Teaching Skills for 21st Century in Indian Context
Introduction:
Each and every teachers has been working for the betterment of the society and the nation from the ancient times in various forms and adopting through numerous teaching-learning strategies from rote learning to conditioning learning. But in the modern era we cannot be satisfied with these practices. we need a modern pedagogical approaches to teach our students. Many educationists and psychologists has made continuously effort to develop an approach for modern teaching strategy which would be more competent than previous teaching methods and strategies and able to need of 21st century learners.
Major Educationists those contributed to design modern teaching Techniques:
Though the thinkers like Socrates, Plato have thrown the light on student centered learning but it was not in concrete form. modern educationists and thinkers like - Jean Jacques Rousseau has advocated to provide education in natural settings.He suggested to adopt such teaching strategies those promote student's interest in learning and may be helpful to satisfy the curiosity of the students. Madam Maria Montessori, John Dewey, were also made a practical approach for teaching children but it was to mechanical. In the beginning of 20th century Jean Piaget(1936) has given the theory of cognitive development and explain how a child construct the model of the earth. He disagreed with the idea that intelligence was a fixed trait and regarded cognitive development as a process which occurs due to biological maturation and interaction with environment.This theory is totally opposite to previous conditioning theories of learning those proposed by psychologists such as Skinner, Pavlov and Thorndike and presented a new way in the field of education. Further this theory proved as the foundation stone for constructivist learning approach which leaded by a Russian psychologists Lev Vygotsky. He accepted social interaction as a distinctive instrument in process of cognitive development.
Unlike Piaget's notion that children's development must necessarily precede their learning, Vygotsky argued, "Learning is a necessary and universal aspect of the process of developing culturally organised specifically human psychologically function". Vygotsky's approach believes that the child is not a passive learner or blank slate only, instead he is a knowledge constructor in real sense. If we provide ample opportunities of social iteration child may be capable to construct own meanings of the world phenomenon. Modern educationists focus on this constructivist approach to apply in schools for developing effective teaching-learning strategies. From last thirty years the researchers focus on developing constructivist learning techniques pedagogical strategies. by the advancement of scientific knowledge the use of information and communication technology has increased in our classrooms. Now we are working in both fronts - development of modern teaching skills and make our classrooms equipped with information and communication technology. Though the western countries are running very fast than India to make experiment with modern techniques of teaching but we are also go ahead gradually with our limited resources to equipped our schools with modern teaching-learning technologies and to make our teachers smart. Some of the modern teaching- learning should be adopted by our schools and teachers to to compete with the modern world.
Modern Pedagogical strategies and Teaching Skills:
By the using following pedagogical skills and teaching-learning methodologies we can make our teachers to stand against the classroom challenges and perform effectively:
A. Context Based Learning:
This learning strategy is based on constructive approach. Context enable us to learn from experiences.By interpreting new information in the context of where and when, it occurs and relating it what we already know, we come to understand its relative meaning. In a classroom or lecturer theater, the context is typically confined to a fix space and limited time. Beyond the classroom, learning can come from an enriched context such as visiting a heritage site, a museum, a historical place, a natural phenomenon etc., being immersed in a good book. We have opportunities to create contexts by interacting with our surroundings, holding conversations, making notes, and modify nearby objects. We can also came to understand context by exploring the world. It follows that to design effective sites for learning at school. It requires a deep insight to shape the context according to the need of students.
B. Computational Thinking Method:
Computational thinking is a powerful strategy to enable students for problem solving. It is very useful method for mathematical and science teaching. It involves the following steps:
(a). Identify the Problem
(b). Breaking down problem into small segments
(c). Recognize patterns of these decomposed problems
(d). Separate abstract portion of the problems
(e). adopt necessary steps to resolve these segmented problems separately
(f). Identify common Pattern and Synthesize the solution.
C. Adoptive Teaching:
It is well known fact that all learners are different in many ways in a classroom. However most educational material and presentation are the same for the all. This create a serious problems against learners, that how they relate themselves with the learning materials. It means that some learners will be bored, other will be lost and very few are likely to discover paths through the content that result is optimal learning. Adoptive teaching offers solution for this problem.In this method following steps should be followed :
(a). Establish relationship with students of different needs
(b). Collect data about student's previous knowledge
(c). Analyse and Classify the the needs of each learner.
(d). Synthesise the the pattern of each learner and make some groups of students on this basis.
(e). Prepare learning material with appropriate pedagogic approach.
(f). provide opportunities to students to creat thier own understanding about concepts and provide timely scaffolding through Perviously designed learning material.
(g). Collect feedback of students and make a remedial plan to resolve learning obstacles.
