Science Face-to-Face Workshop-Telangana (06.09.17-16.09.17)
A three-day Science workshop was conducted in Telangana state in four spells from 6th to 16th September 2017.
Teachers of Telangana were very enthusiastic, conceptually sound and innovative. This workshop was my best experience so far of working with teachers. Immediately after the workshop, teachers began doing the activities in their schools.
In the workshop, teachers were introduced to the TISSx course with the objective of forming an online teachers’ community of practice and teachers’ self-development. They were also introduced to student modules and the module’s approach, learning objectives and blended design.Teachers navigated through the CLIx platform, explored and completed the activities in the student module, and after analysing the experience and processing the data they discussed the result and built an understanding about it.
Three physical science modules were introduced to teachers:
1. Motion,
2. Sound, and
3. Atomic Structure.
Teachers worked in groups on the rolling ball experiment in the Motion module. They collated the position-time data and calculated average velocity and rate of change of velocity. A good discussion on uniform and non-uniform acceleration followed among the teachers. It was so encouraging to see teachers doing the activity like students; they were so engaged and actively participated in the discussion.
From the Sound module, teachers discussed the production, propagation, amplitude and frequency of sound. Paper cup telephone and singing spoon activities were done to observe the vibrations in the medium when sound propagates through it. The smiles on the teachers’ faces were heartening, because they indicated that the simple activities dealt with deep concepts. Teachers enjoyed a conference call using paper cup toy telephones. From the Atomic Structure module, teachers enjoyed playing the simulations to build an atom and build a molecule. They constructed various elements and molecules and saw the 3D figure. They found it very useful for their students.
Conference call among teachers
Teachers of Telangana welcomed us with warmth. Now we are connected through Telegram (a mobile messenger app) and almost daily receive a sweet ‘good morning’ message from them which shows their love. They add the suffix ‘garu’ to a person’s first name as a mark of respect.
Overall, it was a great experience to be there at the workshop.
(Honey Singh, Research Associate, Teacher Professional Development Team, Vinod Raina Fellow)
