There is a well known saying that teaching is not everybody’s cup of tea. No doubt to become a perfect and effective teacher in life there is need of a dedicated professional spirit, inbuilt teaching traits, commitment, command over subjects and knowledge of right pedagogical approaches.
Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD) has recently launched a unique programme of mass training for millions of teachers across the country. NISHTA a holistic knowledge oriented programme to equip the teachers with latest challenges in teaching learning process and understanding of the learners problems. NISHTA (National initiative of School Heads and Teachers Holistic Advancement) is one of the unique programme of its kind because of its uniformity of contents and awareness throughout the country. It is a module base programme to aware the teachers about different challenges and barrier of teaching processes. As we know that every child is a unique identity with different types of traits and potentialities. A single method or one kind of teaching approach is not suitable for every child. In our Government schools mostly poor and needy children with special needs are getting education throughout the country. There are lot of linguistic, cultural and ethnic barrier exists among children in these schools. Different approaches and methods are needed to impart knowledge among such children. Only those teachers could get the success in their approach who have depth of understanding of such factors and weaknesses of children. For vital understanding of these hurdles among students, there was a need of such kind of holistic approach for teachers which is available in this NISHTA platform. NISHTA is a Sanskrit word which means devotion ,faith and commitment. No doubt in tackling with such kind of students in our schools there is need of a committed professional spirit from the teachers side. In many of NISHTA modules there is mention of different pedagogical approach and child-centric methods. There is detailed knowledge of different strategies and techniques or activities which are beneficial for teachers while dealing with different groups of learners. Detail description about the curriculum and its role in our schools are highlighted in a very lucid way. How we can achieve and bring off the different learning outcomes at elementary level, what are our approaches to achieve all these learning outcomes and what are the best strategies to achieve all these things in a congenial way. It is artistically explained in modules of NISHTA programme. Through various videos, activities, document formats and different quiz we can gain various skills and techniques of teaching. Special focus is given on inclusive curriculum, art integrated learning, health and well-being in schools. There is also mention of developing personal social qualities and creating of safe and healthy school environment. Moreover, a special attention for art integrated learning and different pedagogical approaches for different subjects have been explained in a very effective way. No doubt art integrated learning is the need of the hour. Our new education policy is also based on theme. With the help of art integrated learning in our schools we can create a joyful and creative environment in our schools. Basically there was an urgent need of such kind of programme (Nishta) at this crucial hour of pandemic. Due to COVID-19 pandemic all the academic activities and other live classrooms activities are not running as usual. In order to refresh and refine the talent of teachers this programme of NISHTA was urgently required. However, this is an offline training programme but mandatory for all the teachers. This is an integrated teacher training programme being run under the centrally sponsored scheme Samagra shiksha. This basic motive of this NISHTA programme is to equip the teachers with critical thinking and with different pedagogical approach in their teaching. All the standardised modules are developed in a manner to achieve the all set objectives of NISHTA. No doubt it is the world’s largest training programme of its kinds and it is expected that at least 4 millions teachers will get the benefit of this offline training programme. Moreover it is also expected that after completion of this course, school heads and teachers will get the knowledge and understanding of new initiative in education. In our UT, it has been launched with the same theme and expectation. A team of special national group resource-persons has been created which will impart knowledge to different state resources persons and further at district level. Basically such kind of teachers training programmes are very mandatory for all the teachers to meet the contemporary challenges in education. As we know that teaching is not a static process and one kind of teaching approach and method is not sufficient and appropriate at all the time. Mostly our routine methods of teaching are outdated in present scenario. Now there is frequent trend of online teaching and integrated learning. Now the routine learning methods and lecture methods are not beneficial for our elementary classes. Now our focus is on different play-way learning methods and activity-based teaching at elementary level. Because we have found that these approaches are more beneficial for our children. Through these techniques and teaching there is maximum involvement of senses. And it is scientifically proven fact that students can learn better and in a more efficient way when there is involvement of maximum senses. In NISHTA, standardised modules there is detail elaboration of such things. At the completion of every module a certificate will be given to every participant which is mandatory for all teachers. No doubt it is very informative and knowledge oriented programme for teachers. It is a complete package of standardised modules with different team activities, quizzes, in built continuous feed back mechanism, child-centred activities and various educational games. Definately it will help the millions of teaching faculity across the country and further accelerate the teaching learning process in actual classroom.
By Shyam Sudan
