Classroom Teaching Aids: Make Learning Fun and Effective

Imagine your kid being in a school with no blackboard or whiteboard, no pictures and no props or models. Sounds boring? That’s where teaching aids come in! Teaching aids like audio and visual aids make learning fun and interactive. However, the importance of teaching aids is not restricted to making learning more engaging. Teaching aids are tools that teachers use to demonstrate and explain concepts better. They make the process of learning more effective. 

This blog explores the meaning of teaching aids and their objectives. If you are a parent, exploring teaching aids can be vital to understanding if your kid is getting the sort of learning he or she needs. Read on to find out the different types and objectives of classroom teaching aids.

Types of Classroom Teaching Aids

Teachers use different types of classroom teaching aids. These include audio, visual, and tactile teaching aids. With today’s technology, teachers also have many interactive aids at their disposal. The five main types of teaching aids are as follows:

• Visual Aids

Visual aids are aids that can be seen and read. These include posters, diagrams, and colourful drawings. Who doesn’t love colourful and intuitive posters? What is more interesting? Seeing a large coloured poster of the water cycle, or reading about it? This is the importance of teaching aids!

• Audio Aids

Think of those rhymes your children learnt in kindergarten by reciting them to a tune. Music helps us remember things better. Audio aids leverage this feature of music by creating a joyful atmosphere for learning. Through audio recordings and music, audio aids help kids understand and memorise concepts more quickly and efficiently. Audio aids are some of the easiest ways of exploring teaching aids. They are easy to acquire and easy to use.

• Tactile Aids

Tactile aids are models or objects that we can hold and study. Imagine being able to construct molecules instead of having to visualise them through pictures! That is what tactile aids enable us to do. Research has shown that true learning happens when all five senses are engaged. Thus, by involving touch, tactile aids help us learn in a deeper, more eternal fashion. 

• Digital Aids

Interactive aids are smart gadgets. With digital learning becoming such a major part of the learning process, interactive aids have grown in importance and scale. These now include educational apps, games, and quizzes. It is now possible to chart your own learning path through interactive and personalised learning apps.

• Real-life Aids

Despite the rise of digital teaching aids, real-life aids have not lost their importance. These include real-life objects or tools that can help us learn. For example, every school takes kids out on field trips and educational trips. Real-life places like zoos and gardens can often teach students more than any video or interactive quiz. Thus, real-life aids are important for your child’s development.

This blog has already discussed the importance of teaching aids. Let us now focus on the objectives of these teaching aids. 

Objectives of Teaching Aids

We have seen the meaning of teaching aids. Given below are the five main objectives of teaching aids.

• Making Learning Interesting

Teaching aids are a good way of engaging the mind and the body. Your kid is not just sitting in the classroom listening to the teacher. Instead, he or she is actively involved in the learning process. Classroom teaching aids, including maps, posters, videos, and audio clips, help make learning more fun and interesting for the students. 

• Simplifying Complex Ideas

When teaching aids are used by the teacher, the students engage in hands-on learning. They learn to look at concepts as puzzles to be solved. Through teaching aids, complex and abstract concepts can be easily visualised and understood. Still wondering if teaching aids are worth it? Rest assured, they are!

• Improving Memory

As mentioned before, audio aids help students remember concepts better. Similarly, other teaching aids like visual maps and charts help students categorise and memorise concepts better. 

• Encouraging Different Learning Styles

Research has shown that all of us learn differently. We all have different capacities for grasping and remembering concepts. We all have different IQs and mental capacities. Traditional teaching has always been at odds with this individualistic trait of human beings. However, with teaching aids, it has now become possible to bridge the gap between the different IQ levels in a classroom. 

Remember, some kids have better visual capacities. They can interpret pictorial data faster than others. Some other kids might have better audio capacities. They might remember something they’ve heard better than other kids. Thus, teachers use a combination of different teaching aids. This makes the classroom a more inclusive and encouraging place for all the students.

• Encouraging Creativity

When kids are involved in the learning process, they can show their creativity more effectively. Enabling kids to learn at their own pace and to give feedback on the learning process can teach educators and parents more about the learning process. Learn from your kids as you teach them. And you’ll see their creativity come to fruition. 

Thus, classroom teaching aids have gained immense importance through the years. Gone are the days when the ‘jug and mug’ principle was in use. The teacher is no longer the only jug that fills the mugs of the students. Similarly, the students are no longer mere receivers of information. Instead, they are active participants in the learning process. 

If you want your kids to experience a classroom in which teaching aids are used effectively, look no further. Billabong High International School is the best option. For more information, contact us today.