Friday, December 28, 2018

Brave women in SIKHISM


1. The First Sikh Born in Chahal village (now Lahore, Pakistan),
Mata Nanaki loved and nurtured her younger brother Nanak.
In 1469, Nanak experienced a divine vision as a young man and became the first Guru or "teacher" of what is now the Sikh faith. Mata Nanaki was the first to follow him and should be celebrated as the first Sikh, which literally means "disciple" or "seeker of truth."
2. Mata Khivi was the wife of Guru Angad and was in charge of the langar (community kitchen). She was an unlimited source of bounty and helped create a new social consciousness for women.
3. Guru Amar Das trained missionaries to spread Sikhism throughout the country.
Of the 146 missionaries Guru Amar Das trained and sent out, 52 were women. At one time the country of Afghanistan and Kashmir were under the jurisdiction of women masands (priests). These women had complete jurisdiction in decision making, collection of revenues as well as preaching to congregations.
4. Mai Bhago was the brave women who shamed the 40 deserters to return to the battle of Muktsar. She led them into battle where they achieved martyrdom and were blessed by Guru Gobind Singh.
5. Mata Gujri was an illuminating force behind her husband Guru Tegh Bahadur and her son Guru Gobind Singh. After the martyrdom of Guru Tegh Bahadur, Mata Gujri guided and inspired her son Guru Gobind Singh. She was responsible for the training of the Sahibzadas (the four sons of Guru Gobind Singh) who gave up their lives for Sikhism at a young age. Mata Gujri was an inspiring force during one of the most difficult times in Sikh history. Because of her purity, Guru Gobind Singh declared that Sikhs should consider Mata Sahib Kaur as the spiritual mother of the Khalsa.
6. The widow of Guru Gobind Singh,
Mata Sundri helped provide leadership for the Sikhs in a very difficult and tumultuous time following the death of Guru Gobind Singh. She helped maintain the sanctity of the Guru Granth Sahib as the only successor of Guru Gobind Singh and dealt strictly with pretenders and aspires of Guruship.
After all they played a huge role in binding the Sikhs together
Mata Gujri displayed great Power more than much stronger men, by with standing the cold weather of the Burj where she rested in winter during her imprisonment.

Wednesday, December 19, 2018

Be thankful


Be thankful
In your road to success and fulfillment you will undoubtedly feel stress. You will feel burnout and fatigue. You will think about your goal and it will seem like a pipe dream, like it is a light-year away. If this is the case, you want to focus on what you do have, on the blessings in your life, and show a little gratitude. Do you want a $1,000,000? Well you have $1,000, and that is more than some. Do you want to take the road in a Maserati? You have a Mini, and it gets you from A to B.
The authors of the book ‘The Power of Thanks’ (Irvine and Mosley, 2015) believe that gratitude creates perspective and allows you to take stock of more than just the fleeting stressors of a busy schedule. According to the book, there are more than 10 scientifically proven benefits of gratitude, including that grateful people achieve more, with research showing higher levels of enthusiasm and academic achievement. As well as this, gratitude lowers stress and increases emotional wellbeing over time. Furthermore, grateful people are less likely to burnout and are able to stick to a task and so will be more likely to see it through. So, if you increase your gratitude, this will give you more to be grateful for in the long term!

Tips for healthy Teachers


Tips for all teachers to keep going and remain strong, healthy and happy teaching days
Invest in yourself
We often come across teachers who seek medical consultation for weakness, giddiness and tiredness. The stress of modern lifestyle spares nobody. Type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, obesity and depression are on the rise. Remember the flight attendant's instructions on an airplane? "Put on your oxygen masks first before helping others." To be able to be deliver the best to your students invest in yourself. Meditate and learn good breathing techniques.  Enjoy time with your family and friends. Get enough sleep and get up refreshed every morning. Get regular health checks. Seek medical help at the earliest sign of any illness or mental stress.
Care for your back
Your profession often demands standing and sitting for long hours. A good posture, with weight control and regular exercise will keep your spine strong and stable and prevent back pain, neck pain and spinal problems. Maintain correct posture while you sit or stand. Stand up straight and tall with your stomach tucked in and shoulders relaxed. Sit back in your chair with feet flat on the ground. Ensure your lower back is supported while sitting.
Care for your voice
Your voice is your most important asset. As teachers, you are more prone to voice related problems. Prepare for taking a class or a long lecture by doing vocal warm-ups. Drink plenty of water. This is not only the healthiest drink to keep you refreshed and energetic but also lubricates your vocal cords by producing enough mucus. Avoid clearing your throat often; since each time when you clear your throat, your vocal cords are slammed together. Instead, take a sip of water or swallow the collected secretions.
Use nonverbal cues like a whistle, bell or hand clapping to gain the attention of your students. Do not talk too loudly. If possible, use a mike, especially in a noisy environment
Avoid eye strain using 20-20-20 rule
As teachers, you will often end up doing intense near work involving reading, writing or working in front of a screen for long periods of time. Using digital screens reduces the number of times you blink your eyes. This puts a tremendous strain on your eyes. Follow the 20-20-20 rule. Every 20 minutes look away at a distance of at least 20 feet for at least 20 seconds.
Wash your hands often with soap and water
This simple action which is often overlooked can protect you from many illnesses. Also avoid touching your eyes, nose, and mouth with unwashed hands. It will prevent germs from entering your body. It reduces your risk of falling sick with coughs and colds, flu, H1N1 or stomach infections. Hand washing is called the 'do-it- yourself' vaccine.
Keep remain healthy and strong living days, since youre a Teacher.
Have healthy teaching days! 

Retention of employees


Engage employees to increase retention
Engaging your employees—that is, making sure that they are committed and productive in their work—can benefit you as much as it benefits employees.
If you hire the right employees, chances are good they’ll be engaged—committed to your business and happy in their work. But to ensure ongoing engagement, you as an employer must play a major role, particularly when it comes to communication. Consider these five strategies:
Be clear on what your business stands for. Your company’s mission and vision and brand must be front and center in everything you do.
Communicate well and often. Your employees need to know—on a continuous basis—how both they and your company are doing.
Understand generational differences. To get the best out of all your employees, know what motivates different generations.
Find out what your employees need. Ask your employees on a regular basis how they’re doing, and be ready to follow up on their input.
Empower all employees to do their best. Provide the leadership, resources, and training your employees need to realize their potential.
Understanding what engages employees can help during all phases of the employment cycle—from recruitment to training to performance assessment and beyond. It’s also much easier to retain employees who are engaged and committed to your institution’s success. Improving retention rates doesn't have to be difficult. By being a positive role model and directly connecting with your employees, you'll be more likely to understand what they need to continue to help your business thrive.

Tuesday, December 18, 2018

Success


Success
The key to the success is to know what you want and to know how to attain it. Success also does not come through hard to master skills or esoteric knowledge, but through getting the basics right and following through again and again.
Napoleon Hill’s (2004) Think and Grow Rich makes this clear. Hill spent a long time researching the most successful men to write about their methods in his book.  He writes that "wishing will not bring riches." Most of us know that is correct, of course. However, he goes on to state that "desiring riches with a state of mind that becomes an obsession, then planning definite ways and means to acquire riches, and backing those plans with persistence which does not recognize failure, will bring riches." Obviously you can substitute this for whatever your goal is, as long as you are clear and definite about what you want. Then, Hill writes that you should plan what you are going to give back for whatever you receive, as he believes there is no such thing as something for nothing.
Then, you should establish a timeframe, and determine at exactly what date you will reach your goal, as targets need to be smart and time oriented.Next should follow a plan of action, and you should immediately take action towards you goal. The next thing you should do is to write this down. Write a clear, concise description of the previous steps that you can use to remind yourself of the pledge you have made. After this, you must read what you have written aloud, twice a day, before bed and after you wake up. As you read, visualize yourself having met your goal.
This shows us that the most important thing about our quest for success are our emotions and our mindset. It is these things that cause us to be successful, or prevent us realizing what we can be. This is absolutely key. Success is not just about what you do. It is about what you think. This is why these key mindset shifts can be so powerful and effective

Hard work as an opportunity


Hard work as an opportunity
Success in whatever area of your life will take hard, focused work, and if you don’t know this you need to change your mindset to reflect this simple, unalterable fact. It is true that in contemporary society we are fans of immediate gratification, wanting the quick buck, the fifteen minutes of fame. However, genuine success and innovation requires hours of graft and elbow grease.
Take the story Colonel Sanders (Young, 2016). When most people would be looking back on a life well lived and thinking about drawing their pension, Colonel Sanders developed a recipe for fried chicken and he took it on the road to try and sell it. He was told no by a 1000 or more restaurants before he was told yes. Now you would have to search long and hard before you found someone who didn’t know what “finger lickin’ good” meant.
Another example of this hard work and drive is Starbucks’ CEO Howard Schultz. He must drink a lot of coffee to work as hard as he does! Rumour has it that he gets to work at 6am and stays until 7am. He doesn’t stop at weekends, Skyping employees in different time zones during closing time and from home and generally working around the clock. Likewise, Tim Cook must have found it hard to fill the shoes of Steve Jobs. However, he got the top job at Apple for a reason. Apparently, he has always been a hard worker. It is said that he starts sending emails at the unreal hour of 4:30am! Most at the company say he's the first in to arrive at the office and the last to leave. Likewise, he used to hold full meetings on Sunday night in order to be ready for Monday. These two examples illustrate that to be successful you need to work hard and commit to your goal, and if you are looking for immediate gratification or a quick fix, then you have to change your mindset.
So, to recap, success is a long road and the journey will sometimes be tough. Know though that these small mindset tweaks will provide strategies that can help you on this journey. Not only will they help you reach your destination, they will also enable you to plan the journey more effectively.  So, from one to fifteen:
1.Don’t see challenge as a chore, but as a sign that you are operating outside of your comfort zone, and learning.
2.Focus on the process, and then the end goals will take care of themselves.
3. Never underestimate the power of practice, as this is what makes success, not raw talent.
4.Plan, make prototypes. You may not get it right first time, and that is fine.
5.Be eager for discovery
6.Believe you can achieve
7.Don’t think that success = rich
8.Condition yourself for success
9.Value the important over the urgent
10.Do things today
11.Value others
12. Be thankful
13. Improve yourself and your life will improve
14. Don’t beat yourself up
15.See hard work as an opportunity.

Self - improvisation


One of the mindset shift is to focus on improving yourself.
Many believe that focusing on improving yourself, rather than external things such as your job or your bank balance, will lead you to greater success. Strategies for self-improvement can be incredibly simple: eating more nutritious food, going to the gym, and getting enough sleep are all extremely effective. However, a proven strategy to improve your life that is backed up by a huge number of experts and various studies is the practice of meditation and mindfulness.
 Meditation is an extremely effective self-improvement method, and it can enrich your whole life. It has been known to reduce anxiety and has been used for millennia by a myriad as different civilizations, as most spiritual and religious groups have meditation as a way to connect with and centre yourself.
 Meditation improves your cardio vascular fitness, encourages your body to more quickly recover from illness and injury, and has countless other health benefits.
World-renowned neuroscientist Richie Davidson (Wolkin, 2015) has shown through his research that practicing meditation can actually change the structure of your brain. Scientists have discovered increased grey matter in the prefrontal cortex of those who meditate. This part of the brain is in charge of executive function, i.e. planning, and it is easy to see how development in this area of your brain will help you be more successful.  Likewise, practicing mindfulness and meditation will allow you to focus more on the present, which will stop you putting things off until tomorrow. Some believe that if there is one thing that you are going to pursue to improve yourself, then meditation is the thing.
 As well as this vitally important strategy for self-improvement, Learning Mind (Guest, 2015) suggests some simple strategies for improving yourself than can lead to greater success in any area of your life. One of these is to start your morning in a way that is fresh and lively, by eating a nutritious breakfast and where possible exercising. This is something that Tony Robbins (Meier, 2015) also recommends when he suggests people commit to ‘an hour of power’ (of fifteen minutes to fulfillment or thirty minutes to thrive) in the morning. This will keep you juiced and productive for the rest of the day. The second recommendation by learning mind is to ensure you take some free time no matter how busy you are, or how tight your deadlines are. This will help you to recharge your batteries for your next workday...

Learning assessment


The Assessment for Learning is the process of seeking and interpreting evidence for use by learners and their teachers to decide where the learners are in their learning, where they need to go and how best to get there. Nine Principles of Good Practice for Assessing for Learning:
i) The assessment of student learning begins with educational values. Assessment is not an
end in itself but a vehicle for educational improvement. Its effective practice, then, begins with and enacts a vision of the kinds of learning we most value for students and strive to help them
achieve. Educational values should drive not only what we choose to assess but also how we do so.
ii) Assessment is most effective when it reflects an understanding of learning:
as multidimensional, integrated, and revealed in performance over time. Learning is a complex process. It entails not only what students know but what they can do with what they know; it
involves not only knowledge and abilities but values, attitudes, and habits of mind that affect both academic success and performance beyond the classroom. Assessment should reflect these
understandings by employing a diverse array of methods, including those that call for actual performance, using them over time so as to reveal change, growth, and increasing degrees of integration.
iii) Assessment works best when the programs it seeks to improve have clear, explicitly stated purposes. Assessment is a goal-oriented process. It entails comparing educational performance with educational purposes and expectations -- those derived from the institution's
mission, from faculty intentions in program and course design, and from knowledge of students' own goals.
iv) Assessment requires attention to outcomes but also an equally to the experiences that lead to those outcomes. Information about outcomes is of high importance; where students "end up" matters greatly. But to improve outcomes, we need to know about student experience along the way -- about the curricula, teaching, and kind of student effort that lead to particular outcomes. Assessment can help us understand which students learn best under what conditions; with such knowledge comes the capacity to improve the whole of their learning.
v) Assessment works best when it is ongoing not episodic. Assessment is a process whose power is cumulative. Though isolated, "one-shot" assessment can be better than none, improvement is best fostered when assessment entails a linked series of activities undertaken over time. This may mean tracking the process of individual students, or of cohorts of students; it may mean collecting the same examples of student performance or using the same instrument semester after semester. The point is to monitor progress toward intended goals in a spirit of continuous improvement.
vi) Assessment fosters wider improvement when representatives from across the educational community are involved. Student learning is a campus-wide responsibility, and assessment is a way of enacting that responsibility. Thus, while assessment efforts may start small, the aim over time is to involve people from across the educational community. Faculty play an especially important role, but assessment's questions can't be fully addressed without participation by student-affairs educators, librarians, administrators, and students. Assessment may also involve individuals from beyond the campus (alumni/ae, trustees, employers) whose experience can enrich the sense of appropriate aims and standards for learning.
vii) Assessment makes a difference when it begins with issues of use and illuminates questions that people really care about. Assessment recognizes the value of information in the process of improvement. But to be useful, information must be connected to issues or questions that people really care about. This implies assessment approaches that produce evidence that
relevant parties will find credible, suggestive, and applicable to decisions that need to be made. It means thinking in advance about how the information will be used, and by whom. The point of
assessment is not to gather data and return "results"; it is a process that starts with the questions of decision-makers, that involves them in the gathering and interpreting of data, and that informs
and helps guide continuous improvement.
viii) Assessment is most likely to lead to improvement when it is part of a larger set of conditions that promote change. Assessment alone changes little. Its greatest contribution comes on campuses where the quality of teaching and learning is visibly valued and worked at. On such campuses, the push to improve educational performance is a visible and primary goal of leadership; improving the quality of undergraduate education is central to the institution's
planning, budgeting, and personnel decisions.
ix) Assessment through educators meet responsibilities to students and to the public. There is a compelling public stake in education. As educators, we have a responsibility to the publicsnthat support or depend on us to provide information about the ways in which our students meet goals and expectations. But that responsibility goes beyond the reporting of such information; our deeper obligation -- to ourselves, our students, and society -- is to improve. Those to whom educators are accountable have a corresponding obligation to support such attempts at improvement. There are ten Categories of Assessment Techniques.
I) Assessing Prior Knowledge, Recall, and Understanding Techniques in this category assess content learning; that is, how well students are learning the content of the particular subject they are studying.
II) Assessing Skill in Analysis and Critical Thinking Techniques in this category assess procedural learning; that is, students' skills at analyzing
information or questions or problems to understand more fully or solve more effectively.
III) Assessing Skill in Synthesis and Critical Thinking
Techniques in this category stimulate students to create, and allow faculty to assess original intellectual products that result from a synthesis of the course content and the students' intelligence, judgment, knowledge, and skills.
.IV) Assessing Skill in Problem Solving
Techniques in this category allow faculty to assess and promote problemsolving skills of various kinds.
V) Assessing Skill in Application and Performance Techniques in this category assess conditional knowledge; that is, students' understanding of when and where to apply what has been learned. VI)Assessing Students' Awareness of Their Attitudes and Values
Techniques in this category are designed to help faculty better understand and more effectively promote the development of attitudes, opinions, values, and self-awareness. VII)Assessing Students' Self-Awareness as Learners Techniques in this category focus on students' awareness of goals, interests, or ways of learning.
VIII) Assessing Course-Related Learning and Study Skills, Strategies, and Behaviors Techniques in this category focus attention on the ways students carry out their work; that is, the
actual behaviors in which they engage as they try to learn.
IX)Assessing Learner Reactions to Teachers and Teaching
Techniques in this category provide context-specific and teacher-specific feedback that can be used to improve teaching.
X) Assessing Learner Reactions to Class Activities, Assignments, and Materials
Techniques in this category are designed to provide faculty information that will help improve course materials and assignments. Some assessment methods can also cover more than one level of learning at the same time, depending upon how well the objective or learning outcome has been written.