Resource Group Meeting - Sambalpur

A resource group meeting was held in PMIASE on the 21st of January, 2012. 12 selected teachers attended the meeting and a total of 4 teaching aids were prepared as part of th workshop.

Resource Group Meeting - Ganjam and Gajapati

A resource group meeting for selected teachers of Ganjam and Gajapati districts was held in DPIASE, Berhampur, on the 24th of January 2012. 19 teachers attended this meeting and worked in groups to prepare teaching aids on chosen topics. AAO Ganjam and Gajapati also attended this meeting and spent a long time watching the presentations by the various groups as well as interacting with the teachers. 9 teaching aids were prepared as part of this meeting.

SKCG High School, Gurandi, January 20th, 2012

Purpose of visit: observe a collaborative project on "Archimedes Principle" and "global warming."

Name of the teacher: Karuna Sriram

Lesson plan based on the Samartha format

·       Micro lesson planning not available

·       TLM used: black board, charts and computer

·       Topic introduced indirectly

·       Questions posed to the class and students individuals

·       Pressure in inversely proportional to area - this was explained very effectively through a simple experiment using pegs

·       Another simple experiment using a spring balance, stone, beaker and a measuring tube was used to prove that the loss of weight of the stone,inside water is equivalent to the water displaced

·       I posed some questions to the students to check their understanding and they could answer them confidently

·       Edukit was used

·       Student groups themselves repeated the experiment

·       Observation Notes were taken by students

·       Some very intelligent and probing questions were posed by both the students as well as the teachers   like the one posed by a student - as why does iron sink while a gigantic ship made of the same material, floats in water. The teacher explained this very clearly, which the students could understand.

·       The teacher asked as to why the amount of weight loss inside water is equivalent to the water displaced by connecting it with the "law of conservation of mass and energy" which the students were not able to comprehend

Project Name: Global Warming

Name of the teacher: Y Shiv Kumar

·       Topic introduced indirectly

·       TLM used: map, charts, pictures, black board, computer, model etc.

·       Questions posed to class

·       Students were involved and the atmosphere was interactive

·       Edukit used but the teacher initially read out in English from the animation available which later rectified and instead of reading he explained the gist of the same

·       Tasks and assignments were given as part of the project. A number of critical questions had been prepared in advance by the teacher which wee used by the various groups to pose questions to the other groups

·       Lesson plan was not available

Critical Remarks

·       There was a preparatory plan but it was not thorough as a lesson plan was not available in case of the latter while it was available in case of the former

·       Observation check list was not available and documentation was sketchy in both the cases

·       Relevant hard spots were addressed in both the cases

·       Pedagogic technique: Activity Based Learning in both the cases although the former displayed a lot of creativity and made the student delve deeper by triggering critical thinking

·       Group formation, demonstration evident In both the cases while hands on activity and experimentation was done as part of the former

·       Although group formation was evident there was no clear role allocation in both the cases

·       Project execution: Most of the steps were followed

·       What I observed was more of a lab transaction based on engaged learning rather than a collaborative project

Block Colony UP School, Kashinagar

HM - Trinath Nayak

Total number of teachers: 8

Teachers undergoing training: 4

Although the school has 4 computers, hardware problem is a constant irritation. They are under regular maintenance but even then problems are frequent.

I had a discussion with the HM and the English teacher. The latter makes good use of technology even though she teaches English.

• The visit to this school was an unscheduled one as I had some time after completing my planned visit to the nearby school. My sole purpose was to gauge the level of internalization of the program objectives.
• The HM and the teacher I interacted with are very positive about the program but I still feel somewhere the finer point - as regards the criticality of pedagogy as a driver of technology integration is missing.
• That integrating technology in teaching learning is a pedagogic decision and not a technology one is missing.

Varanasi Govt. High School, Kashinagar

Date: 19th January, 2012

Name of the teacher: Routhe Dilip Kumar

Topic: DNA

Materials used: black board, charts, computer

·  Micro lesson plan available but I was not able to have a look because of power cut
·  Questions were posed to students which they answered confidently
·  Students did not pose questions, which should ideally have been the case
·  Students were divided into groups
[X]  Teacher had good knowledge of content but body language was wanting. Displayed a somewhat stiff attitude which I feel erected a barrier between the teacher and a student

Some of the problems from which the school suffers and which are acting as an impediment to the program are as follows:

·  Non-functional computers - 2 of them which needs to be formatted
·  Frequent power cuts
[X]  Non-cooperative HM who does not understand the objectives of the program and seems to discourage teachers from attending training sessions and implement their respective work plans

[ ]  Critical Remarks

[X]  Preparatory plan was missing as I gave the teachers a days notice

[X]  Hard spots were addressed but the teacher could not come down to the level of the students while doing the same. Although he had a very good knowledge of the content, he could not come down to the level of the students, while delivering the same

[X]  Pedagogic technique - ABL. Teacher was not able to make the students think and did not give time for the same. He went a little fast

[X]  Although the students were posed questions, the transaction was more of a preaching rather than that of facilitating

[X]  Group formation, demonstration was done, but there was no clear role allocation amongst the group members

[X]  Project execution: Most of the steps were followed

MRB High School Parlakhemundi, January 18, 2012

16 teachers from this school are undergoing training.

HM: Subhash Chandra Chowdhury

The HM is new to this school and was earlier the DI of Koraput district and as such had attended training in SCERT of two days duration as a administrator. He is desirous of attending the entire 18 days training meant for the educators and this will currently be a problem as 3rd phase of training is underway in DPIASE and he can attend from the 4th phase. He needs to be updated by the monitoring expert at the school itself. As such his understanding of technology integration in teaching learning is sketchy as he is only trained in the usage of office suite and it is of critical importance that he understands what appropriate and effective integration of technology in teaching learning is all about - as he is the most important link in the chain.

Had a word with the students/in fact interacted with the entire class and found that all the students get a chance to visit the computer lab twice a week but are actually able to use the computers once a week. The school has six computers but one is with the HM, one is being used for Edusat and one of them is again being kept in the HMs personal quarters, within the school. I have requested the HM to move the computer from his personal quarters to the school lab to which he has agreed.

[ ]  Objective of visit: to watch two collaborative projects on sound and reflection and make an assessment as to what extent the DE program in embedded in the school ecosystem. There was time for only one project - sound.

Participating teachers: Subhashree Padhi/G. Govindaraju

Collaborative project on sound / observations

[ ]  Lesson plan and micro lesson planning available. Had forgot to add an introductory question as part of the same. Anyway she started with one although she had not mentioned the same as part of the plan.

[ ]  Topic was introduced indirectly

[ ]  Questions were posed to the class and this made the class interactive

[ ]  Some questions were also posed to the individual students

[ ]  Teacher played a facilitating role instead of preaching

[ ]  Students took down notes

[ ]  Made effective use of black board by drawing some diagrams to better explain how sound waves travel. These images are available in Edukit but as the project was being done in a classroom, black board had to be used, as the lap top (monitoring experts) could not meet the needs of the entire class

[X]  Critical Remarks

[X]  Students worked in groups\ activity. Role allocation was absent

[X]  An interesting part was that the HM and one of the science teachers were observing the class with me and they pointed out that the teacher doing the project had missed out on an important part - how auditory nerves carry the vibrations from the ear to the brain

[X]  I wrapped up the day with a discussion with all the teachers who have attended the training, trying to gauge what they have imbibed from the same, especially the brain based learning part because that will determine how they teach and how much of an effort are they making in changing their pedagogy in which effective and appropriate use of computers is but a part.

[X]  I had to take up this discussion because I found that most of the teachers raise questions like - there is a shortage of time, so much of syllabus to cover etc. which points to the fact that they haven't understood our basic objective, which is to make classroom teaching a deeper and richer experience for both the teachers and students,make learning a joyful experience, getting the students to delve deeper and thereby reducing absentism and improving the overall academic atmosphere in the long run.

Apna Paricha UP School, Parlakhemundi/17th January 2012

Visited the school in the afternoon after reaching from Bhubaneshwar and could spend about 1.5 hours only. Had a discussion with the HM and found that he had attended the first phase of training and had missed out on the second phase because of an accident. I am not very sure how well he understands the DE program as I didn't have much time to delve deeper into this aspect due to insufficient time at my disposal.

I could observe a lab transaction and the details are mentioned below.

Teacher name:Swarna Prabhakar

HM: Bidyadhara Panda

• Topic/ Lab Transaction: Soil
• Tools used: charts, computers, black board, Edu-kit
• Topic introduced indirectly
• Students used Edukit to explain
• Activity/Demonstration/box constructed of card board with one side covered with a transparent paper used to demonstrate the different the different layers of soil
• Students given an opportunity to demonstrate
• Questions posed to students as well as the class - question wheel used, which was an innovative   arrangement
• Group formation and activity
•  Evaluation sheet was used
• Lesson plan available
• Micro-lesson planning not available
•  Home task was assigned to all the students/groups
• Quick assessment showed that students have understood the fundamentals and were forthcoming with answers to all the questions posed
• Teacher aware of Edukit but not very thorough
•  Had a look at the registers - training (teacher and students), lab transaction and pedagogy and found them to be up to date.
• 3 resource group meetings have been held so far instead of 5 (@ of 1 per month)
• There are 6 teachers who are undergoing training but three of them seem to use computers regularly whereas the other three are aged people and are not very enthusiastic about computers and I found them doing lesson plans in paper.

I feel the school can improve in many ways and there are ample opportunities available for the same.

Critical remarks

• Group formation was resorted to by the teacher but there was no clear role allocation.
• Using a question wheel to select questions for groups was a very innovative step.
• As far as an ideal lab transaction is concerned it met most of the criteria as detailed by the team in our earlier review-cum-refresher meeting.