Being a B.E graduate in information science with experience in the IT industry, Teaching for me is not a job, a career or even a profession. It’s way more than that.
My journey as a Computer Science educator so far is a commitment to learning, not only about the curriculum content, grade levels, school policy and technological innovations but about a true passion for new knowledge and skills that make me more effective as a professional educator and a human being.
Teaching multiple grade levels is a challenge that has kept me on my toes and has made me a better educator. Now almost at the end of the academic year, I have found it rewarding in different ways that I didn’t anticipate – I can handle and groom myself to adapt to different student needs, and I know the curriculum much better. I can teach the students in a way that will help them in the current year as well as the upcoming year.
But the challenges were very many. I would hardly get 4 hours of sleep and spend time preparing for the classes. I would spend at least 3 hrs for 1 hour of class preparation for middle school students as Computer science is a vast field and no one knows everything.
Since our is a new campus, having a working computer lab took time and effort. I learnt that if I looked at the problems, I would find problems; but if I looked at solutions I would find only solutions. As time passed by, I also realized it is not very difficult once you have everything in one place.
Developing a code is not about having the answers, but about cultivating the ability to figure things out using your resources. If the grade 6 students were finding it difficult to write the code, I would encourage them to draw the flowchart decompose the problem and find answers. In addition to creating interactive classes, I used my experiences to create more visual, conceptual interactions for the students to break the barrier of coding.
Learning and teaching microcontrollers to the middle school students was very challenging. That is when I understood the need for collaboration with other teachers/colleagues. I am much more comfortable now being honest with my students in moments of uncertainty. I used to put so much pressure on myself to be perfect and know everything, but that didn’t give me the outcome I desired. I started to learn alongside students and welcomed mistakes as learning opportunities. It’s been enjoyable to explore ideas with the students and work together towards a common goal of learning.
Another important lesson that I learned was the importance of feedback. During my teaching experience, I would want to find ways to improve my teaching skills – let it be feedback from students/peers / HOS. This helped me grow and strengthened my relationship with the students. When the trust started building, I observed that students were more engaged, and motivated and felt comfortable in reaching out for help and sharing their thoughts.
I would proudly like to say being an inventive problem solver and an enthusiastic educator are the strengths added to me at this juncture. Nothing of this would have been possible without our HOS Ms Mathangi. My sincere gratitude to Ms Asmita, Ms Mangala, Ms Sandhya and Mr Shashikumar for their support in my journey
Ms Shruthi Srinivas, Ekya NICE Road