BEYOND CONVENTION

THE TEACHING-LEARNING EQUATION, WHETHER WITHIN THE CLASSROOM OR OUTSIDE IT, NOW ENCOMPASSES INNOVATIVE STRATEGIES SUCH AS GETTING INTO THE SKIN OF CHARACTERS AND USING ART, MUSIC, DANCE AND TRAVEL TO LEARN CONCEPTS BETTER, AMONGST NUMEROUS OTHER CREATIVE APPROACHES.
SOME UNIQUE EXAMPLES FROM ACROSS
THE WORLD

   The words 'teaching' and 'learning' project different images to different people. Conventionally, these actions were perceived as dull and tedious tasks, but that is far from the truth, especially now. The world over, there are academicians, who thrive on making the whole procedure of teaching and learning, a stimulating and inspiring experience. To them, innovation is the name of the game and they strive to bring excitement into the everyday classroom with their novel methods.
   Tina Seelig, executive director, Stanford University Technology Ventures, is one such pioneer, who employs several out-of-the box teaching methods. “Most of my techniques involve getting students engaged with the entrepreneurial process. This means taking risks, challenging assumptions, identifying opportunities, leveraging limited resources, and creating value,” says Tina.
An exciting project Tina ran around the world, including India, Thailand, Ecuador and the US, dealt with making students add value to an everyday object, which culminated in to a film, Imagine It.“Students were given a packet of post-it notes and five days to create as much value with them as possible,” explains Tina. So, one team created a musical piece by asking people to write musical notes on the post-its, and put them together. Another team created awareness on wellness of the heart, by getting people to agree to take care of their hearts by signing the post-its etc.
   In another method used in Mumbai and Bangalore, Tina asked students to visit the local bazaar and speak to coffee shop personnel or cobblers to find out all about their businesses as well as to observe how many customers they drew and what the turnover was. Thus the participants were made to get out of their comfort zones,since many were hesitant to approach strangers and ask them these insightful questions.
   Another exercise involved asking participants to make two lists, one filled with good ideas, the other with bad ones (to start a business in). The papers with the good ideas were then torn up, and the participants were asked to convert all the bad ideas into good ones.The lesson? There is an opportunity in every 'fuzzy' idea.
   Further, pairs of students are given paper and colour pencils, and each has to design a wallet for the other based on his/her personality. It could be fancy or simple, loud or understated. The lesson: understand your customer.
   In the UK, at Oxford Brookes University Business School, Richard Beresford, director, Centre for Creativity and Enterprise Development, uses innovative teaching practices, which are fun too. One of his exercises deals with placing Brookes' students on a boat off the Swedish coastline with students from seven other European countries. This exercise forms the basis for networking and opens many business opportunities.
   Brian Morgan, director, Cardiff School of Management, University of Wales Institute, Cardiff, gives an example of how the physical environment can be linked to teaching and learning. Students visit local underground caves, go white water rafting or abseiling.“All these activities have a purpose attached, such as getting somewhere and coming back safe, and these form part of the students' learning experiences,”says Morgan.

 

 

 

 

   At the SP Jain Center of Management, in Singapore and Dubai, dean Debashis Chatterjee, uses unusual methods such as SMILO or Self Mastery in Life and Organisation. Learning, he believes, happens not so much through lectures, but through total immersion in the learning process. So SMILO encourages students to work on projects such as nurturing a plant for six months or making a drab busstop in Singapore look interesting. Chatterjee who offers seminar courses at Harvard and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) on wisdom leadership has also developed a course in Singapore, based on two war classics: the Gita, and China's ancient military treatise, The Art of War.
   At the Singapore Institute of Management and Tamasek Polytechnic, students take pushcarts on rent, source items like wallets, handbags and music albums and sell them at a profit. This helps them to learn sourcing, display, supply, customer service, costing and
general business sense.
   At Singapore Polytechnic, professors guide students to create robots that play soccer, cashing in on the appeal of sport to youngsters. Through this, they learn about movements of the human body and artificial intelligence.
   Trilochan Sastry, professor, IIM, Bangalore, speaks of the ‘Independent Activities Period’ at MIT, which is a week devoted to things outside the curriculum when students do ‘crazy stuff’. “Once they hoisted a car on top of a dome on campus. While this may seem bizarre, it tests their ability to balance the car on such a surface, which is an engineering feat,” enthuses Sastry.
   An innovative method Sastry has observed at MIT is team teaching. He explains,“Two experts in different areas, like marketing and production, teach the same class so students can gain a multidisciplinary perspective.”
   Closer to home, at Women's Institute for Studies in Development Oriented Management (WISDOM),Rajasthan,students were given an open-ended poem by Subhash Sharma of Indian Business Academy, to which they added their lines. This became the WISDOM college song. Sharma explains,“Poetry develops the right brain and unfolds creativity. I use poetry to expand the students' mental horizons, because management goes beyond technical know-how.”
   Sharma has penned another ‘corporate rhyme’ called Churning of the Ocean by the Quantum Rope, and set it to a tune which students sing. He believes it gets students charged up. “Goals that earlier appeared tough now
seem easy.The group chanting energises them and fights negative emotions,” reveals Sharma.
   In another instance, Ramnath Narayanswamy, professor, IIM, Bangalore, uses epics like the Mahabharatha and interprets the roles by the Pandavas and Kauravas in lieu of today's managers. According to this exercise, Yuddhishtira is a mentor, Bhima an executor manager, Nakul an enabler, Sahadeva the visionary without action, Arjuna is the manager in search of his meaning in life, and Karna is loyalty personified- the manager who'd probably buy vegetables for his boss, while Krishna is the CEO!
   Narayanswamy uses culture in his classes for IIM students where he exposes them to craftsmen and artists. Students understand what makes them tick, how they cope with failure, what inspires them, and how their love for art supercedes everything, including money.
   Another course for businesswomen offered by Kalyani Gandhi, professor, IIM, Bangalore, uses dance as a confidence-building tool.
   While the field of management lends itself to creative learning and teaching, there have been innovative methods emplpyed in engineering and mathematics too.
   At IIIT, Bangalore, students and professor GNS Prasanna, have developed a novel way of playing chess, called inverse chess or i-chess. Players play the game backwards: they start with a few pieces and get all the pieces back. Explains Prasanna,“You play backwards
instead of forwards. The game is constructive, not destructive, because your end result involves getting as many pieces back as possible.” While the game is fun, it involves math, programming, reasoning, logic and analytical thinking.
   Similarly, Rajendra Joshi from International Academy for Creative Teaching speaks of a snakes and ladders game that was created for computer engineering students, and how students of civil engineering in Chennai have devised a board game that helps them in the revision of hydroelectric projects.
   As you can see from the examples above, while the US and UK are forerunners in innovative teaching methods, India is not lagging behind either. So, the question of whether teaching and learning should still be considered boring, is purely rhetorical not to mention, obsolete.