Today’s Learnings...

Thought of writing today’s experience, today itself  thereby making this post afresh.  Luckily got my ME-TIME today  as my gal has got dance class today😊. Don’t have much time so without meandering, getting into the point straight. Today morning, conducted University practical exam for my II year -B.Tech Data Structures  subject students. We started the exam at 8 AM. Around 9 AM, my co-faculty told me that one of my students is not attempting any programs and he keeps opening and closing the window.  I am the main faculty and I teach them the theory part of Data structures too. I did not focus on that particular student at all, as I know that  he is a studious chap. I was shocked to see that he  did not even finish one program. He usually finish the given programs within half an hour and  this was unacceptable. I went and told him, “What’s wrong with you. You usually finish quickly. Still you have time till 9.40 AM”. He did not respond . I told him,”You are capable of doing these programs  so easily , so please go ahead”. Then I left the place, as I am aware that too much of  advice does not work with this generation. He finished the programs on time and he left.

Around 10 AM he called me and said that he wanted to discuss about his  project on Machine Learning. Machine learning is taught for III yr students but most of my Data Structure II yr students are also obsessed with this Machine learning and they often discuss their machine learning projects with me than about Data structures . This student was also one such kind and he came with his project idea on Stock Market Prediction and he  wanted some throughputs from me. More often such discussions would be a Bi-directional, teaching-learning process in which both the teacher and the student teach and learn mutually. I usually like listening to my student’s project ideas. Touch wood! I have got damn good set of students so far, who usually want to do projects. I actually kick start this process by giving them an option of skipping a theory  question for a project  in their cycle tests and they come to me for explaining their projects and they continue to do so even if it is not for marks 😊.

Even the student I am talking about had a nice idea and he wanted to code the machine learning algorithms on his own instead of importing the Python libraries. At the end of the discussion, this guy said he is going home tomorrow and  his flight is scheduled tomorrow.  Most of our students are from Northern part of India and I was so confused why he is leaving when University theory exams are approaching. He told me that his grandma passed away yesterday but due to University practical exams, he had to stay back  and her rituals are over it seems .He said this controlling his tears. I had to control  even stronger, being a sensitive person and being  a teacher, I am not supposed to  break down in front of my student. He then said he came to this project discussion just to  keep him mentally occupied to forget his pain. He again came at 3 PM to ask doubts on the same project on how to give weights to the features.  I was really moved by his positivity even in a difficult situation and yes it was really a bidirectional teaching-learning process.

While leaving he said thanks to me for giving him confidence in the University Examination in the morning, as he got  totally blank  due to his family situation and It seems,  he  focused after I spoke to him. Never knew that even a small act of us would create a  big difference without our complete knowledge. Blessed to be a teacher!

Thanks for reading.