How can we initiate PLAY in low resource schools?
Initiating PLAY in low resource schools is possible if the teacher actively engages to create games, modify the local games and prepare activities that includes all the students. Besides game teachers can collect locally available resources and low cost educational resources to build prototypes, projects or presentations to bring play as hands-on learning.
recently designed an activity involving my entire class based on our local game Bagchal after seeing students play the game. Students themselves acted as “Baghs” and “Bakhras” with 2 students assigned the task of controlling all the players. I used the game to have a discussion on coordinate geometry and the concepts of predator and prey. We conducted this activity without needing any additional resources, and involving the entire class made the experience more engaging and meaningful. Playing games is a great way for students to engage in learning
I have been documenting my classroom activities using short videos and posting it on my YouTube channel to encourage other teachers to adopt simple play based learning activities in their classroom.
Running PEBL session for the teachers from Dolpa.
Our school invited around 17 teachers from 4 different government schools of Dolpa to observe the teaching methods in our school and train them to run better fun learning classes. The resources available in the school were limited and they had doubts over running hands on classes in their schools. The teachers participated in a playful session of Paper helicopter and Tangram that I facilitated. They were delighted to know that they could bring just experiences to their students with nothing more than some cutouts of geometrical shape and a piece of paper. They left with the idea that a teacher's mindset, not resources, are obstacles to delivering hands-on learning.
In the end I gave them the book of PLAY designed by the Karkhana Samuha and asked them if they can run sessions from the books by collecting the available resources in their place. They all seemed inspired and ready to take the classes to Dolpa.
PEBL storytelling with light - Chimi Miss
I had difficulty running one of the PEBL activities called “Storytelling with Light.” I asked for help from my colleague Chimi Sherpa. She is an English teacher in our school and she agreed to run the session. After sharing how to run the session Chimi miss went about delivering the session to her students. The students created beautiful stories, and I got to learn so much by observing how she went about facilitating the activity.
I believe to teach is to learn twice and what we learn must be shared so that it reaches a greater number of people and we see the change. I am on a mission to share my learning to a larger audience, so I have been sharing videos via my social media to educate more people.
