Best Classroom Practices Making classes interesting and interactive

Sharing best practices in TUT How I make my classes interesting and interactive

 Introduction  Classroom as an environment  My teaching philosophy  Good character  Good preparation Road map

Introduction Vuyisile Memani (Department Of Computer Systems Engineering, Soshanguve South Campus)

Classroom as an environment  Classroom is an environment, not just any environment, but a delicate one and like clay in the potter’s hands. As a lecturer, I have the power to determine its form.  Delicate in the sense that dreams can be nourished and at the same time they can be destroyed in the classroom.

Classroom as an environment  I can choose to create a nourishing and conducive environment for teaching and learning whereby students are made to believe in themselves, or alternatively  I can choose to create a destructive and hostile environment where students are never appreciated and are ever made to believe that they are not good enough

My teaching philosophy  My teaching philosophy is: “You cannot impact upon what you cannot attract and attraction without knowledge is baseless”  Two important handles I extracted from the philosophy which serve as ingredient to interesting and interactive classes: Good character and good preparation

Good character “Good character attracts, bad character repels”  As a lecturer I am a repository of knowledge, students must feed-off me.  Consequently I need to attract students to myself and not repel them.

Good character  So any traits in me that have the potential of repelling students away from me, rendering me unproductive and ineffective in my call of duty, I need to uproot.  For I cannot expect to attract students to myself, work well with them or even impact positively upon their lives while I remain rude, mean, foul- mouthed and disrespectful towards them.

The do’s  Be friendly, fair and firm with students.  Treat students with respect. The respect that I give is the respect that I get in return.  Make students believe in themselves.  Inculcate a culture of taking responsibility.  Crystallize concepts

The don'ts NEVER:  Use foul language. I mind my language.  Plant a seed of inferiority in the lives of students.  Discriminate against students on the basis any basis, be it race, religion, culture, gender, sexual orientation or political affiliation. Never discriminate, they are all your students!

Good preparation  Prepare, Prepare & Prepare! “Failure to prepare for success is good preparation for failure”  I am a firm believer in thorough preparations. I prepare thoroughly for my classes, because I take each class as my last one.  For each class I set out clear and unambiguous objectives which I make known to my students.

Good preparation  After a class I want my students to remember the following: What was taught? Why it was taught? Where can it be applied? How can it be applied?

Good preparation  I am also a firm believer of self empowerment. I cannot continue to be a repository of knowledge without furthering my own knowledge!!!

Thank You THANK YOU NDIYABULELA KEA LEBOGA BAIE DANKIE...