Making formulae concrete

Sarita Suryadevra

As a teacher I am always looking for new and innovative ways of making a concept simpler for my students to understand. In the school I teach, teachers are encouraged to experiment without the fear of success or failure. I was struggling to teach marginal productivity to my students. The math formula was really difficult for them to understand. As I was trying to clarify their doubts, an idea struck me. I discussed it with the students. They were excited, and the next day we conducted the following activity.

Class: 9C [NIOS]
Subject: Economics
Title: Production
Objective: To make students understand the concept of marginal productivity
Method: Activity based learning

The students set up an imaginary toy boat manufacturing factory named ARGO II.
Three observers and four volunteers as labourers, one time keeper, and one floor manager were chosen.
The concept was explained through three sub activities.

Activity 1

1. Four labourers were given two minutes to make identical paper boats. The size of the paper used was 18 cms.
2. They made five boats, of which one was imperfect, hence rejected by the floor manager.
   Observation: Efficiency of labour varies.

Activity 2

1. One new labourer was added to the previous team of four, other conditions remaining unchanged.
2. The output was increased to eight. Observation: The efficiency of the previous labourers increased due to repetition of work plus the new labourer was very efficient.

Activity 3

1. Now the method was changed to ‘Process based division of labour’, i.e., two workers measured and cut the paper to the desired size, the 3^rd made the first fold, the 4^th made the second fold and the 5^th worker opened the folds and gave the paper boat finishing touches.
2. The output increased to 11 boats. Observation: After the process based division of labour was introduced, output increased a lot. Hence, in this particular factory it was an efficient method of production used.

The observations were written on the board in the following format.

The students understood the concept of marginal productivity and division of labour. Now the sums did not seem difficult. My students from last year’s batch came and asked me if I was going to conduct the activity for this year’s students as well.

The author teaches history, geography, economics and economic applications at Vidya Valley School, Pune. She can be reached at sarita.suryadevra@vidyavalley.com.