Empowering teachers to create learning avenues

Updated on: Monday, November 16, 2009

Teachers need to be empowered to recognise and value what children learn from their home, social and cultural environment and to create opportunities for them to discover, learn and develop,” said K. Vijayalakshmi, principal, Lady Willingdon Institute of Advanced Study in Education.

She said that the present system of education is not much different from the colonial system that the country inherited.

Education has to be made more contextual and teachers must appreciate the fact that direct and real experiences are more valuable, she said.

There must be a conscious move away from readymade knowledge which can be evaluated objectively, to an emphasis on thinking and learning. Dr. Vijayalakshmi was speaking at a two-day roundtable on ‘Education for a smarter planet' organised by IBM and Chennai Corporation.

The meeting in which teachers, educational experts, practitioners and representatives from the School Education Department participated was also used as a means to take stock of and devise ways forward for IBM's ‘Reinventing education' programme.

The methodology which promotes more teacher-student interaction and curiosity driven learning has till now been implemented in 10 schools each in Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh.

“New and creative ways of implementing IT to transform education have to be devised,” said Julie Coyne, Manager, Citizenship and Corporate Affairs, IBM (Asia Pacific). “Technology is not an end in itself, but it plays a vital role. The other focus area must be aligning teacher professional development needs to the requirements of the 21st century.”

Corporation school students and teachers who participated in the roundtable were given a session to share their experiences and offer suggestions to improve the ‘Reinventing education' programme.

Empowering teachers to create learning avenues

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