Now, teaching aids get a green spin

Classroom lessons may get livelier and brighter soon, with the state government training teachers to make and use teaching aids. However, these will not be traditional teaching aids like paper charts, clay models, plastic maps, globes, and power point presentations.

Instead, teachers in the city are being trained to integrate specialised teaching aids made out of eco-friendly materials like papier mache, jute, mud, and other recyclable materials, and use them innovatively.

Though classrooms in schools are equipped with the latest technology like audio-visuals to aid teachers, the use of simple objects like handmade puppets is more effective in holding a child’s attention, said A Pawar, education officer for the western suburbs.

“The use of teaching aids is an age-old concept,” he said. “It is one of the first lessons that teachers receive during their BEd studies. Unfortunately, we always tend to underestimate teaching aids. Any good teacher will tell you that it is these aids that make a class memorable.”

Started under the Rashtriya Madhyamik Shiksha Abhiyan, these training sessions focussed on developing eco-friendly teaching aids through two-day workshops held on Friday and Saturday. The teachers were taught to make posters, flash cards, syllable wheels, flip charts, easy readers, and word-building cards from recyclable materials.

“Since teachers are role models for students, we want them to spread the green message,” said Pawar. “Instead of listening to lectures on how to preserve the environment, the students should learn from teachers’ actions.”

In these workshops, teachers created a variety of teaching aids for all subjects out of waste or eco-friendly materials. They made models of the human anatomy entirely out of jute hemp ropes and attractive work books from newspapers.

Some teachers designed a piece of cardboard fixed with nails that can be used to teach simple mathematics to primary classes. “All that the teacher has to do is carry a few long rubber bands, then stretch the bands across the nails to teach the students addition, subtraction or even angles,” said V Chindarkar, Aniyog High School, Khar.

To teach students about the latest collision of two ships that caused an oil spill off the city’s coast, some teachers have made a model of the ship Chitra out of coir and coconut shells.