Why are Vikalp teachers different?

Students have not been given many opportunities to think in public schools. Teachers in these schools prefer to encourage docility, meekness, and obedience to authority over intellectual inquiry and rational thought. This is so because teachers who keep the students quiet, complete the syllabus on time, and raise no questions about the curriculum are rewarded. Teachers who encourage critical spirit are frowned upon.

Focus on Learning

In Vikalp, the role of teachers is completely different. Their primary role is to develop critical spirit among students. This involves principles of rational thought and reasoned judgement. Focus is not on teaching but learning. Classroom environment shifts from passive acquisition of facts and routines to the active discovery and application of ideas. Concepts are not introduced as a given fact. Students are guided to discover concepts while doing activities with learning tools. Reflect on what they have learned and apply their understanding in different circumstances.

Teachers are Professionals

Unlike doctors and lawyers, teachers are not considered professionals. Despite possessing a body of knowledge, they do not have autonomy. Generally, the organisation where they are working makes decisions for them. Teachers are supposed to deliver pre-prepared lessons as if they are working in the assembly line of a factory.  In Vikalp​, facilitators are supposed to share their love for their subjects with students. ​Teachers are considered as critical thinkers who have all kinds of autonomy to instill initiative, inquiry and creative thinking among their students.​

Teacher Training 

Teachers are not trained in lecture methods. Vikalp has in-house Teacher Training Academy where teachers are trained in a teaching methodology which adopts Socratic approach to enhancing meaning of the material and thinking of the students. The essence of the teacher training is twofold: to encourage and enhance the critical thinking skills of prospective teachers and teach them techniques for encouraging critical thinking inside classrooms and converting them into “communities of inquiry”.​ This is done by training teacher in the following thinking skills: –

• Conduct activities with learning tools so that students can do and learn
• Create a classroom environment where critical thinking can flourish
• This Socratic method of questioning where students discover answers by asking questions.
• Integrate ​critical thinking into the curriculum. Enabling students not only to remember and understand, but also analyze, apply, evaluate and create.

Assessment

The way we assess student progress has also contributed to the under-emphasis on higher levels of thinking. Benjamin Bloom claims that 95 percent of standardized test questions in the U.S. are devoted to recall and memorization, and neglects the higher-level thinking processes. He decries that there is overemphasis on the lower-level thinking skills of recall and rote memory. He explains that this is so because it is easier to develop assessments to test a child’s recall and memory. Consequently, classroom transactions ​are oriented towards preparing students for this kind of test.

Most of the test items in school test for memory and recall. In Vikalp, the scenario is different. Teachers are trained to incorporate critical thinking skills even in multiple choice questions. Vikalp Facilitators are trained to develop short and long essay type questions on testing the level of critical thinking in each child. Consequently, questions are framed to test not only the lower-order- thinking processes of memory or understanding. But also, higher-order-thinking processes like students’ ability to analyze, evaluate, apply and create.

This change in assessment leads to change in classroom transactions. Emphasis shifts from acquisition of facts to students’ ability to analyze, evaluate, apply and create. Lectures are replaced by doing activities, discussions and projects. Vikalp teachers are trained and they know what questions to ask, in what direction to lead the discussion, what tasks to assign in order to foster critical thinking. This Socratic method of questioning focuses on discovering answers by asking questions to students and discussing it in detail. Examples of Socratic questions used in Vikalp classes are as below: –

1. Getting students to clarify their thinking and explore the origin of their thinking e.g., ‘Why do you say that?’, ‘Could you explain further?’
2. Challenging students about assumptions. e.g., ‘Is this always the case?’, ‘Why do you think that this assumption holds here?’
3. Providing evidence as a basis for arguments. e.g., ‘Why do you say that?’, ‘Is there reason to doubt this evidence?’
4. Discovering alternative viewpoints and perspectives and conflicts between content e.g., ‘What is the counter-argument?’, ‘Can/did anyone see this another way?’
5. Exploring implications and consequences e.g., ‘But if…happened, what else would result?’, ‘How does…affect…?’
6. Questioning the question e.g., ‘Why do you think that I asked that question?’, ‘Why was that question important?’, ‘Which of your questions turned out to be the most useful?’