CBSE School Principal is Now Pedagogical Leader

CBSE school principals are now Pedagogical Leader of the school and they will be responsible to prepare Annual Pedagogical Plan of the school. As per the CBSE circular Acad-15/2019, the school principals will act as Pedagogical Leaders of their school. They will not only prepare a pedagogical plan for the academic session but also monitor the same. They will have to submit a detailed report on Pedagogical Plan to the CBSE, New Delhi every year.

Annual Pedagogical Plans

CBSE has mentioned three circulars regarding focus on learning outcomes, integrated education and training of teachers. Here are these circulars:

1. Circular No Acad-05 dated 18.01.2019 with regard to the mandatory adoption of Learning Outcomes based teaching and learning in all the schools affiliated of the Board. In the said circular it has also been directed that the Principals of all schools are to assume pedagogical leadership of their respective schools and prepare annual pedagogical plans with the help of their teachers for all classes and all subjects being taught.
2. Circular no Acad-12/2019 dated 08.03.2019 issued by the Academic unit, where the Board has mandated that all schools affiliated to the Board to focus on art integrated education, aside from art education is a compulsory part of the curriculum in classes 1 to 10.
3. Circular No. 13 dated 09.03.2019 regarding in-service Training of Principals and Teachers with respect to Chapter 16 of the Affiliation Bye-Laws 2018, wherein it is stated that the Board has now decided to focus on classroom transactions to ensure delivery of quality education and all-around development of each student.

Principals as Pedagogical Leaders

The Board has decided that henceforth the Principals of all schools affiliated to the Board shall be the Pedagogical leaders of their schools. Pedagogical leadership encompasses many roles and functions in learning organizations. Pedagogical leaders are responsible to support teaching and learning in their schools. It includes instructional leadership to support classroom teachers in their key role of implementing curriculum, and transforming teaching and learning by establishing organizational norms of continuous quality improvement. Pedagogical leaders continuously evaluate the effectiveness of the learning program, to meet standards established to optimize learning environments.

Role of school Pedagogical Leader

CBSE has clearly mentioned the role of school pedagogical leader (school principal) regarding implementation of the plan.

All Principals of all affiliated schools of CBSE shall therefore now have a crucial role to play in the evolution of the teaching-learning ecosystem as the Head and pedagogical leader of their schools. In the role of school pedagogical leader, the Principal is expected to undertake the following:

• Lead, Guide and Support the teaching and learning processes in the school by focusing on classroom specific requirements for transacting the curriculum, so that both teachers and students perform at their optimal best.
• Direct the entire focus of all school activities towards the students’ learning and acquiring of necessary competencies. Every activity is taken up by the school, therefore, should be mapped for the academic competencies, and for life skills, values, etc., being acquired by the student.
• Prepare an annual pedagogical plan of the school by designing and developing an annual plan for the school by giving equal importance to scholastic and co-scholastic areas.
• Promote innovative pedagogy, with a special focus on integrating art, sport and ICT (Information and Communication Technology) with education, and use active and experiential learning methods in the classrooms.
• Ensure joyful learning at all levels through the use of such innovative pedagogy.
• Develop school-specific resources for teaching and learning, in the form of lesson plans, e-content, use of mathematics and science kits developed by NCERT, etc.
• Ensure proper in-house training of teachers in the school to enable them to unleash their own unique capabilities and creativity in their classrooms.
• To be up to date with all new ideas and tools, etc. being used in education at the global level and constantly innovate the pedagogy of the school.
• To make efforts to learn from the best practices of other schools, by arranging for discussions with Principals of such schools, or through observation visits of teachers to other schools.

Annual Pedagogical Plan

The Board has not laid down the structure or format of the annual pedagogical plan as the Board respects academic autonomy of every school and expects each school to prepare its own unique and innovative annual plan. This plan must be an implementable one with timelines that should include administrative inputs and detailed pedagogical aspects. This exercise has to be undertaken every year commencing from the academic session 2019-20 onwards. The board may ask for uploading a copy of the annual pedagogical plan at the time of registration for Board exams.

List of Suggestive Activities

A suggestive list of activities is given below only with the purpose of initiating schools to take up the exercise of annual pedagogical planning. The schools are free to finalize their own set of components for the annual pedagogical plan as per institutional requirements, available resources and future goals of the institution. It is reiterated that the list below is only indicative (and not mandatory) and can be considered for inclusion by the schools in their annual pedagogical plans:

• Basic information about the school
• Vision, mission and Focus of the School
• Details of stakeholders
• Consultations and discussions held for preparing the annual plan.
• Goals to be achieved- annual and long term
• The culture of the school
• Economic and Academic Resources available
• Number of Grades, Grade wise number of subjects, Subject wise number of instructional modules
• Time tables
• Pedagogical solutions (i.e. how curriculum shall be transacted in each grade for each subject/module and specific teaching-learning techniques)
• Assessment tools and rubrics for each class and each subject.
• Assessment of aptitude and learning needs of each child and ensuring availability of the need-based instructional facility
• Assessment training needs of Teachers and staff at all level
• In-service teacher training topics and schedule
• Coordination with parents/community/Board
• Pupil’s well-being (which includes health care in school, group and individual counseling, personal hygiene).
• Supporting activities (which includes co-curricular activities, activities after school, transportation, etc.)
• How to take care of diversity in class
• The requirement of remedial classes
• Annual themes/celebrations/events/collaboration with other schools
• Community outreach
• Special events to be organized in the year
• Number of meetings to be held for implementation of the plan
• Annexure such as details of timetable, remedial classes, peer learning, subjects and languages taught guidelines for child safety, etc.

Implementation of Pedagogical Plan

To implement Pedagogical plan Principals of all affiliated schools of the Board are required to do the following:

• Prepare their own structure for the annual pedagogical plan and implementation calendar as suggested above.
• Ensure grade wise, subject wise and unit wise detailing of the innovative pedagogy to be used through the preparation of structured lesson plans.
• Develop content related to art, sport and ICT with education, with the help of concerned teachers as well as Art, Sports and ICT teachers.
• Ensure dissemination of plan to all teachers and all concerned by June every year.
• Ensure proper implementation of this plan.
• Monitor the progress at least on a monthly basis.
• Reach out to the Board for any training needs.
• Maintain records of the preparation of the plan and the progress in the implementation.
• The schools are required to produce these records for extension and upgradation of affiliation of the school from this academic year itself.

Schools may share their annual pedagogical plans with the Board as soon as they are ready. Selected few plans will be circulated to all the affiliated schools as exemplar or best practice. The plans may be sent to the Director Academics CBSE on email ID: cbseacad.app@gmail.com.

Needless to mention that Principals as Pedagogical leaders influence what happens in the classroom by fostering an organizational climate where teachers and other staff members optimize learning opportunities for children and strive to improve their own practice. Pedagogy is the art and science of teaching with an emphasis on the dispositions and behaviors of teachers and their interactions with children. Pedagogical leadership can apply to all levels of classrooms from pre-primary to Senior Secondary. Principals as Pedagogical leaders may keep the collective focus of the teachers and families of students on holistic child development and ensure its achievement through active pedagogical plans by leading and guiding the schools throughout the academic year.

Test Generator for Schools and Teachers

Assessment is an integral part of the teaching-learning process. A continuous and comprehensive assessment is a must for better learning outcomes. myCBSEguide Test Generator helps schools and teachers create question papers online for chapter level tests to annual exams. Their question bank has more than 3 Lakh questions. It includes MCQs and subjective questions based on CBSE syllabus and marking scheme.

Wishing you all a joyful, productive and successful Academic Year 2019-2020.