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Try to recall the story of ‘Jack and the Beanstalk’…the adventure it unraveled, the quick thinking it evoked on part of the young boy and finally the treasures it got along …probably this story had its impact on the way it made a teacher make her students do and learn.
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A project was evolved .It focused on sensitizing the students about the importance of trees and plants in our life. The project was so planned that the students could make real life connections. The seed of the project was sown during the summer vacations, where the students were asked to grow a mango tree without mentioning anything about the planning and learning that the teacher was speculating about.
The parents were sent a letter to encourage and guide their wards about the upcoming project. The students of Navrachana school were on way to learn while doing. The majority of the students are from urban background and they belong to Gujarati community. 90% of students have computers at home. |
Raksha Sisodia, the mentor of the project, is a teacher at Navrachana School, Vadodara. Her sixteen years of teaching experience makes her believe in real-life work experiences as it develops skills in many areas .She uses technology to share the learning with others.
She is a mature and highly qualified person .She has mastered degrees like M.A., B.Ed., and D.H.E. Reading, learning innovative things, listening music and cooking interest her. After completing the basic course with Intel® in July 2001 she went ahead and trained 140 teachers in Baroda and in remote areas.
She relates her feelings about use of technology “My initial feeling was that technology has no role to play in Hindi and Gujarati subject. But eventually I feel that the integration of technology into Hindi and Gujarati has enhanced the learning of my
students.”
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The project called ‘Vriksha Hamara Jeevan’ made the eight to nine years old students of third standard concerned environmentalists.
To take the student to higher order thinking, they were asked to research through the Internet and other resources to find about good and bad effects of tress on the environment as well as our own life. The school provides all facilities for the
21st century learners .The centralized Server room manages the local network as well as Internet. Internet facility is available on all the machines with the help of an Internet Sharing Device, and facility of a proxy server, which makes Internet Access independent for all the machines on the network As students were getting involved in to the research work teacher divided them into different groups to carryout the project.
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The students were encouraged to share their findings with the class. Each group was asked to choose one tree of their liking to work on and the groups were named accordingly. The students were taken to the nursery for a field trip. The group leaders interviewed the owner of the nursery during their field trip.
Going with the aspirations of the school, Navrachana, to lead the students and teachers from academics to education, from teaching and studying to learning and assimilation, the students were asked to maintain a tree journal. The student was asked to give a detailed report of the same to the teacher. |
Creativity and self-learning organized itself in the way of preparation of posters, appropriate slogan, charts and cards. The hard work of the students was rewarded by gifting the card based on the theme- tree, to their Principal, Ms. Manju Gupta .It was one of her cherished birthday gifts. Young environmentalists also spoke a few lines about the tree. The school Navrachna provides a plethora of activities that support and enhance students’ multiple intelligence. The school has comprehensive talent nurturing programs where the children of various ages hone their talents and skills. The school counselor advises students and parents who approach for solution to their anxieties as well as emotional and behavioral issues.
The students were asked to present their learning, ideas and views through multimedia presentation and newsletter, prepared in the computer lab, with the help of Hindi and Computer teacher. The groups were asked to enhance their presentation and newsletter according to the guidelines and the rubrics. Judicious use of technology and practicing of skills let the students use MS* paint to make pictures of trees, plants, etc. instead of using clip art.
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The technology-aided project was a perfect fit for the school Navrachana as it is in league of eminent cyber-schools by having an excellent computer network setup. The school campus is networked to the centralized server. The Server configuration is a Pentium IV machine with 2.4 Ghz processing speed and 256 MB DDR-RAM. The server runs on Windows 2000-server and also has a CD-Writer connected for data backups. The networking is done through 100MBPS support speed UTP cables Seven HUBS of 16 and 8 ports.
The networking is hybrid star network where all the HUBS connect to the 8-port Network Data switch. The 80 computers distributed in various sections are equipped with 2 Laser printers, 7 inkjet printers and 2 dot-matrix printers. The inkjet printers are the latest models of Epson, Canon and HP with full color support. |
The teacher decided to polish all skills including adeptness in technology. The students took park in role-play and skit according to their topics. The students were asked to collect a poem from the library or from their grand parents/parents. Finally the students were asked to share their presentation and recite the poem in front of the class and guests, which included principal, other teachers and parents. The students distributed the newsletter to the guests. The students evaluated the importance of knowledge about trees, selected relevant questions, collected the correct answers and conducted a small quiz.
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The working at the project in such an organized manner is not novel for the school Navrachana.The students undergo highly enriched curriculum that gives them a sound and broad foundation of the basics as well as opportunities to be challenged and to develop deeply into areas of interest. The stress of exams is done away with in the formation years of child’s learning. Continuous and comprehensive evaluation is done in an informal manner. However, formal evaluation methods are adopted along with the informal methods in the higher primary classes. |
Sports are vital part of the school routine to promote good health, self-confidence, and team spirit besides channelizing of energies. The school conducts regular aptitude tests, advises on study opportunities and future courses, career guidance and personality development.
The endeavor of the teacher, Raaksha Sisodia, was to make students self-learners and giving meaning to the words written in the text. The teacher proudly declares the outcome of the project “
I didn’t have to explain single line of poem as the students understood the meaning of poem by doing the activity of Tree
Plantation.”
Through this project, the teacher was able to develop interest of the students in the Hindi Subject.
Parents were delighted as they congratulated the teacher. She exclaims, “Parents of Manav Shah came and told me that now Manav is doing his Hindi work everyday and he is asking for Hindi Story
books.”
The treasure in the beanstalk was found, ‘the inner desire kindled in
students’ to know more.
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