When my life changed!

It was a life changing moment for me as I realised that “…As educators, [we] exert a powerful influence over classroom norms...” (Wlodkowski & Ginsberg, n.d.). It reminds me of the time in my classroom when I had an epiphany ‘my moods control the classroom environment!’ I paused for few moments to absorb it, as I looked at all my students, waiting for me to begin the class. I am not the same person since then.

I am taking the classrooms that I have taught in my teaching career. These are Maths classrooms of middle school, grades 6 to 8, of private schools in India covering national and international curriculum. In India, Maths is considered the god of all subjects and hence it is also dreaded by many. You could be considered a low level student if you are not good at Maths. So I was always under pressure by the students for ‘more marks in maths’ as that defined ‘them’ in their opinion. I was crushed by their obsession.

My persistent thought was: How do I help them to come out of it?

The 1st value: Maximize Potential

I found developing, upon reflection, my foundation as a teacher: A student is not a reflection of his/her scores in Maths. This is the 1st value that I developed. It led me to trust and connect with them as human beings. And I became a Maths teacher who did not judge students on the basis of their marks in Maths.

This was a change point for me. I realised that each student had something beautiful in him or her that we are not able to see for we are blinded by their ‘Maths gene’. I related to many more students than I could before and discovered that it was quite fun to be with the ‘non-maths’ students as they taught me things I did not know! I realised that building an attitude to learning was more important than scores.

I also discovered that maintaining a stance of ‘you are intelligent in your own way’, helped me to alleviate fear of Maths that gripped so many students. Their stress eased off and they relaxed. That actually helped them maximise their potential in the subject! It worked for some students.

But what does one do that maximises the potential of all students?

The 2nd Value: Unconditional Acceptance

I moved from north of India to the south, a different world altogether! And I found that my earlier ways of teaching were not of much help. I was trying the methods of north in the south! I realised through my failures “Our emotions influence our motivation. In turn, our emotions are socialized through culture”. (Wlodkowski & Ginsberg, n.d.)

The school in the north was part of an eco-system that was aggressive and competitive. The one in south was a part of an eco-system where relationship was everything. But what is this relationship that they were talking about? This was a school that followed Jiddu Krishnamurti’s (Krishnamurti Foundation India, n.d) teachings.

It is here that the 2nd value, of holding relationship above all other things, that was understood by me. Through various attempts, dialogues and readings I understood that if one wants to change another, it can only start by meeting the other in a state of unconditional or non-judgmental acceptance, the true basis of all relationships. This is a process and might take a whole lifetime to develop. However, it was worth it. For each difficult student, the head of school encouraged me to build a relationship or deepen the existing relationship. It helped to develop a ‘connect’ with each student.

But it was not enough. While relationship can be the base, what about teaching? How do I ensure that everyone learn effectively in my group? My search continued. I searched for an external system of curricula that helped me to create a space that would allow each student to relate to me and the subject.

The 3rd Value: Inclusive Education

I moved to IB education and came in touch with education from all over the world. the school I was in exposed teachers as much as possible to develop their own way. There were students from 42 different countries and teachers from 5! Now I was exposed to the reality of race, nationality, class, gender, special needs and language affecting learning experiences for the students.

It is here that I created the 3rd and value for education for me and that was “…redesigning your curriculum to accommodate the diverse learners in your course”. (Cornell, n.d.) Or Inclusion, that is understood by me as “…a never-ending search to find better ways of responding to diversity”. (Ainscow & Sandill, 2010). Since I had students from gifted to disabled, I needed to learn to “… make the system flexible to cater for children along the entire spectrum from the very gifted to the severely disabled”. (Guyana, 2013)

Our school exposed us to multiple ways of approaching curriculum such as Multiple Intelligences, IB Learner Profile, IBMYP ATL skills and the spectrum of learning difficulties. Then the school took us, the teachers as “… co-developers of an inclusive curriculum” (Opertti & Brady, 2011) and gave us the space to come to our own creative selves. The heads of curriculum also focused on “teacher attitudes around inclusion and diversity” (Opertti & Brady, 2011). The work was “…based on trust and confidence, with high expectations and supportive structures and procedures” (Opertti & Brady, 2011). For me, this provided the necessary challenge and safety net to stretch my comfort zone and create my own systems.

I created systems after systems to be able to be able to respond to any set of students and soon acquired reputation in the school as the teacher who can teach ‘anyone from any background and maximise his or her potential’. My experiences of the creative methods I tried are encased as “HumaneMaths” (Kochar, 2013)

I had arrived as a teacher with the right base, right attitude and right designing capacity.

Conclusion

Teaching for me is to evoke the intrinsic learner that resides in each of us, and bring it to the forefront. It is a deep process of de-conditioning or unlearning of what we have been conditioned to believe and come to our true self.

On one side it needs a relationship with students that is based on unconditional acceptance of each. That creates a safe zone for students to express themselves. On the other side it needs a curriculum that provides all students with challenges differentiated enough for each to discover his or her true potential.

Learning how to achieve both has been my own growth process that continues even today.

“It is part of human nature to be curious, to be active, to initiate thought and behavior, to make meaning from experience, and to be effective at what we value. These primary sources of motivation reside in all of us, across all cultures. When students can see that what they are learning makes sense and is important, their intrinsic motivation emerges”. (Wlodkowski & Ginsberg, n.d.)


References

1. Ainscow, M. & Sandill, A. (2010). Developing inclusive education systems: The role of organizational cultures and leadership. International Journal of Inclusive Education, 14(4), 401-416. Retrieved from Google Scholar.

2. Cornell. (n.d.). Incorporating Diversity: Center for Teaching Innovation. Retrieved from https://teaching.cornell.edu/resource/incorporating-diversity

3. Guyana, M. O. E. (2013, April 22). Developing an Inclusive Education System. Retrieved from https://education.gov.gy/web/index.php/item/474-developing-an-inclusive-education-system

4. Kochar, M. (2013, October). The Mathematics of Art. Retrieved from http://www.teacherplus.org/the-mathematics-of-art/.

5. Krishnamurti Foundation India. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://thevalleyschool.info/.

6. Opertti, R. & Brady, J. (2011). Developing inclusive teachers from an inclusive curricular perspective. Prospects: Quarterly Review of Comparative Education, 41(3), 459-472. Retrieved from ERIC.

7. Wlodkowski , R., & Ginsberg, M. (n.d.). A Framework for Culturally Responsive Teaching. Retrieved from http://www.ascd.org/publications/educational-leadership/sept95/vol53/num01/A-Framework-for-Culturally-Responsive-Teaching.aspx