Dr Md Mahmudul Hassan :
In the classroom, students can learn through activities that stimulate their senses.
They learn by using the four main senses of the five senses, such as; Hearing, smelling, seeing and feeling.
And that’s basically the application of activity-based learning.
If teachers teach through lecture based methodology, students may use only auditory power and to some extent sight sense at the best.
But, equal use of the four main senses is very important to ensure effective and realistic learning. Activity-based learning strategy makes school more exciting for students and in this process, they are more likely to remember for a long time what they learn.
Activity Based Learning (ABL) is the process of learning, where students learn by performing activities in the classroom.
As opposed to simply asking students to listen and take notes, activity-based learning motivates students to participate in their own learning experiences.
Activity-based learning includes practical activities, project preparation, problem solving, learning outside the classroom and interacting with nature.
It encourages students to learn independently, self-assess and test competence through these teaching strategies.
By adopting this strategy, teachers can try to equip their students with critical analysis, problem solving and creativity skills.
The research says that every individual has the highest potential for learning in childhood as 90 per cent of the human brain is developed by the age of five.
Childhood is an important stage, since the first 8 years of their life lay the foundation for health, education and overall life success in the future.
It emphasizes the need to choose the right strategies to teach children so that their potential can be utilized to the best of their ability.
It is a well-known fact that children are playful by nature and they naturally love to learn.
Thus activity-based learning is inevitably one of the best ways for a child to acquire and retain knowledge.
Activity-based learning develops creative thinking skills.
Using problem-solving games and activities is a great way to get children thinking outside the box. This learning process is very important to develop students’ creative and reasoning skills.
Following are some of the significant advantages of this teaching technique:
1. Activity-based learning is an active and self-effort based learning.
Here the focus is on student learning rather than the teacher.
It engages students in learning and gives them opportunities to work for themselves.
2. This education encourages learners to be creative in the way they express their knowledge and thinking.
Activity-based learning methods provide opportunities for students to express what they have learned and enhance oral presentation skills.
3. Activity-based learning improves teamwork skills and helps students engage in practical work.
Dividing students into small groups for different projects encourages them to be confident by working spontaneously and teaches everyone in the class to value their contribution.
4. Activity-based learning engages children with different learning styles and benefits them learning with confidence.
When students are given a task or project, they engage both physically and mentally to complete it. Resultantly the students get better learning opportunities.
5. A key feature of activity-based learning is to help the children apply their knowledge to real-life situations and thus it establishes the relevance and usefulness of learning resources and materials.
6. This learning strategy leads students to acquire better knowledge.
As students learn through their own exploration and experimentation, learning becomes an output of experience.
In conventional education teachers are speakers and students are passive listeners or receivers.
There is no substitute for activity-based learning to retain the true quality of education and ensure learning outcomes.
This teaching strategy can be adopted in different ways.
Activities can be designed based on the structure of the class and the topic to be taught.
The most common method of activity-based teaching is teaching through group work or group discussion where students are divided into groups and assigned tasks.
Each group tries to solve the problem or complete the activity by interacting among themselves.
Also, puzzles, games, role plays, skits, storytelling, demonstrations, using real objects, taking students on an educational tour, playing a topic-related video, showing a documentary in the classroom, creating team leaders, teaching leadership skills and enhancing career skills by conducting group studies etc. are excellent examples of activity-based learning.
In essence, the more students can be engaged in activities, the more curiosity is awakened in the students.
Students forget the theoretical lectures of the teacher.
The creative thinking and critical thinking skills that are imparted to them by providing with reality-based education, students can discover the consequences in their career world.
Activity-based learning is so important that it has been made mandatory by the Right to Education Act in our neighboring country India.
I think the Activity-Based Learning (ABL) strategy should be made mandatory in our country also under the right to Education Act.
(The writer is Principal, Daffodil International School, Dhaka).
