The Progressive Teacher magazine completed its first year this April! To mark this and to create a forum for discussion on school education, the magazine organised an event called The Progressive Teacher Conclave followed by ‘Teaching Excellence Awards’ on April 25, 2015 at the FICCI Auditorium, New Delhi. The Conclave had a key note address, three panel discussions and Awards for Excellence in Teaching and School Education. It was attended by over 400 delegates—teachers, principals, heads and coordinators, educationists and students.
The event started with the welcome note by Rita Wilson, editor of the magazine .She shared the aim and genesis of conclave and hoped it would be seen as a forum to ‘question, share and learn’ where all would ‘trade ideas’ to increase the pool of ideas with each one.
The keynote address was given by Professor Krishna Kumar, Professor of Education at Central Institute of Education, University of Delhi. He spoke on Teachers and the New Culture of Schooling. He emphasised on the dignity and respect of teachers and expressed the negatives of CCTV cameras installed in schools in the context of the freedom and individuality of the teachers. Prof Kumar shared a number of real life examples where CCTV cameras acted as an obstacle rather than a tool for meeting objectives. He pointed out the skewed thinking in which schools that lack proper sanitary conditions are equipped with CCTV cameras. Such ‘inspection’ of teachers he said actually erodes the professional rights of the teacher who is a professional, as such she must be recognised and respected as somebody who can demonstrate the capacity to take decisions; for this she needs to have certain amount of individuality and independence.
The teacher has to make children individuals who have to take their decisions independently in life. So, both the dignity of the children as well as the teachers is important. Pointing to the disturbing trend of new schools with opulent infrastructure often at the cost of real learning and education, he asserted the need to consider the ‘aesthetics of austerity’.
Professor Kumar’s address was followed by three panel discussions.
A number of presentations by the group companies were a part of the event. There were presentations by Indrani Maitra on Adding Value to Classroom Teaching, Piyush Garg on 3D Modelling with 3D Printers, Neenu Puri on Creating Cultures of Learning and Vinay Sharma on Experiential Learning Environment.
Panel I – Acknowledging the Teacher
Sarita Mathur
Moderator: Sarita Mathur
(Educational Consultant)
Participants: Maya Menon – Founder Director, The Teacher Foundation; Lt. Col (Retd.) A. Shekhar – Principal, Atul Vidyala, Valsad, Gujarat; Salony Priya – Director, Ummeed Counselling and Consulting Services, Kolkata; Savitri Narayanan- Principal, John Martyn Memorial School, Dehradun
Savitri Narayanan , Maya Menon, Sarita Mathur, Lt. Col (Retd.) A. Shekhar and Salony Priya,
Key points made
by each panelist
Savitri Narayanan: Ms Narayanan contextualised her talk by saying how she had taught in an elite school in Indonesia before joining her present school, a low budget school. Being a village girl, she said she is familiar with the simplicity of life in a village and so can connect with her school and its students. Most of the students of her school belong to families of low income groups like gardeners, cooks, carpenters, etc. She said her teachers and she tried to ‘bring out the best in the students’ by working hard and by collaborating with ‘everyone who was a part of the school’. By fortune and the great effort she and her teachers put in she is able to make the children of her school ‘equally capable and efficient as compared to the other children in the ‘elite’ schools’. Her school is able to generate donations and other ways of help because of which she has been able to make her school technologically equivalent to the other schools. Many children from her primary school have got admission in the Doon School and other elite schools in Dehradun. She said ‘challenges can be met if one has the will to face them’ and asserted teachers should be acknowledged for the hard work they do in building up the future generations.
Maya Menon: Ms Menon said she works closely with teachers and well understands the challenges the teachers face. Teachers are the life of the education system but still their effort is not acknowledged the way it should be. Maya focused on statistics to show that teaching as a profession is dominantly ‘female’ with a small male population. People do not consider teaching as a profession with a growth prospective in the long run so a very limited proportion of the male population joins it. All the best professions in the world have both the sexes almost equally participating in them except for teaching. Efforts should be made to motivate men to join the profession. Ms Menon listed the main areas of concern that needed to address and acknowledge the worth of teachers to the society:
Teacher’s voice should be seen as important and they should be given their own space to take decisions rather than merely imposing authority and controls on them.
Development programs for teachers should be built and continuous guidance to them should be provided to strengthen their skills and in terms of how they can plan their career.
Technological advancements are good and it is important to move with time but at the same time teacher’s voice and dignity and voice should not be suppressed as a result of smart classes and other technological advancements. These are and should be seen as ways to enhance teaching and not to replace the ‘essence of teaching’
Improvement in salary structures to attract and retain talent.
Lt. Col (Retd) A Shekhar said that a teacher can transform children’s lives and create confidence and high spirit in them so that they can come up with miracles. Like Ms Menon, he too spoke of how males are the minority community in the teaching profession and should be motivated to take up this profession along with females.
He shared his experiences in which he mentioned that being a teacher and a soldier are the least preferred professions and he has himself faced a situation in his personal life where he being a soldier was not much appreciated. He asked the audience how many of them would want their children getting married to teachers.
Following were his suggestions for motivating the population to be teachers:
Teachers should be paid well.
Generally the females working as teachers are demotivated by certain comments by their husbands that their income is very low, so dignity of the teachers should be maintained by everybody be it at the work place or the house.
Teacher training needs to be improved and strengthened.
Salony Priya: Salony Priya said she works in an organisation that works on counselling and understands the pain of being unacknowledged as she too as a Counsellor, faces this.
According to her the most important steps that need to be taken is to change the mindset of the society in terms of how it views the teaching profession.
Another important point that Ms Priya touched upon was the approach towards co-curricular activities. She said that till date co-curricular activities are considered extra-curricular. She mentioned a few instances where to satisfy the parent community a school started a unique grading system where there were no F grades. All the grades were either of A, A+, A++, A-, A- – and so on but to that also the smart children were able to manipulate the grades by making all – signs as + signs and the teachers prepared another result sheet so that actual results could be countered against the fake ones. Ms Priya made her points through varied incisive comic strips and cartoons highlighting the factors that contribute to the demotivation of teachers.
She emphasised the growing need to maintain the teacher’s self-esteem and said that they should have space for their voice which is respected. She urged for a solution so that teachers are motivated and emphasised the need for sustained programmes for the social and emotional well-being of teachers.
Audience questions/
Comments to the panel
To be a teacher, the first quality should be a passion in the individual for teaching; secondly there should be selfmotivation workshops to inculcate and sustain such a passion.
The CTET needs to be reviewed.
The sports education teachers need to be given the same respect as the academic teachers; sports is still not given much importance.
What can be the career growth for teachers. Even after teaching for 20 years everybody does not see career growth? For this the panel answered that corporate houses need to carve paths for more opportunities for teachers.
Panel II – New Curriculum and Classroom Culture
John Mason
Moderator: John Mason
(Educationist)
Regional Director, South Asia for Cambridge International Examinations; Dr Neelam Kaur, Principal, Akal Academy, Baru Sahib, Himachal Pradesh); Mats Rosen, Academic Head, Kunskapskolan, Gurgaon; Neera Chopra, Academic Analyst ; Jyoti Dhawan, Principal, Him Jyoti School, Dehradun; Richa Agnihotri, Lead- International Curriculum , Step By Step School, Noida.
Richa Agnihotri, Jyoti Dhawan, Neera Chopra, John Mason, Mats Rosen, Neelam Kaur and Ruchira Ghosh
Key points made
by each panelist
John Mason: Mr John started the discussion by saying how we all are the slaves of the syllabus and view it as a body of content that can’t be negotiated with. Richa Agnihotri: Ms Agnihotri began with a question – should the curriculum be changed, is it actually required, who says it and why and who should do so.… She pointed out how the Indian curriculum was changing and some good initiatives had been taken. The problem with the Indian curriculum, she said, is that it is not skill based. She mentioned that reforms in the area of education and the curriculum have taken place but at a very slow pace. According to her merely changing the curriculum is not sufficient. To actually change the curriculum, a team is needed – a team of analysts, innovators, scientists, and educationists.
Jyoti Dhawan: Ms Dhawan made her case through an evocative kaleidoscope of pictures of the students in different spheres of work at her school. The pictures showed that if anything is done with ‘utmost faith, with heart and dedication’, it can lead to wonders. She explained how the girls in her school are from the underprivileged sections of society and from rural background; they study the same curriculum as in other schools and do as well, often outshining them. According to her any curriculum if followed with ‘the heart and with logical application’ can do wonders. She suggested that each child should be accepted the way he/she is.
Neera Chopra: Neera Chopra asserted that if the curriculum is changed then we have to accept it. She raised a critical point, if the curriculum has changed and in the primary and middle school segments, we the teachers have changed it and based on some logic. She highlighted the fact that as per the B. Ed course, for any class, textbooks are a teaching tool and not the syllabus yet we have made the textbooks the syllabus. Ms Chopra put the spotlight on the pre- primary curriculum in which English is taught by focusing on writing. She emphasised that each child learns his/her mother tongue by merely listening and not by writing but perhaps due to parental pressure (parents are anxious that their child being in an English medium should produce results soon); the child is forced to write at this tender age. In many of the schools cursive writing is still in practice when we do not read it in daily life. So, the curriculum needs to be meaningful and relevant. The actual flow of teaching English should be listening, reading and then finally writing, but because of the increased syllabi and less time, we place a focus on writing. According to her reading is extremely important for pre- primary children. Ms Chopra urged teachers to effect these changes in their teaching practice.
Mats Rosen: Mr Rosen shared the salient features of the Swedish Kunskapskolan–the Knowledge Schools. In this curriculum, children first read and then write. The teaching and learning is highly individualised: each student works at his/ her level and there is a clear tracking of it. According to this curriculum children grow with self-confidence. The purpose of a school as well as the purpose of each individual is given due importance. Individuals are given the freedom to be what they want to be by choosing their own subjects. He suggested that the curriculum should follow a CCR approach which is Clear, Challenging and Reasonable.
And he asserted that for a curriculum to be successful, it has to be a ‘possibility’. The focus of the schools should be ‘making learning happen rather than just producing.’ He concluded by focusing on the different ways of learning and teaching that play a vital role. He suggested that teachers should research and identify different ways in which children learn, even if learning happens outside the classroom. Dr Neelam Kaur: Dr Neelam Kaur emphasised the role of values in the education system.
She raised the question of the purpose of education –the ‘Why of Education’ and said it is not just a means to a practical existence and wondered what the use of education is if it lacks values. Dr Neelam explained the curriculum philosophy of the 130 schools run by the Akal Academy (to which her school belongs) is based on the idea that life and society is not a ‘bazaar’ but a ‘parivar’ and there is thus a strong focus on values in the curriculum. She elaborated by saying that pay packages and salaries alone do not matter, the teacher as well as the students should also feel contented in all respects. In the rural areas where all their schools are located, teacher training is difficult to conduct so the teachers do not get sufficient amount of training and development programs yet they have made efforts to ensure teachers learn about the new educational developments.
Ruchira Ghosh: Ruchira Ghosh said she has worked with a number of schools both in private and public sector and was speaking as a ‘curriculum provider’. The curriculum offered by Cambridge International Examinations (CIE) is experiential in nature and clearly says it should be aligned to the schools vision. The curriculum is based on well defined core principles; it is broad and balanced and has as its centre teacher- student progressive partnership. Ms Ghosh highlighted the need to recognise and include learner’s expectations from us as teachers. The panel moderator, John Mason, summarised by concluding that the teacher sets the base of the classroom and his/her role is of key importance.
Encouragement of the teacher is also important for her to achieve the set objectives.
Key points made on New
Classroom Culture
Neera Chopra: Out of 35 minutes in the classroom, 10 minutes go in ‘checking children’ about how are they sitting; teachers should also change their attitudes and find out ways to deal with students in a more effective way. The seating arrangements should be in groups rather than in rows. She talked about a program called BALA which is beautifully running in some government schools that focus on using the school building to teach concepts.
Jyoti Dhawan: She concluded- Let’s not make the monster out of this monster (curriculum). We should try to shape it to make it better rather than just criticising it all the time. The global classrooms should not necessarily be ‘squares or rectangles, we can also experiment with circular classrooms’.
Richa Agnihotri: Classrooms are no more limited to room, the facebook page, the blogs, the whatsapp groups, etc. can and are classrooms.
Audience Questions
Comments to the panel:
Teaching children to respect all sectors of the society is very important SUPW periods should be encouraged.
Imparting practical knowledge is very important for example, visits to planetariums to teach about planets.
Experiential learning is very important, different ways should be identified for this.
Why is the syllabus so vast; often it includes elements which are not even important while important things are still missing in it?
All teaching cannot be assessed, and all assessment cannot be taught.
Our schools and curriculum need to ask -Why is a child expected to know all the subjects when there is separate teacher for every separate subject
The essence of the curriculum is getting lost, life skills have to be taught from birth and not merely through a curriculum, and one should ‘create a curriculum and not merely debate on it’.
Panel III – Changing Role of School Leadership
Abha Adams
Moderator: Abha Adams
(Education consultant)
Participants: Col. (Retd) Gopal Karunakaran, Director – Shiv Nadar Schools; Sarvesh Naidu, Director -Pathways World School, Gurgaon; Sarita Mathur – Education Consultant;, Anubhuti Mehta, Senior Consultant School Projects – Amity Group of Schools; Jagpreet Singh,Headmaster -Punjab Public School, Nabha.
Col. (Retd) Gopal Karunakaran, Sarita Mathur, Anubhuti Mehta, Sarvesh Naidu and Jagpreet Singh,
Key points made
by each panelist
Abha Adams started the discussion by mentioning about there are slow and soft changes in the education system. We see curriculum as a possibility. Each school is and has to interface with different people: parents, competitors, government policies, political pressures, and so on. Ms Adams described 8 types of leadership styles and said we as teachers needs to ask ourselves what type of leaders we are. It is very important to be a good leader and the leader has kept experimenting wherever possible.
A teacher is a leader. The role of the teacher is very important. Research, she said, has shown that a teacher takes about 3,000 decisions in a week which even a CEO of a company does not. New ways of working for school leaders are important these days where they have to work collectively and collaboratively with children rather than just imposing things on them. The leaders have to understand children.
Col. (Retd) Gopal Karunakaran: Col Gopal began by asking the audience a question ‘Why are there so many army people in education?’The answer to this question, he said, is that teachers and schools have to do battles. Each day the teachers are doing battles. Col. Gopal continued with the analogy when he said to be in army or in school the first and foremost condition to be a good leader is that one has to be idealistic. If a person is not idealistic, he/she can’t be a good soldier or a teacher. He shared his mantra of leadership: leadership involves 3 thingsgetting the job done, keeping the team happy (motivated) and having a vision.
Sarita Mathur: Ms Mathur said she believes that for a principal to be a good leader, she/he has to be first a good human being and has to be a person with ethics and values. She dipped into her experiences as a teacher and said she appreciates leaders who take care of certain small things that enable wonders in the long run, for example, picking up a piece of paper if seen in the corridor, switching off the lights and fans when moving out of the room even if for five minutes. She mentioned how principals who attend workshops with their team of teachers set sterling examples through their actions. Good leaders have to be good decision makers.
Anubhuti Mehta: Ms Mehta spoke about her long stint with the Kendriya Vidyalayas before she moved to the private sector with the Amity group where she worked on multiple profiles. She said at no time had the organisation carved a path for her growth –she took the plunge and moved ahead. She said all teachers aspire to become leaders, but wondered if their schools/ organisations are helping them to be good leaders. The irony behind this is that teachers are never given opportunities to be good leaders and emphasised the need to groom teachers to be good leaders. She stated the example of Satya Bharti Foundation schools that runs on a totally different approach. Ms Mehta urged that all efforts should be made so that teachers are given opportunities to be good leaders.
Sarvesh Naidu: Dr Naidu started his presentation by conducting a quick activity in which each person had to greet someone behind or in front of him/her. Through this activity he concluded that to be good leaders you have to connect with people. He mentioned that sometimes the top level leaders are isolated as they are left with nobody around them and pointed out that it is important to connect with people to be good leaders. He narrated an incident where a small child was asked to identify the person he sees in the corridor every day and he answered saying it was the person who sits in the room next to the receptionist’s seat. The person was the Principal of the school but the child did not know this. This, Dr Naidu said, surely indicates lack of connectivity. According to Dr Naidu, there is no mantra for leadership, it keeps on changing as per the need of the hour. To be a good leader, only IQs is not important; EQ and a balanced personality is also important. If you are over occupied with IQ, then you cannot be a good leader, he said. To be a good leader, one has to leave his/her ahankar. Leadership is about sixth sense along with the five senses.
Jagpreet Singh: Mr Singh defined leaders thus: ‘good leaders lead but bad leaders mislead.’ He shared his personal life experiences that how he was selected as a leader by virtue of his leadership skills in a reputed organisation leaving behind all those who were much more experienced than him. He narrated a few instances where he showed his connectivity, intelligence and leadership skills helped him to achieve targets in his professional life. According to Mr Singh, being a principal of a school is the most thankless job as nobody comes to the principal’s office with a solution, everyone comes with a problem and so the leadership in school calls for a lot of problem solving
Audience Questions/
Comments to the Panel
What are you as leaders collectively doing to change and shape the education system in our country?
Ms Adams said ‘nothing’ as we all work in silos and we need to change this. She summed up the panel discussion thus – Schools need leaders and a vision and the leader has to be passionate, a risk taker, one who connects with people is futuristic, and balanced, with sixth sense and with no ahankar. Leaders should take responsibility to give authority to other leaders.