Nowadays, children are getting habituated to mobile phones, computers and television. They are accustomed to develop their understanding through audio-visuals only. Closure of schools due to pandemic and commencement of online education have promoted the use of videos and virtual activities to impart adequate knowledge with desired outcomes in children.
Shifting back to offline classes looks like a challenging task for educators in current situation as drawing student’s attention and holding it for 30 minutes becomes unattainable from time to time. What could be done that can make students interested in learning in the classroom situation?
A small joke regarding anything, any fun talk for a minute or two or a short story related to the topic looks just fine to catch and hold their attention. If the teacher is a fun-loving person, a consistent reader or a keen observer, then it becomes easy for him/her to gather set induction stories. However, traditional teachers who focus only on textbook need to look for short stories or events which can be told to students in a way that prepare them to listen to the teacher. Looking for the topic related stories also requires glancing through the curriculum and a strategic planning of the lesson. One does not need to find five different stories for all the five various classes that one teaches. Stories can be repeated in different classes by introducing small changes in them. Sharing stories and incidents with colleagues is one of the best ways to have a collection of stories only in a few months.
Researches show that children have an attention span of two-three times more than their age. So, an 11-year-old child can be attentive for approximately 33 minutes in the class if he is interested. Educators who have continuous one hour class may face an issue with the above-mentioned condition. Short 5-minutes games come handy under these circumstances. Since past more than ten years, I have been using few memory and action games that whole class can play together during my block periods. I found it extremely useful to make children feel relaxed and make them ready to learn the same topic further, to enter into new class or may be during the transition between two periods. I have seen children feeling happy, overjoyed and bubbling with energy while playing such games. They develop a kind of liking for the teacher, start listening to the teacher more and get ready to be more interactive during the next session. Children who are shy and reserved also cannot resist themselves from participating in such games which further help them to break the barriers between them and their classmates and teachers.
To recapitulate, a particular kind of habit can be changed with relentless efforts and a little enthusiasm. Children are always supportive when the teacher tries to incorporate something new in the classroom. They like helping their teachers. They relish conversing with her and partaking in the classroom activities. They like sharing their thoughts and stories with their teacher. Let’s join our hands together to work on children’s focus and attention in order to make our teaching and their learning more effective!
By Snehal Christian
(DBPS, English Medium, Rajnagar)