Developing ATL Skills through Chemistry

by Jalpa Shreyas Shah

The aim of education is not just transfer of knowledge from the source to receiver but to help individuals develop skills and attitudes which will help them to connect with the real world and solve challenges in real life. In other words, I would say, education leads to empowerment, and individuals and organizations should focus on development of these 21st century skills. As knowledge becomes obsolete, empowerment skills are for a lifetime and hence we call them 21st century skills.

  

It is time we realize that individuals learn in different ways and it is imperative we equip them with those skills which will help them “to learn how to learn” in IB programmes. This is achieved through ‘Approaches to teaching learning (ATL) skills’. However, most traditional schools of thought in India focus only on mathematical, logical and linguistic skills, and not on skill development which will help students to learn.

Knowledge is everywhere. Students should be taught to take what is relevant and, using them, solve the challenges of real life. Hence, development of ATL skills plays an important role for all stakeholders.

For teachers, the end result lies in students being able to learn better, handle their emotions, and manage themselves in every aspect of life. While teachers are voluntarily or involuntarily using these ATL skills as mentioned in the cluster below, however, the need of the hour is to make these skills more explicit and more directly addressed in the classroom.

These 5 Categories of ATL skills, at the MYP level, are then broken down into 10 Clusters:

Communication	⇒	1.   Communication - Interactive and Language
Social	⇒	2.   Collaboration
Self-Management	⇒	3.   Organization
		4.   Affective
		5.   Reflection
Research	⇒	6.   Information Literacy
		7.   Media Literacy
Thinking	⇒	8.   Critical Thinking
		9.   Creative Thinking
		10. Transfer

In an exercise, Grade IX chemistry students were given hands-on experience for development of Affective skills through a ‘Buddha walks into your life’ activity related to Bohr’s Model of the structure of the atom.

Buddha walks into your life – a meditation activity based on Bohr’s Model of the structure of the atom – for developing Self-Management skills.

• The students studied about Bohr’s Model of the structure of the atom in their chemistry class.
• The structure of Bohr’s Model of the atom can be compared to that of a ‘mandala’.
• One translation of the Sanskrit word mandala is ‘circle’. It is a diagram often used in Buddhism to depict the abode of a deity or a microcosm of the universe. Just as a mandala gives you a path towards your inner self, in Bohr’s Model of the structure of the atom, the orbits tell us about path of electrons.
• The idea is that whatever is at the centre of the mandala has the power to influence their lives. We can think of our lives and livelihood in those terms.
• Students were asked to engage in this activity where they were required to draw concentric circles as shown in diagram above on an A-4 sheet of paper, with their names and class written on it.
• They then meditated for ten minutes.
• Toward the end of that meditation session, they asked questions to themselves, such as “What qualities do I want to cultivate in myself?”
• These qualities might be kindness, sincerity, wisdom, or something equally personal to them.
• They looked at those qualities, allowing their minds to rest on them.
• They were then asked to write down at the centre of their mandala the core standout qualities they thought about.
• Finally, they were asked to reflect on how the core qualities (which were in their mandala) influenced their lives.

For example, if the student wrote down kindness, what would shift in that connection to his or her peers? What would shift in how the student spends his or her money? What would shift in how the student exercised?

Learning Outcome

• The students switched their focus from questions about what they ought to be doing with their career and life to an idea of what they want to be.

• This helped them to engage their career and life paths, because they could always cultivate the qualities that were important to them, whereas they may not always be able to make a living doing exactly what they wanted to do.

• The students felt a deep connection to their inner self and they had an idea about the core values which defined them and helped them to connect with the world outside their selves.

As a teacher, I felt more connected to my students when I read their mandala about the values and qualities which each one of them carried to their heart’s core. The students also wrote about the turmoils and problems they were facing. As a teacher, it was a great achievement as, in the middle of a heavy technical subject like chemistry, I could strike a chord with the students and give them an exposure to learning to develop Self-Management Skills – Affective Skills.

Student Reflections

Dhruwal Porwal:  Awesome. ATL skills – Communication skills was developed in chair race.

Pavitar Arneja:  It was very much relaxing, removing the stress of the problems caused us. ATL skills – Communication as we were releasing our problems, we were sharing our problems through text.

Sarthak:  It was relaxing session. ATL skills – Critical thinking, concentration, strategies to overcome distractions.

Kanishk Singh:  Very good, relieved me a bit. ATL skills – Communication by asking doubts, creative thinking by Buddha walks into our life.

Ananya Mimani:  I think that the activity was really enlightening as it helped me reflect on my entire life. ATL skills – Critical Thinking. Communication skills.

Apoorva Dhakad:  It was nice. ATL skills – Social Skills, Communication, Critical Thinking.

Cheshta Chhabra:  The activity was a refreshing experience and it had helped all of us to take a break from our study filled lives and calm down. ATL skills – Affective skills as we had practiced concentration.

Pearl:  Very good activity new type of activity. ATL skills – Communicating, thinking.

Raj Meena:  It was very good and refreshing activity. ATL skills – Critical thinking by thinking about the topic, and communication by communicating to teacher.

Arya Naga:  I was a really nice activity which connected my thoughts with those chakras of life and Buddha model. ATL skills – Affective skills that are practicing focus when doing the budhha walks in to your life activity.

Maitri Sharma:  It was a really nice activity and I had lots of fun during it. It also created calmness in our mind. ATL skills – Thinking skills, creative skills and concentration skills.

Kushagra Jain:  It was good. ATL skills – Critical and thinking skills.

Krish Talreja:  It a fun and a very good activity to revise the topic and we enjoyed it. ATL skills – Communication.

Eishita Dhanwani:  It was a great activity. It helped me take considerations of my strengths and weaknesses. ATL skills – I think I developed every skill in some or the other way.

Ved Patel:  It is very good for our life so that we can improve our mistakes in our life and set a goal in our life. ATL skills – Communication.

Jalpa Shreyas Shah