Learning is an endless process that we
all must do, no matter what the circumstances are. Learning in short is LIFE
which means that Learning Is For Everyone. What are the things that we should think about during COVID-19 to sustain LIFE?
First of all, to live for LIFE we must take
care of our bodies, hearts, and minds. To take care of ourselves in order to sustain
LIFE, we must eat good food, exercise spend time outside, as these
things will benefit our children’s physical and mental health.
Secondly, it is important to give children
time and space for learning. Parents as well as teachers can offer children
the time and space to do investigations, sense-making, outdoors
beneficial projects, using commonly available materials from their environment
to develop their critical and creative thinking skills. We can give available
resources, and help children get organised in a particular way to develop their
investigation skills.
Likewise, we can also allow our children
flexible daily routines. Giving consistent daily routines will support
wellness and productivity of the students. We can have routines for sleeping, eating, doing shared activities, online time and alone time. Establish rules for
screen time and follow. Be flexible and adjust schedules and structures to support
goals for living and learning at home.
Another thing we need to do is allowing our
children unstructured time. When we let children be free to foster their
creativity, it will give them downtime to cope with their own
emotions and thoughts during this pandemic. Hence, this will help
to linger flexibility in staying safe and healthy during this hard
time.
Co-construct learning experience is another thing we can use during this pandemic. As we need a thought partner to support our students’ reasoning by asking questions like, 'What do you notice?', 'Why do you think this is happening?', 'Can you clarify me about this?' If obtainable, offer opportunities to connect with teachers and peers online through online classes at different times.
Moreover, finding time for reflection of each student is a very important part of education. We need to encourage self-reflection and reflection from others on what they learned and how they learned it, how they are feeling. We can do this by allowing students to draw, write, create a video blog and talk about their reflections.
Furthermore, it is vital for parents to share their
thoughts with their children during this time as we cannot send them to places
as we did during the normal time. Parents can describe what they are doing as they
do it, whether it is cooking, fixing something, taking care of pets or other
housework. Ask questions out loud, even if you do not know the answer. Talk
about different aspects of the work. As you spend time with your kids, engage
in a range of questioning, talking, and listening.
In addition, it is nice to build upon interests. Being a teacher or a parent you know your child the best. Encourage
them to pursue projects, or collaborate about personal, family, or community work. Share your work and allow students to think and work with you in
meaningful, career-related contexts. Address current events together with care.
This way we can learn daily activities like cooking, repairing, budgeting, gardening and so on. Identify relevant problems in children's lives
and engage in projects to discuss them.
We also need to practice compassion all the time when at home or in an online class. We can extend compassion to those with whom we interact during stressful times, including ourselves. Be mindful of the unseen personal lives of those in our networks as well as the factors that enter decision-making of which we are not knowing.
It is necessary to make everyone aware of the rapid
changes that occur worldwide all the time. We have to bring changes in our way
of teaching and dealing online or direct classes for our children with
compassion, love and care to build our society for life by solving the problems
we come across in a proper way as highlighted before.
We can’t stop LIFE in any circumstance, we need to step ahead for success all the time no matter how hard it is.
Written by
Fathimath Shabeena
English Teacher
Maradhoo School.
0 Comments