ELT Thinking activity: The role of pupil and Teacher

Hello Readers, this blog is a part of my ELT paper and remedial class in which our teacher gave the task to write about the role of Pupil and Teacher.
                                                     

Teacher and student both are two sides of one coin. Teacher can not teach without learner and learner cannot learn without teacher. They both are nation's builder. So, both are very important in teaching learning process.


      What should be the role of Teacher:

The post of the teacher is the best post in the world because he is the maker of new nation, he is lives changer, who cultivate us from the animal to the human-being, he has power to build or to destroy.There are many features,  as a teacher one should cultivate. Here I take the examples of my teacher Dr. Dilip Barad head of the Department of English MK Bhavnagar University in below points.

1) Friend, Philosopher and Guide:

A teacher should have friendly nature with the students, he should be the philosopher as well as guide. My teacher has very friendly nature with all the students, everyone can share s/he ideas with the teacher. And also he is very good philosopher, thinker and intellect. He used to give thinking activity to all students to make students rational thinker. Teacher also should provide proper guidance to the students and my sir also very good guide for us because he inspire us to take part in any kind of events and also provide what students want from him.

2) Professional preparedness:

Teacher should be the master and has power in his subjects matter. If teacher is specialist in his subject and confidence then he can provides proper information to the students. because the teacher has to lay the foundation of a student's life and he has to increase the curiosity in the students. Teacher should remove the confusion from the mind of pupils and provide fact answer to the students. Hence, teacher must loyal to his profession.

3) Good in Subject presentation:

Teacher should be like a salesman who sell knowledge in a wonderful way.Teacher must use various teaching learning material like my teacher who teach with technology and my another teacher teach us with various game, with experiments, with demonstration, etc. So, students' interest will increase towards study. Chalk and talk sometime bore students so teacher should use various method and techniques in teaching style.

4) Teacher as facilitator and co-learner:

In the era of information and technology, students already have smartphone ans internet so they have every kind of information. Now they do not come with empty mind they have all kind of information about their subject so here teacher have to perform the role of facilitator and make the a beautiful classroom atmosphere in which students can learn themselves. So, teacher should used project method, debate, group work etc.

5) Teacher as Classroom manager:

As a teacher if you want to make interesting atmosphere of classroom you have to ponder following points:

• Always start positively
• Know where are starting from
• Know where are you going
• Know what resources you will need
•  have a backup material or activities in hand
• Involved all the students in activities
• What to teach, why to teach and how to teach

             What is the role of Student

The role of students also very crucial along with teacher's role. Without teacher the teacher learning process is impossible. Our Educational text also students center, teaching learning is happening for the sake of student, student is a central aspect of teaching learning. So, according to me the role of students is as following:

1) Curious:

Students should be curious to learn and gain knowledge, they should ask questions to remove confusion to understand the subject matter. Curiousness lead students towards brightness and always ready to learn new thing from teacher.

2) Active:

Student must active in every kind of activity whether outside of class or in the classroom. When teacher arrange any of activity students should be a part of such activity so it make you learner active and perfect.

3) Punctual:

Students must be punctual in school time or in given tasks by teacher. Punctuality make students honest and it is good sign for students. Punctual students always loved by teacher and also a very good habit.

4) Self-disciplined:

Disciplined students loved by everyone. Discipline means not that kind of in which teacher punished students to be disciplined but disciplined should be come from self realizing. Our every greatest Educational thinkers from western countries to Asian countries all emphasis in self discipline.

5) Leader:

Students also have to possess the skill of leadership because they will go to lead nation in future. So, leadership is good virtue to be cultivated. Leadership is very important for societal functioning so students must acquire this kind of habit at school level.

6) Extrovert:

Every student has different kind of personalities, some are introvert and some are extrovert. But as per my thinking, students should be a extrovert,because extrovert students fit themselves in every kind of situation and also loved by everyone. I'm not saying that introvert personality is bad, somewhat it is very good but introvert students do note make relationship with other, whereas extrovert students work in group and group work is very important for gregariousness.

                                                             

Interaction with Dr. Javed Khan

"Teaching and Learning" are  two sides of one coin. Teacher need an object to teach like Students and similarly Students need an object to gain knowledge like teacher. One can not exist without another. Teaching and learning happening in the classroom to make human-being. We can also say that teaching learning  interchanging process of knowledge.

So, we have three days interaction with ELT specialist Dr. Javed Hussain Khan in which we had many points related ELT paper like:

What is initiation? Why do we need initiation.

What is ELT

Function of ELT in Higher Education and at School level.

ELT and its concerns.

various purposes of ELT and so on.

  As we all know that in the Era of Information and Communication, one should learn the language which is much used in communication. So, English language is link language for people to connect and communicate with the world. Hence, English language teaching is much needed to be acquire. Now the following points are to give our answer to given task by sir.

1. Key concept on ELT discussed in the class:

As above mentioned that English language is widely using in the world, in every interdisciplinary like Commerce, science, Arts, Medical, Engineering etc. About the concept, sir talked about ELT and its various manifestation in which sir explained various purposes for teaching English as follow:

• TENI - Teaching English as native Language.
• EFL - English as Foreign language.
• ESP - English for specific purpose.
• ESL -  English as second language.
• EAP - English for academic purpose.
• Linguistic.
• Semiotics.
• Grammar.
• Phonotics
• Graphology
• Morphology
• Etymology

From these points sir gave us the concept about the function of the English language in various field. especially, English for specific purpose and English for academic purpose in which sir talked about the language that language is a social institution, it is a product of culture. So, through the language we can understand cultural dimension.

2) Core Knowledge discussed in class:

• English for academic purpose Liz hamp Lyon.
• Assessment and evaluation system.
• English for literary purpose.(Language of Drama, Novel and Poetry)

The core knowledge of interaction as above mentioned purposes, one is English for academic purpose and second is English for specific purpose, assessment and evaluation and English for literary purpose. These types are interrelated with each other. The arguments of Liz-Hamp Lyon about the English for academic purpose, in which he talked about the examination system which emphasize on only reading skill and writing skill and also he said that EAP is focus on teaching English language like Grammar, semiotic, semantic etc.

3) Comment on Teaching style/Communication/ language/presentation.

We can say that Javed sir is veteran teacher of ELT, so no doubt in teaching style. His fluency, perfect pronounciation and eye contact make live class. We can say that learning with fun. Before the session, he already told us that I am not going to take lectures but I'm here for interaction, and communication is the first needy aspect in teaching learning, therefore one have to master in communication skill because without communicative power, classroom's atmosphere would be boring. Furthermore, we came to know about sir's mastery in language when he shared his experience about the United kingdom where he learnt many things related language and also got good percentage in that language coarse and also we realize his language power during interaction. If we talk about the language of Javed sir then indeed, his level is much higher than the students. About presentation, I think there was little bit different in oral and ppt. PPT was full of content, so sir had evaded many slide but he done very good presentation with oral communication.

4) My Learning experience:

As per my opinion, those three days session was highly intellectual and very fruitful, because I have learnt many new thing about the English language teaching, and also learnt about language structures like Etymology, phonetics. There are many words that I used to speak in my daily life but never pronounce proper way like "Thought" sound start with "F", "There" sound with "Der". And yes, I learnt Morpholgy first time from sir. So, I can say that those three day were not enough to learn proper language but If we attend daily lecture then we can get mastery in English language.

5) How is it going to be helpful to you as students in exam and in life as teacher or any profession or human being.

 For student these lecture were very beneficial because sir covered up every aspects of ELT and we can write in exam  aabout the English Language teaching with the help of variopus examples given by sir, it will be very beneficial for students and also for teacher. Javed sir has told us that if teacher not acquire or has no mastery in English language teaching then what about the students who become a teacher in future of nation. Moreover, for profession also it help much because English for specific purpose used in various fields like Medical, science, commerce, etc. And for normal people also English language is important for communication with the world. So, For everyone ELT is very important to learn and acquire. 

Movie Review of "Lagaan"

Hello readers,

On the auspicious day of 15th August 2018 Film Screening Committee organized Movie Screening of the movie "Lagaan" at the Department of English MK Bhavnagar University. Generally, we watch movies for the sake of entertainment, but as a students of English literature we have to watch movie with the help of various literary theories, approaches and different perspectives.

• A'Lagaan': Once upon a time in India is an Indian epic sports drama film directed by Ashutosh Gowarikar. The film is set in the Victorian period of India's colonial British Raj. The story revolves around a small village whose inhabitants, burdened by taxes, find themselves in an extraordinary situation as an arrogant officer challenges them to game of Cricket as a wager to avoid the taxes. The narrative spins around this situation as the alien game and playing for a result that change their village's destiny.

• So, this is archetypal story similar to other movies. There are many archetypal symbols like temple, Rain, Myth, love story, etc. But here we can try to understand or will interpret through the various literary theories, approaches and different perspective like:

• Post Colonialism
• Nationalism
• Indianess
• Patriarchy
• Cricket as metaphor
• Subaltern
• Rural India
• Teamwork and Leadership

• Teamwork and Leadership:   teamwork and leadership is main aspects of this movie, we can say that this is major factor of this film. Leadership is not an easy task, leadership is both a research area and a practical skill encompasses the ability of an individual or organization to lead or guide other individuals and teams. Similarly, Bhuvan also tries to buildup team for the betterment of the village so he tries everything to make unity in the team for the battlement.

• Rural India:  
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•                        India ranks second worldwide in farm output, more than 80% of population live in the rural area, and rural farmers helps a lot to growth our GDP. The real India live in villages. So, The entire setting of the movie in the village, not a single scene of the urban area shown in the movie. So, here  the director tried to show the real India through the villages, how the condition of the people in the village, their farm, everyday life, tension about rain for food grain and  Britisher imposed the high  taxes(Lagaan) on farmers, they unable to pay because of a prolonged drought. Furthermore, we also see the family structure like joint family, gender role, culture and religious atmosphere all the things show the real Rural India.

Subaltern:  

                   

                 Subaltern means marginalization in caste, gender, race, etc by hegemony of power. Power position and elite class are discourse maker and other are inferior. This little beat concept about subaltern. So, in this movie we can see various aspects like gender, caste, culture through subaltern study. Through caste base, First there is one marginalized character his name is Kachra belong to lower class. Further, when Bhuvan elect Kachra in the village team then teammate deny to take him as team member because he is untouchable. Second subaltern in the gender role, gauri's character is marginalized. When Bhuvan looking for to make team then Gauri wants to play a game but her father ask her to do household work, and also all the women characters are passive in the movie. And third one is cultural marginalization. Here we can compare two women character one is Elizabeth is teaching the rules of cricket to win the bet for lagaan and otherside Gauri worship to God for victory. So, here we can say that movie portrayed Indian Culture and psychology inferior to British culture and psychology. fourth living manner and styel between both cultures also make superiority and inferiority.

Cricket as Metaphor:

This movie is very unique one than other patriotic movies. Generally, Patriotic movies use atom bomb, Machinegun, sword, spears to fight with national enemy, but here director use Cricket as metaphor because cricket is a Britisher's game and India also very powerful in this game in 21st century. So , here very good used of this game to make critical thinking and also to make it entertaining. According to me that may be director thought may be was that we can not defeat Britisher with atom or else things but we can do it with cricket because now we are master in cricket. So, It can be possible that the intention of the movie maker to use cricket as metaphor.

Patriarchy:  

As we all know that many Bollywood movie are based on patriarchal ideas. This movie also follow the tradition of our movies. If we talk about the patriarchal elements in the movie we first see the marginalization of women in the character of Gauri, Elizabeth, Arjan's wife and sister, Bhuvan's Mother all are passive and voiceless. When Gauri wanted to play cricket then her father told her to do household work and said this is not women's work. second is Elizabeth, when he tries to help Indian cricket team and her brother come to know about that matter he also scold her and to made her aware to do not go to village. Third are Arjan's wife and sister who not come out outside from the home when the villagers dances outside because of Arjan's restrictions. And at last Bhuvan's mother also a voiceless even she is veteran and has power to handle all thing and give good suggestions to Sarpanch but patriarchal ideology never accept.

Indianess: 

The entire movie is about Indianess. There are many aspects are portrait Indianess like:

Religious activities

Dance form

Food

Clothes

Game

Profession

Gender role

Caste system

Nationalism cum Regionalism:  

                         I don't think so that the movie is about nationalism or patriotism. It can be  the different thinking of director to represent nationalism through regionalism. But, according to me it is only about regionalism, Bhuvan's concerns only for his region or village not stand for entire country's sake. Movie is about the taxes(Laggan) imposed by Britisher on the farmers and farmers unable to pay so Villagers raise their voice fore the sake of their farm and economical condition not for the betterment or freedom from British Raj. I think you see the movie as a patriotic but what is the out come of the is? beyond the cricket game, there is a love triangle between the main characters Bhuvan, Elizabeth and Gauri that's it. 

Post-Colonialism: 

I cant apply Post colonial theory in this movie because movie's setting is in Pre-colonial India. So, there is points from the perspective of director we can say postcolonialism is that the game of cricket in today's Infia.  The game of cricket is belong to Britisher but today we India much powerful in cricket than Britisher. Hence, we can say that India follow the and use British game as our own and mindset as well.

Youth festival -2017 Shyamal

             Youth festival -2017 "Shyamal"

     First time I participated in Drama. It was great experience for me. I just seen the atmosphere around the University during festival, and it was very enthusiastic.

                 The day was end with so many memorable moments. It was really very nice event organised on large scale at our university. First we all friends went to Amphi theatre where skit was going to be performed. All colleges performed very well,the best performance which I like the most is the Skit 'Frage' which was performed by The Department of English, it was amazing skit. It was full of current themes which our nation was facing now a days, the theme was about harassment of girls and women in the present day. 

The Next day, In the drama " Visfot"(Ghar na Dive Ghar Salge Tyare) ,I played a Role of Police Inspector Timir. In a way it helped me into removing stage fear. The Story of Drama is about family relation that Chief Minister Of Maharashtra Patil Saheb killed by his own daughter in the Bomb attack then Patil's son Inspector Timir took charge of that case and got terrorist who his own sister, after the realization and know the fact behind his sister Story, he forgives her and make happy ending. I felt fantastic after the performed drama first time. This all credit goes to our Drama sir Ankur Zaveri. All the Artists performed very well in such a way.

Classroom Activity on the poem "Design"

                         Classroom Activity on the poem "Design" by Robert Frost

This blog is a part of my classroom activity in which first we have to draw a picture related nature then our task is to read the poem "Design" and draw a picture about what you understand or imagine from the poem.

This is my 1st Drawing related nature. This picture is very beautiful, there are mountains, flow of water, trees, sun, flowers etc. I can say that this picture is very pure and natural without any kind of bad thing because I imagine this picture as per my views and imagination regarding nature.

Second picture is about the poem "Design" in which we have to draw picture as per the poem's structure and poet's imagination about Nature. So, here Robert Frost imagine the nature much different than us because he was a farmer that is why he very well connected with the nature. If we see the Wordsworth and Frost then we can find that both have different views regarding the Nature, Wordsworth was from urban aria and he wrote about the nature only for his enjoyment. While Robert Frost was a farmer so the nature for him is not the things for enjoyment. Wordsworth seen nature as teacher and symbol of peace while Frost seen the violation in the Nature, everyday one insect or creature killed another that is why he said that 'Does God really watch over us? If we believe that Nature is  the God then why violation happening in the lap of God?

Oneness Of Literature

Online Discussion: Oneness of Literature

This Blog is a part of classroom activities in which students have to interpret two works one is T.S.Eliot's 'Wasteland' and another is the story ' The Joke' by Anton Chekhov.

All literature are connected with each other; all, those which are already written, those being written and those yet to be written. Thus, to understand a work of art, one must have an outstanding of this continuity.

literature is like a flowing river it has many way to flow but its root is one. Hence, as per many theorist like T.S.Eliot, Northrop Fry etc that the structures of literature are somewhat connected with each other like similar in symbols, signs, structure etc. Northrop Frye in his theory of Archetypal criticism based on the idea that whole of the literature has oneness of its existence. All literature shares common DNA or Skeleton. While, T.S.Eliot said in his "Tradition and Individual talent" that past is very important for new because any kind of literature bring the basic structure from the past work of art. Hence, he said that poet should know the pastness of the past.

We have many different ages' works of literature having same structure related to other works like John Donne poetry, Andrew Marvell, T.S.Eliot, etc. All works have similar theme of sexual perversion, so we can say that literature somewhat related with each other. Here we are not going to see above works but we will see the similarities between 'Joke' and 'Wasteland.'

There is one stanza in the poem "Wasteland" which is very similar to the story of Anton Chekhov "The Joke"

And when we were children, staying at the archduke's,

My cousin's, he took me out on a sled,

Marie, hold on tight. And down we went.

In the mountains, there you feel free

Interpretation:

The stanza of the poem is much connected with the story "The joke". Both have same theme in "wasteland" about childhood memory and hidden sexuality and "The joke" a visible lust both have same theme of sexual perversion and also the same symbols used the symbol of mountain and down of sled only the name is changed Marie instead Nadia. In the story Lover many time uttered the words 'I love you' but as per my views it is not pure love but sexual perversion because pure love not need any kind of words uttering frequently but lover was sexually perverse like John Donne's poems. So, we can say that every works have oneness and somewhat connected with each other.

Gujarati Translation of the story:

Translation always is different than original works. We can not get the real charm or feelings of the work in translated version. Hence, there are many words like the title of the story "The Joke" and "Nanakdi majak" there is no appropriate word of 'sled' and many more.