Playfulness as an educational tool

Johan Huizinga (who wrote Homo Ludens, or "Man the Player," in 1938)  suggested that "play is primary to and necessary (though not sufficient) condition of the generation of culture".

Playfulness can be a great educational tool to help children enjoy (and easily retain) learnings. Teachers can adapt many games for teaching most of the  subjects.  What could be some examples? Let us do a quick think:

• http://www.wikihow.com/Play-Flags-of-All-Nations
  
• http://www.wikihow.com/Play-Pass-the-Parcel: At each turn, the student can be asked to do an activity: explain a concept, recite a poem, etc.
• http://www.group-games.com/ice-breakers/homemade-pictionary-game.html
• http://www.group-games.com/stationary-games/hot-seat.html (there can be a five-minute hot seat every day, conducted in a fun manner so that students want to be really at the hot seat)
• Dumb Charade (use relevant subject instead of movies)
• A quick round of Rapid Fire Quiz (First to raise hand gets to answer) 

Handing out gifts for the winners can do wonders. Children love gifts! Even if it is an eraser or a pencil or simply a "star" drawn on the hand.

What would be the impact if more and more teachers play similar games to teach as many subjects as possible in this manner?

Actually, playfulness has a deeper impact. As Hector Rodriguez shares in The Playful and the Serious: An approximation to Huizinga's Homo Ludens:

The purpose of playful learning is not to improve the "effectiveness" of teaching but to encourage a profound rethinking of the essential nature of its methods and subject matter.

A report "Playfulness-based Design in Educational Games: A perspective on an Evolutionary Contest Game" cites: 

When players are interested in something, it keeps them engaged, and when their attention is on one thing, they are described as playful (Eysenck & Keane, 2000).Webster and Martocchio (1992) define playfulness as the device that attracts players’attention and involves them during their play.

Huizinga said:

Let my playing be my learning, and my learning be my playing.

Amen!

Museums, Fun and Education

Bharat reminds me how Museums are a powerful tool for education and it is sad that many Museums in India are in a sad state of affairs.

So, let us revisit Museums' role in education:

Prabhas Kumar Singh quotes John Falk & Lynn (1992), who had extensively studied museum education in U.S.A, India, U.K and many other countries:

The information a visitor receives during a museum visit tends to bear a ‘contextual map’. The museum visit represents a collection of experiences rather than a single unitary phenomenon.

Any information obtained during the museum visit is likely to include social related, attitude related, cognitive related and sensory related association.

These associations will become embedded in memory altogether with the result that anyone facet of these experiences can facilitate the recall of the entire experience.

Thus Museums are rather a source of intellectual stimulation and entertainment.

Exhibition halls, properly arranged secondary collections, labels, guided tours, traveling exhibitions, school class visits, loan services to the schools, training courses to the teachers, illustrated lectures, motion pictures, film trips and publications, etc. are the various means which constitute the educational activities in a museum.

There are many organizations, projects and budgets, but no ENTHUSIASTS among those who run these initiatives!

For example, National Council of Science Museums (NCSM), an autonomous society under the Ministry of Culture, Government of India (formed 1978), administers 27 science centres/museums/planetariums spread all over India.

The Delhi unit is National Science Centre , www.nscdelhi.org, (Pragati Maidan, Near Gate No.1).

Its various VARIOUS INDOOR & OUTDOOR ACTIVITIES include:

• Commemorative Events
• Community Programmes
• Creative Ability Camp
• Environmental Awareness Programmes
• Film Shows
• Nature Study Camps
• Popular Science Lectures
• Science Camp/Fair
• Science Demonstration Lectures (SDL)
• Science Quiz
• Science Seminar
• Science Shows
• Sky Observation Camp
• Taramandal Shows
• Teachers' Training Programme
• Vacation Hobby Camp/ Centre

An interesting project : Virtual Museums as Innovative Tool for Adult Education (VMIT)

Pay MORE to Teachers

It is well known that most people avoid teaching as a profession (usually it is the last resort.)

The United Nations has reiterated that "Low salaries, lack of job security, inadequate training and overcrowded classrooms have combined to deter many willing and eligible people from becoming teachers....The shortage of qualified teachers is one of the biggest challenges to achieving the Education for All goals.”

How can we encourage talented people to take up the teaching profession?

First thing, of course, is to pay them more. But, what else?

What ALL do we need to do to CAUSE a world-wide revolution in education?

How can we create a powerful context for people to CHOOSE teaching as a first-preference profession?

Ekal Vidyalaya

Ekal Vidyalaya: "A charitable trust that initiates, supports, and runs non-formal one-teacher schools (popularly known as Ekal Vidyalayas) all over the country. With the participation of numerous non-profit trusts and organizations, this program has now become the greatest non-governmental education movement in the country."

Vision: To banish illiteracy from the face of tribal India by providing free, non-formal education through a People-Movement.

Mission: The Ekal Vidyalaya movement aims to help eradicate illiteracy from rural and tribal India by 2011. To date, Ekal Vidyalaya is a movement of over 24,006 teachers, 5,000 (Approximately) voluntary workers, 20 field organizations (scattered in 20 Indian states), and 8 support agencies as on December 2007.

Join as a Volunteer here.

Sponsor a School here.

WAH! Empowering Rural India. One Child at a Time.

Work An Hour 2008: Asha for Education has launched the 11th edition of its flagship online fundraiser Work An Hour. From July 15th to September 15th, you are invited to donate to 15 very special projects in need of funding to help educate underprivileged children in India.

The concept is simple "Participants are asked to symbolically Work an Hour towards the cause of children's education by donating an hour's worth or more of their salary."

Some highlights:

• Donors will have the ability to give to a project of their choice.
• First WAH campaign started in 1998, raised over $30,000 from close to 700 donors. Last year, WAH raised over $140,000 with a donor base of over 1,250 participants.
• Projects chosen in the past included a wide range of education initiatives, such as educating slum children, supporting schools for the disabled and non-formal education centers, educating children of sexworkers, mitigating child labor etc.
• This year's campaign addresses the empowerment of rural and tribal communities & centered around, Empowering Rural India. One Child at a Time.

CLICK HERE TO DONATE.

Youth at Rescue!

Can Youth Save Our World ?: Alexander M Zoltai writes about the story of The World’s Youngest Principal - 17-year-old Zhang Yong and throws up some very powerful questions!

How do you think youth can be helped best to understand the world?

How do you think adults can be educated to accept the power and creativity of youth?

As we ponder over these, Alex shares a few inspiring quotes, one of them being:

“The cause of universal education deserves the utmost support,
for no nation can achieve success unless education is accorded all its citizens.
Such an education should promote
the consciousness of both the oneness of humanity
and the integral connection between humankind and the world of nature.
By nurturing a sense of world citizenship,
education can prepare the youth of the world
for the organic changes in the structure of society
which the principle of oneness implies.”
Bahá’í International Community, 1992 June 06, Earth Charter

Read it all at Our Evolution.

Should you volunteer, or support financially?

How do you deal with children begging on the streets?

Nandita Das shares:

Children begging in the streets, for instance – that’s one issue that I have not sorted out in my mind, yet. I don’t know whether I should give alms and encourage begging. I also know that is not going to change the situation. But then, am I doing anything else in lieu of not giving a tenner? When I see them at traffic lights, I feel that at least I should make eye contact, talk to them. Many of my friends keep telling me, ‘Don’t talk to them’, ‘Don’t even look at them. You are asking for trouble.’ But I try to connect with them. I make faces, talk to them... that is a moment of lightness in their lives, and, as I have realised, in mine too.

I don’t undermine monetary contribution, because there is such an unequal distribution of money in this world. It is important that people contribute financially too. But being involved, volunteering to give some time, apart from money, often enriches one’s own life.

If, as a human being, one wants to grow and be more sensitive, there’s nothing like giving time and creating those experiences for oneself.

What is your take?

How would you like to contribute towards education of underprivileged children?

Inclusive Education

Teach India: 'Don't weed out kids, work them in' : Amol Gupte, writer and creative-director of Taare Zameen Par, has very strong views on overhauling the Indian Education System. He says:

An Inclusive education, to me,
is one that does not practice selective exclusion—
weeding out children on the basis of unreasonable milestones.....,
and I am shocked by the way
the education system systematically and selectively
denies children with special needs access to the classroom.
What people forget is that
the speed of the herd is not determined
by the fastest but the slowest in the pack.

On, what would he like to change?

A total overhaul of the curriculum.
I would like to see a more holistic curriculum,
where the focus is on knowledge not scores.
Besides, I would like to replace rote learning
with subjective knowledge that would benefit a child much more.

Hmmn...that is lot work! Let us get going!

Teach India

Teach India: Teach India aims to support the education of underprivileged children....


DONATE SOMETHING MUCH MORE IMPORTANT THAT FUNDS.......

YOUR TIME

HOW MUCH TIME do you HAVE for underprivileged children?