“WHEN IT COMES TO THE DESIGN OF EFFECTIVE LEARNING EXPERIENCES, ONE PROVOCATIVE QUESTION IS WORTH A HUNDRED PROCLAMATIONS.”

On the 25th of June we the students of Mushtifund Aryaans Higher Secondary School (MAHSS) had the privilege to interact with not only one but two eminent personalities, Prof. Shrinivasan Suryanarayan and Mr.Girish Gopalakrishnan. Firstly, we the students would like to thank Our director Mr. Vyankatesh Prabhudesai for having organised this knowledge packed session and also the speakers for their valuable time. Sir VPD started the session by the introduction of the speakers.

Praising Prof. Shrinivasan Suryanarayan as one of the best professors he had ever met, Sir VPD presented to us his bio data. Professor Srinivasan Suryanarayan (Suri) has been involved with teaching and research, administration beginning with IIT Bombay, for nearly five decades. As an aerospace engineer, Prof. Suri was closely involved with R & D for many of the national aerospace programs and his contributions to the Light Combat Aircraft program and the missile programs of the DRDO have been widely acknowledged. He is a recipient of several Awards, for Excellence in Aerospace Education, for Aerospace R & D and for contributions to National programmes. He is a Fellow of several distinguished Professional Academies. Professor Suri was honoured by IIT Bombay with the Life-Time Achievement Award during its Golden Jubilee celebrations in March 2008. More recently, in 2018, he was honored as a Distinguished Alumnus by the Indian Institute of Science Bangalore at the Diamond Jubilee celebrations of the Aerospace Engineering Department. Since 2005, Prof Suri has been devoting his attention to educational methodology and policy and to the use of Technology as an Enabler in extending the reach of Education.

Sir VPD introduced us to the second speaker, Mr Girish Gopalakrishnan, an educationalist and technologist with over 20 years of experience in the industry. He was a graduate engineer from NIT Trichy and has a post graduate degree in Management information systems from the university of West of England in Bristol(UK). He started his career as a product engineer in 1996 with the automobile industry and moved on to work in information systems in 2000. His experience spans working in multiple verticals like commodity, trading, e-government,  edutech, agritech and insuretech. Throughout his working years, he has maintained a strong connection with academy. He was a visiting faculty at SDA Bocconi, School of Business (Italy), Bocconi University (Italy), Budapest University( Hungary), University of Ballarat and Central Queensland University in Australia. Mr Girish was the director of shared services with the department of

education in Victoria, Australia between 2009 and 2012. He has several international papers in the area including a TEDx talk on ‘informal learning’. He currently serves on the advisory board of several private and government bodies and is currently on a project with the Australian government to provide advisory services to the vocational and educational sectors in Victoria (Australia).

Then Prof. Suri started interacting with the students of class 11. The subject matter of his interaction was ‘Dimensions Of Modern Education’. His interaction with Mr. Girish enabled him to look at the dimensions at how Technology can be used to promote the goals of policy and that technology can help extend the reach of education to a lot of people and also get involved in technology as an enabler. He was happy to say that even during such a corona pandemic, technology ensures continuous learning. “What is education??” he asked. “Education does not happen without learning. Learning is a crucial element of education and teaching is a facilitation of learning. Teaching is not merely content design and the delivery of the content. Though the teacher teaches the learner has to participate in the process”. Further he went on to say how learning happens in the brain of a person where the brain has to handle the data, process it and convert it into meaningful information within a fraction of second and then provide inputs to the motor sensors to act accordingly. So learning and implementing is a massive process which happens in the brain. He compared natural intelligence with the artificial intelligence of the robots. Brain has natural intelligence which is an evolutionary memory which has evolved over the years. In computer science, Artificial Intelligence (AI) was coined in 1956 where people could write programs to help machines decide its actions. Here the intelligence has to be coded and embedded in the memory of the onboard computer in the robots. He also explained about how additional intelligence adds to the Natural intelligence when a child is born and gets exposed to the environment. He then shared the screen to Mr. Girish to continue.

Mr. Girish Gopalakrishnan, presently in Melbourne, Australia despite his busy schedule, spared some time for an virtual session with the students. He has been interacting with Prof. Suri for the past 3 decades and was very delighted to share the screen with him. He went on to tell about Formal and Informal learning.

  • Formal Learning: It comprises only 10% It is a structured and scheduled learning like attending lectures,exams, doing homework etc.
  • Informal learning: It is unstructured and impromptu learning which we learn by interacting and observing. It has 2 parts: a) social learning: learning through interaction. Comprises 20% learning. b) Experimental learning: learning by doing experiments and applying concepts .

Comprises 70% of learning.

Three points which make informal learning more interesting are:

  1. a) Growth of information through the internet.
  1. b) Ability to connect with people.
  1. Forced to use technology due to pandemic

Mr. Giri explained us about the six behavioural traits which help us to become a good informal learner.

  • Collaborate: Interact and work with broader groups to build more perspectives, get
  • Sharing knowledge: Always share knowledge despite the competitive
  • Talking to experts: Get more information from seniors, experts and alumnus.
  • Practicing live projects: Solve community and real social problems through what you have learnt .This will help build a lot of “experiential learning”.
  • Connecting to your concepts through structured learning
  • Adding context to your

Technology plays a key role in building these traits. They are accepted as industry traits. He said that every industry would like to collaborate or like people with these traits.”We should build these traits and implement them to be a successful person” he quoted.

Then Prof. Suri appreciated the efforts of Sir. VPD for successful attempt of imbibing informal learning by engaging and interacting with the experts and helping the students of his institution to grow. By sharing a short inspirational story from the early 17th century of the mysterious pink galaxy, he conveyed that if you are an astronomer, you should have the knowledge of the instrument you are using. It is the frame and the mind of the learner which is an instrument of learning. He further focused on the mind state which has to be calm and clean and not cluttered which inhibits learning. He pointed out the importance of meditation and breathing techniques to attain focus and remain calm.

An interesting question and answer session was coordinated by our Sir VPD. He discussed the problems raised by the media regarding the ongoing online learning ,the problems faced by the teachers and connectivity issues. Prof.Suri then added to Sir’s point by saying that the teachers have to learn to conduct online classes to facilitate proper learning. Further on, Mr. Giri explained that UNESCO had come up with a study that device attached learning should not be introduced till the age of 12. At Least for the primary section, the technology has to be avoided and more of group activities should be enhanced. Ability to learn better has been brought down by the use of devices and depending upon the course and the content online teaching should be taken up. He also discussed about ergonomic factors like awkward postures which will affect learning from home. More screen time may damage the eyesight, ears and also many other challenges and issues may be faced. Mr. Giri cleared the doubts raised by some of the students

regarding experienced learning and the impact of online and offline learning on outcome based education. He also stretched on the fact that though there is a lot of advancement in AI, the role of a teacher can never be replaced. Sir VPD and Prof. Suri also agreed to this point.

Sir VPD also spoke of the activities held at MAHSS , workshops by professionals , study trips to various sectors to make education more interesting and effective. Every time Prof. Suri visits Goa he makes sure that he has an interaction with the students of MAHSS.

We the students of Class 11 were highly motivated by the inspirational words of Prof. S Suryanarayan and Mr. Girish Gopalakrishnan which will always remain in our hearts making us more focussed by keeping a calm mind and being disciplined.

“e-LEARNING DOESN’T JUST HAPPEN , IT REQUIRES CAREFUL PLANNING AND

IMPLEMENTATION.”

Written by:

Eeshani N. Pai Kane Class 11.