Maha educator gets award for novel teaching method in lockdown

A Maharashtra teacher, who did notallow coronavirus-induced lockdown to come in the way ofcontinuing his classes for his students in rural areas, haswon recognition for his efforts that involved use ofconference calls and storytelling.

Balaji Baburao Jadhav (35), who hails from Sangavivillage under Renapur tehsil of Latur district in centralMaharashtra, has been selected for the Honey Bee NetworkCreativity Inclusive Innovation Award 2020.

He is a Zilla Parishad teacher at Vijayanagar in Maantehsil of Satara district and won the award for his teachingthrough conference call'' method.

Earlier, Ranjitsinh Disale, 32, who works as a teacherat the Zilla Parishad Primary School at Paritewadi in Solapur,won the Global Teacher Prize 2020 in recognition of hisefforts to promote girls education and trigger a quick-response (QR) coded textbook revolution in India.

After the Centre imposed a complete lockdown acrossthe country in March-end last year to curb the spread ofCOVID-19, classroom teaching stopped and learning shiftedonline.

But, attending online classes was difficult forstudents in rural areas due to non-availability of computers,laptop, smartphones and Internet connectivity problems.

To overcome this hurdle, Jadhav came up with aninnovative teaching method to impart education to his studentsduring the lockdown period.

He adopted the idea of conference calls to conductclasses from April onwards.

Jadhav taught 10 students at one time in conferencecall in the morning and evening. Parents of these studentswere mostly shepherds and labourers, who had simple keypadmobile phones and faced network issues in rural areas.

He concentrated on developing four fundamentalskills of language, listening, speaking, reading and writing(LSRW) among students.

At the beginning of lockdown, he started storytellingto develop their listening skills. After developing listeningskill, students would narrate the same story through whichthey developed speaking skill.

After that, Jadhav asked students to write downstories in a notebook. He used storytelling format to draw andretain the attention of pupils.

Then, he asked students to record the stories. Now,students have made an e-library of 500 recorded stories.

In this way, my students developed four fundamentalskills of language and now they are perfect in listening,speaking, reading and writing.

''I am confident that my students will become good newsanchors, reporters, writers and speakers, Jadhav told PTI.

For his teaching innovation during the lockdown,Jadhav was selected for the award on December 24.

The award is jointly instituted by Honey Bee Networkand GIAN and is given to ideas for creativity and innovationor to traditional knowledge practices which solve day-to-dayproblems faced by the society.

Jadhav was congratulated by NCP MP Supriya Sule, stateministers Amit Deshmukh and Varsha Gaikwad, among others, forhis achievement.

So far, Jadhav has received more than 70 state,national and international awards.

''My project is followed in 20 districts ofMaharashtra, 24 states in the country and 14 countries in theworld. The benefit of people is my real satisfaction thanan award,'' he said.

''I am happy to be honoured. I will try to connect withmore teachers with such platforms in the future,'' Jadhav said.

PTI CORRSY RSY

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)