
boost to my confidence level, to have a professional approach
to any problem, and last but not the least, taught me to work
together in a cordial atmosphere. This programme gave us an
opportunity to meet different people from different areas of
our country. For full 28 days we were like an extended family
sharing ours pluses and minuses and are still in touch with
many of them. I must assure you for me it not an excursion but
a learning excursion. It helped me to improve upon my teaching
techniques, classroom interaction and especially what learning
styles and levels should be evolved for better and effective
teaching in the classroom.
As stated earlier in my thanks letter dt. 26-09-03, I've told
you that I will be sharing all that I've gained at ASC, Shimla
with my students. And yes, I do share my experiences and apply
various teaching techniques with my students to the best of
my ability in spite of the limited resources and infrastructure,
'cause I believe in the saying 'learning without sharing is
of no use and it is through sharing our learning grows'. Some
of the methods that we (includes my other 3 colleagues who attended
the aforesaid O.P. 66) have adopted for effective classroom
teaching that we gained at ASC Shimla are as follows:-
- Giving
freedom to students to ask questions for better interaction.
- One day
in a week for surprise test, taking problems of the students
or revision of the last weeks teaching.
- Maintaining
friendly atmosphere in the classroom.
- Motivating
my colleagues to adopt some of the measures for better classroom
teaching.
- Helping
students in solving their personal queries thus in return gaining
their trust and confidence.
Yes, these
measures worked and I got a positive feedback from the students
through their positive behavior, eagerness to learn, confidence
building (now they don't hesitate to ask questions but also participate
in discussions), and the attendance of the students has also gone
up. And with your blessings I am amongst those teachers who are
liked and respected by their students (I can't help being modest…).
I know it is not the end but a beginning, because once you think
you know all, you are dead; learning is a lifelong experience,
there's always a room to improve and innovate. One should always
be thirsty to learn and we should not only learn but also apply
it to the benefit of every one. In a nutshell, I mean that I will
always strive to be the best. I want to share some lines with
you:
BE
THE BEST
If can't be pine on top of the hill
Be a scrub in the valley
Be a bush if you can't be a tree
If can't be a sun, be a star
It isn't by size you win or you fail -
Be the best of whatever you are …..
With these thoughts, I once again thank you for giving me an
opportunity to share my reflections with you. I know this feedback
helps your team to ponder upon innovative methods which could
be adopted in future OP and Refresher courses for the benefit
of teaching fraternity as one of the resource person rightly
said, 'teachers make generations, he is the leader of society
not the follower'.
[Praveen Dublish]
Lecturer in Law, Meerut College Meerut.
Pin: 250001 [U.P.]
Phone: 0121-2665040, 0-9837023668
Email: mynamepd@rediffmail.com
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Reflections 