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Showing posts from July, 2010

Educating kids using a Television

Educating kids using a Television My Experiences in Teaching Article 5 Another area on which I am doing my research is the T.V Educational C hannels. I capture T.V programs in my web camera and then give a voice dubbing in Tamil. (Now in youtube.com we may have lot of content) There is no doubt that T.V can be used as an excellent educational tool in schools. However, I think that we are yet to start exploiting that medium in India. I think very easily a teacher can play a video on a subject for 10 or 15 minutes and then interact with the students in many ways. He can interact with my students by asking them simple questions and make them explain in their own words what they saw. **** **** ****

The frog class I took for the UKG kids

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A Spoken English class with a live frog, I took for the UKG kids   Article 4 . .. Another day, I trapped a small frog hardly half an inch in size from the school corridor. I took it to the UKG class. I put it on my hand and I allowed the small frog to jump all over me. All along I was talking in English many simple sentences about the frog. I also made the class repeat what I said. I was thrilled to see the kids jump with joy. However, letting out the frog alive out of the class room was a great challenge for me. This was the method I adopted to teach them " Spoken English " for UKG kids. *** *** ***

Tape Recorder as a Teaching Tool

My Experiences in Teaching Article 3 Another day, I took the tape recorder to the UKG class and asked the kids to call out their names loudly and recorded their voice in the Taper Recorder. Then I played it back. The kids jumped with joy on hearing their recorded voices from the tape recorder. I was elated to see the enjoyment in those young buds. The UKG class teacher was amused to know that with very little effort, using a tape recorder we can make the class very interesting for young children. ***   ***   ***

Learning to write:LION

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 Teaching to write "LION" -- My experiences in Teaching .. Article 2 Using computer to kindle interest in education for “dull” students The Principal, Mr.Muthukumar of the village school I worked was a very nice gentleman. He gave me appropriate encouragement and a very free hand in experimenting many things. Hence, I used to assemble the " dullest " students from standards 1 to 6 and conduct innovative computer based classes to them using Multi-media software like Encarta Encyclopaedia and kindle their interest in learning. First " see " the picture of a lion. Then " hear " its roar. Then " write " the word "lion" To elaborate on this, I will make a kid type a word like " LION " into the encyclopaedia program. Within a few seconds, we get pictures of "lion" in the screen. If I click on a picture we hear the roaring of a lion in the speaker. Then I would go to the black board and write &

My experiences in Teaching

My experiences in Teaching Article 1  I would like to narrate my teaching experience to my daughters and school students in the last few years in a couple of articles . I taught my daughters' English lesson in our mother tongue viz., Tamil. I have two daughters aged 13 years and 9 years respectively (2005)  who are studying in a matriculation school in Salem. Since LKG I had been spending my time on Sundays to teach all their subjects in our mother tongue viz. Tamil. Hence, now they are very fluent in English. It is unfortunate that in almost all matriculation schools the teachers are very reluctant to explain the lessons in the mother tongue of the children .  ***   ***   ***  Ashamed to tell their father's occupation. In 2005, I happen to work in a matriculation school in a village in Salem District.  It was about 10 kms from Salem town. There the students were ashamed to even tell the occupation of their father. I was moved very much. I encouraged them telling

Sample paint on Cupboard

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Sample paint on Cupboard to create a SCRIBBLING SPACE Venkatachalam Salem . MY REAL LIFE INCIDENTS ON CHILD REARING I had read in many childcare books that we very often tell our children. “Don’t do that” and “Don’t do this”. In addition, that we do not take enough efforts to tell them “what to do” instead. Let me narrate an incident. I think then my elder daughter Abinaya was 2 years old. I will get a small box of colour crayons costing around Rs.10 and a notebook and give it to her. I will demonstrate and the kid will be excited with the colours and start scribbling. In a matter of two weeks or so, all the colour crayons will get broken off. It will be scattered in all nook and corner of the house. Every time my wife sweeps the house, she will be shouting at me. “See what your daughter had done. All the crayons are broken and strewn all around”. Again, after 2 months, I will get her a new set of colour crayons. Seeing the new box, again my kid will once again take intere

THAREE NAADA INCIDENT (Shuttle jumping incident)

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THAREE NAADA INCIDENT (Shuttle jumping incident) MY REAL LIFE INCIDENTS ON CHILD REARING . . Tamil Translation I think then my elder daughter, Abinaya was about 2 years old. She was well-behaved, bold and always active like kids of that age. Once we all visited my father-in-law’s house as a family for a few days stay. They have a loom-shed adjoining to their house. There, round the clock, the workers will be weaving cloth in a couple of looms. Everybody, including my kids will be going to the loom-shed often. They will also chat and play with the labourers there. One day, I had gone out and returned home. Then my daughter Abinaya approached me and said that “DADDY, THAREE NAADA YAEGIREE KADAVULA PATTUCHI”. If you translate that to English you get, “DAD, THE SHUTTLE JUMPED OUT OF THE LOOM AND HIT THE DOOR”. Her face was communicating something dangerous had happened. But I could not understand it. Keeping my face puzzled, I said to my daughter, “I CAN’T UNDERSTAND WHAT YOU SAY, MY