Building Bridges in Education: Embracing Bilateral Learning

Dharani Bharat
3 min readMay 31, 2024

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There are a very few professions in the world which can create a significant impact on lives on a day to day basis. Teaching is one of the few jobs, but ever since the commencement of the new second decade of new millennia, the job has been getting tougher every year. Think of all the root causes, Addressing the pupil’s behavioral strangeness is one of the most discussed issues among all.

Let’s decode the this bilaterally, primarily, the behavioral strangeness begins when the pupil’s withdraw from your class, as they believed they couldn’t align with the your expectations of learning. Every teacher has their core belief in the education system, ( “the why’s’ ‘), The problem commences when a teacher fails to look into the knowledge seekers expectations of learning, and you involuntarily ignore the seeker’s belief in setting up a collective expectation of learning. Since this moment onwards, you and your subject is an alien to the pupil and ever after. A teacher must adopt the balancing act of expectations of theirs to the reality of the knowledge seeker.

So, How does one adapt this balancing act? Where does it begin? As most of us from the last millenia, our primitive subconscious drives us to think that knowledge is transferred in unilateral means. So, we all shall start trusting that learning would happen in bilateral means in this new millennia. This is the first step in the paradigm shift. As a follow up activity build the connection with your pupil putting their interests and ideas at the center of your planning the lesson. I know, not all of us trust this idea. That is because we are resisting the change. The entropy of negative energy wouldn’t allow you to rule out the few bad students out of your equation.

Let me prove the power of this negative entropy, let’s recall the toughest topics and tough kids you had to deal with in the past 12 months. Easy right?. Now recall the best classes and the happy moments with the most interesting students. Difficult right to recall right? . Remember bad always weighs more than good. Human brains are wired to feel excited to be sad and moody. We shall devoid our brains from this negative entropy and also stay away from such people.

Now, look back at the idea of building collective expectations, trust is oxygen in the classroom. Let your students know you are always there for them to assist when they go wrong. Let your pupil feel you are no longer a person who hoovers only mistakes of theirs. You need to trust the process in building a bilateral learning environment. Propose your ideas, listen to theirs as well. In not more than 6 weeks, your class rolls into a process which you could never imagine. The entropy of a positive learning environment sprouts in your class. So, do you still believe the pupils have behavioral problems in your class?.

Happy transforming…

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