News
False dichotomies of education that we must strive to overcome
Good education requires not dichotomies, but a consistent endeavour to balance and achieve complementary ends, both in theory and in practice, writes Anurag Behar, CEO, Azim Premji Foundation, in Mint.
How educators can make the classroom teaching of soil more informative, creative, and interactive
Santosh Kumar, in the i wonder… magazine, records the voices of some urban and rural students in informal discussions about soil. He highlights the experiences that shape their understanding of soil and what they would like to learn about it.
Do supply chains characterise the state of a nation?
Ashutosh Tosaria, member, Azim Premji Foundation, in Deccan Herald, compares the 10-minute delivery of products in cities and the breakdown of sanitary pad distribution to government schools and anganwadi centres during the COVID-19 pandemic, to highlight how disjoined our lives are.
How teachers can develop narrative strength to make science more engaging for students
Randy Olson, in the i wonder magazine, illustrates how one can get started with a story using the universal narrative template called ABT (And, But, Therefore).
How Gramin Shiksha Kendra (GSK) works to develop functional competency in English
Ekta Dhankar, Jyotsna Lall, Shipra Suneja, and Vardhna Puri, share their experience of teaching English to first-generation learners in rural Rajasthan, in the Learning Curve magazine, while highlighting the major outcomes of the programme.
Science Education: Physics for closeted Aristotelians
Nitish Sehgal, in the i wonder… magazine, explores how exercises requiring students to verbalise or pictorially depict their understanding of a particular phenomenon may help teachers understand the specific nature of their folk theories.
How gender stereotypes in villages promote prejudice that may lead to an individual’s isolation within the community
Ananya Vasishtha, Student, MA Public Policy and Governance, Azim Premji University, in The Pioneer, explains how such stereotypes are perceived differently in more archaic forms in the rural areas, while women there lack popular voice.
Teacher Education: Why using students’ existing knowledge to build new learning is helpful
Keeping existing knowledge as a base for building up new knowledge helps in engaging every child in the learning process, writes Pompa in the Learning Curve magazine.
How citizens’ ecological imaginations can impact the future of our green infrastructure
Listen to the podcast by Harini Nagendra, Faculty, Azim Premji University, in The Swaddle, on re-imagining environmental sustainability, reframing the development versus environment binary, and creating more equal cities by fostering urban commons.
Ambedkar in a savarna mundu? Why Babasaheb’s clothes matter
Kerala debate on Ambedkar shows his suit is a signifier on multiple levels. Some link it to Buddhist enlightenment, others to the 1942 SC federation flag, writes K Kalyani, Faculty member, Azim Premji University, in ThePrint.
Science Education: How students can learn the foundational principles of physics through simple experiments
G S Rautela, in i wonder… magazine, presents simple but exciting experiments that can be performed with low-cost materials, to understand the basic principles of physics.
Why success of new education policy depends on how we recruit and assess teachers
Aanchal Chomal and Anupama Raj, in The Indian Express, write that setting up clear benchmarks of quality and well-designed recruitment processes hold the key to ensuring better teaching-learning outcomes.
निवेश बढ़ा तो संवरेंगे सरकारी स्कूल
अनुराग बेहर, अजीम प्रेमजी फाउंडेशन के सीईओ, हिन्दुस्तान में लिखते है कि केंद्रीय विद्यालयों की तरह ही हम यदि अन्य सरकारी स्कूलों में निवेश कर सकें, तो निस्संदेह उनकी तस्वीर भी बदल जाएगी।
Bengaluru Rains: While record rainfall appears to be the immediate villain, was it the only reason for flooding?
Torrential rains turned many parts of Bengaluru, including its tech corridors along the Outer Ring Road, into veritable lakes last week. Harini Nagendra, faculty member, Azim Premji University, in The Times of India, suggests solutions in an interview.
Why e‑waste processing is a dangerous occupation
Sapna Mishra and Rakhal Gaitonde, in The Wire, highlight the plight of the workers who process e‑waste, as part of their PhD fieldwork conducted in the slums of a city in a south Indian state.
अधिक कुशल शिक्षकों के लिए बदलना होगा ढांचा
अध्यापकों की क्षमता और उनकी प्रभावशीलता में सुधार की जरूरत है। अनुराग बेहर, अजीम प्रेमजी फाउंडेशन के सीईओ, राजस्थान पत्रिका में लिखते है कि यह तभी हो सकेगा जब शिक्षक शिक्षा व शिक्षकों को अधिक कुशल बनाने की दिशा में संरचनात्मक और व्यवस्थित परिवर्तन होंगे।
When Bengaluru became Venice: Gear up to the challenges of living in a world disrupted by constant risk
We must go beyond band-aids and patchwork solutions, desilt our lakes and widen the concrete box drains to cope with intense bursts of heavy rainfall in short spells, writes Harini Nagendra, faculty member, Azim Premji University, in Deccan Herald.
How to bridge the gap between environmental research and action
The awareness to contribute and care for the environment can begin with teachers and children in schools, write Harini Nagendra and Seema Mundoli, in the Learning Curve magazine.
How one can bring about and contribute to social change
Social action without theoretically informed and practically grounded ideas may have limited ends and impact, writes Kinnari Pandya, in Deccan Herald.
Kendriya Vidyalayas (KVs) are clear examples of how public schools can be run well — we have six decades of evidence
If we back the state run schools with the same investment as the country has made in KVs, our public schools will be transformed, says Anurag Behar, in Mint.
Environmental Education: What children can learn from staying near forests
Ankit Shukla, in the Learning Curve magazine, shares learnings from a visit to a nearby forest that was planned with some children of a government school, inspired by Totto-Chan: The Little Girl at the Window, a book by Tetsuko Kuroyanagi.
How hydroponic farming can become a medium for students to develop connections with science concepts
Prashant Wahule, in i wonder… magazine, explains how encouraging student-led inquiry, discussion, and collaborative work can help children to develop into confident learners by sharing an experience of hydroponic farming with tribal students of Ashram Shala.