Teaching Aptitude-5

1. The ideal method to handle academically backward students is to:
(a) Understand and motivate them
(b) Analyze and scold them
(c) Summon their parents and talk
(d) Tell them learning is not meant for them

2. The best method to wins studentsΓÇÖ trust is to:
(a) Be close and friendly
(b) Be critical and harsh
(c) Be a garrulous and evading
(d) Be scholarly and honest

3. If a student is continuously absent in your class, what will you do?
(a) Submit a detailed report to the principal
(b) Report to the tutor and continue your own work
(c) Tell other students and ask them to intimate the absentee
(d) Explore possible reasons and remedy them if necessary

4. A serious minded teacher as a rule
(a) Allows mistakes to be committed and explains how to minimize them
(b) Takes all precaution so that students will not make mistakes
(c) Teach is such a way that chances of mistakes are avoided
(d) Punish those students who come up with wrong answers

5. The concept of teacher as the sole source of information has become obsolete because of:
(a) Changed perceptions on education
(b) Concern on the part of parents
(c) Leaps in information technology
(d) Deterioration in the stuff of students

ANSWERS
1. Understand and motivate them

As you know a student can have many problems (financial, psychological, etc.) that heavily impact on his performance and behavior. Unless and until these are taken into account, any measure is bound to run to a blank wall. Then try to be a model worthy of emulation. Remember, a living model is a thousand times better than one appears in the pages of books.

2. Be scholarly and honest
It is necessary to be close and friendly but that is not an end in itself. You may be able to take students for a ride by being garrulous and evading. But how long will this trick last? They will definitely see through you and label you as a lousy teacher. So it is imperative to have a through understanding of what you say. In an age where the floodgates of information open with a soft mouse click, you canΓÇÖt afford to be shallow. And then what about mistakes? Openly admit them. If you try to cloak your errors through verbosity, you will become a butt of ridicule sooner or later.

3. Explore possible reasons and remedy them if necessary
Ascertain whether if he is chronically absent or is playing truant only in your class. Well, if the case is the latter, it is you who should mend the ways. Of course there are things you canΓÇÖt do a thing about. The subject may be too hard to crack; maybe he does not get things right; perhaps he is not intelligent enough to grasp it. On the contrary, if he is of sufficient caliber, what keeps him away can be your method and attitude. Undergo a self audit and critically study the results.

4. Allows mistakes to be committed and explains how to minimize them:

Trial and error method has many virtues. For one thing it takes the student along all the contours before reaching an answer; his journey covers the steps and gives view of the processes involved. In other words, the whole thing is process oriented (rather than answer oriented). Secondly the realization that errors are not something to be afraid of may embolden students traverse unknown territories. The journey from the known to the unknown, as you know, is one of the greatest goals of education. Thirdly, the attempts to escape from errors are likely to show to may ways. In pedagogical matrix, these new ways may prove better than the ones we are familiar with.

5. Leaps in information technology
There was a time, not long ago, when the teacher was the beacon of information and knowledge. Not any longer. Flooded with newspapers, magazines and most importantly the internet, nothing is easier than the dig for information. It is not without reason that the internet is called the information superhighway. Tragically, students, as a whole, are superior to teachers in the use of the internet: many of them are netizens, spending hours online, gathering information. So it is time teachers changed perceptions and assumed new roles. It is to be noted that the internet gives information, never knowledge, let alone wisdom. What could a teacher do better than help the student correlate and connect the chunks of information he possesses and process into knowledge? At the same time, make sure you are not lagging behind in exploring the cyber space. Be mouse potatoes!!