In the research of Lilia Halim and associates atUniversity Kebangsaan, Malaysia, on teaching of primary school level, the work of Indian educator-researcher Dr Lalit Kishore has been mentioned.
Halim, et al., [1] in the paper “Teaching marginalized children at primary schools: teachers professional development through collaborative action research” while referencing Inshore (2009) for his action-cum-intevention paper “Stepping into science in small schools: Together with tools, techniques and toys” related to science instruction in rural single teacher schools of Rajasthan, stated that teachers’ finds that professional development through collaborative action research enhance smarginalized children’s learning outcomes.
However, when teachers teachers use similar teaching approaches as those were being used in the urban schools, learning outcomes of marginalized children continue to be poor requiring alternative ways of teaching primary science, it is added
Abstract of Dr Inshore’ work goes as follows.
“This intervention action research paper describes the development and implementation of primary level science experiences in the project mode for small schools in the nongovernmental organization (NGO) sector located in dispersed small habitations in the desert area of an Indian State called Rajasthan. The project was developed in a participatory manner through a need analysis with the author functioning as designer and mentor. The project includes development, training, implementation and recurrent reviews of science activities in the schools combining the use of hand tools and low-cost science experiments. The components of the science learning at primary level had the following aspects: (a) making improvised measuring instruments; (b) familiarization with elementary hand tools; (c) making models; (d) performing experiments; (e) doinginvestigations; (f) making toys; (g) science-related drawing skill. The project was meant for grades three, four and five with 20 science-related activities at each grade level.The evaluation of the project was done through quarterly participatory reviews by the teachers and evaluation of children’s performance in the annual test. The project after one year resulted in establishing the science activity corner,and annual science exhibition for parents and village community. The innovative features of the programme are the use of readily available material; comprehensive experiences; participatory processes and community linkages. The project resulted in improving the achievement levels in the project schools at grade three as compared to the previous year’s achievement scores at 0.01 levels of significance as revealed by the t-test analysis.
References
[1] Halim, et al., (2011). Teaching marginalized children at primary schools: teachers professional development through collaborative action research”Source: https://www.academia.edu/28202728/Teaching_marginalized_children_at_primary_schools_teachers_professional_development_through_collaborative_action_research
[2] Kishore, L. (2009). Stepping into science in small schools: Together with tools, techniques and toys. Proceedings: International Conference to Review Research in Science, Technology and Mathematics Education. Mumbai, India. January 5
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