In this section, I am sharing some of the learning material that I have created and found useful in my work with children.
The material is largely ‘non-prescriptive’ in nature, in the sense that it neither instructs nor limits us with regards to ‘how’ it can be used. The material thus lends itself beautifully to the Resource Room approach, by allowing us to study and explore the topic at hand in many different ways, and in line with the children’s interests and abilities. For instance, when working with the material ‘Famous Places in Asia’ from the ‘Geography’ section, some children may choose to plot the various locations on a map, and others may choose to research out a few of them in greater detail. Similarly, with regards to the material ‘Who am I? – Birds’ in the ‘Science’ section, a group of children may decide to complete their work once they have identified all the birds correctly, while another group of children may like to research a few of the birds in greater detail, or add to the material by making similar picture and information cards of some more birds.
Additionally, the ‘non-prescriptive’ nature of the material enables the children to present their learning in a variety of creative ways. For example, after studying the ‘Story of M K Gandhi’ from the ‘History’ section, a group of children may choose to make an illustrated timeline of Gandhiji’s life, whereas another group may choose to present his life story in the form of a skit. Similarly, while some children working with the ‘National Armed Forces with Awards’, material section in the ‘Civics’ section, may choose to make a PowerPoint presentation on the same, others may choose to design and conduct a quiz on the topic.
While the learning material has been categorized under various subject-areas, it is most certainly meant to be integrated with each other, as and when opportunities arise. Also, some of the material can be presented to the children in different formats. For instance, some of the material in the ‘Language’ and ‘Math’ sections can be presented on A4-sized sheets or, in the form of text cards.
As may be quickly evident, a lot of the material connects naturally with the concepts typically covered in Standards 5 – 7, thus enabling children to reinforce and build on the same in fun and creative ways.
I sincerely hope you find this material useful for your work!