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1. Prof. KK Anand and SMART - Right Place for the Real Talents
SMART (Science & Mathematics Academy for Real Talents) has been producing outstanding results in Olympiads, IIT-JEE, BITSAT and AIEEE over the years and most recently during 2011 as well. For more details, kindly go through the annexure “Achievements at a glance by students of SMART” and also visit the website www.smartedu.co.in. The academy meticulously prepares its students for optimum performance to their potential in competitive exams through Prof KK Anand, the Founder Director of SMART, alongwith highly competent expert faculty team well trained by Prof. KK Anand.
It is common knowledge that Prof KK Anand is revered by his students as the God of Maths, Physics and Chemistry in the arena of IIT-JEE preparation at Chennai. He is regarded as a genius in the field of IIT-JEE training, having originality in conceptual analysis and excellent problem solving skills. With due respects to others involved in IIT-JEE training at Chennai, it is accepted that he has set superior standards relative to others in all the relevant aspects necessary for IIT-JEE training viz. Quality of Classroom Teaching, Quality/Quantity of Assignments, Quality/Quantity of Tests Quality of Study Materials & Books, and Quality of Guidance.
People who are well aware about the difficulty level of IIT-JEE syllabus are stunned to hear that he is extremely talented in handling all the three subjects viz. Maths, Physics and Chemistry for IIT-JEE with consummate skill, while also being considered to be the best in Chennai. There is hardly anyone in India, who is teaching all the three subjects for IIT-JEE. Even if be so, none can match the outstanding results he has been producing year after year almost singlehandedly. He is certainly a rare phenomenon.
Those who have observed him closely will know as to how he has been the trend setter in many aspects of IIT-JEE training, soon to be adopted by others at Chennai.
His unique interactive teaching style with teasing questions prompting one to land into contradiction and soon resolving it by discussion mixed with humour, is a sheer joy to experience. His commitment and dedication is quite unbelievable. He is a great motivator with magical touch, bringing out the best in his students. His down to earth and friendly attitude makes him easily accessible to the students both during and after the class hours.
The most remarkable characteristic is that, he always thinks in the best interest of the students, while he is straightforward, honest, a person of integrity and one without the mentality of commercial exploitation. He offers the highest quality at the lowest affordable price. He has inspired many students through his fabulous training, and will continue to do so!!
2. Prof KK Anand - Par Excellence in Teaching and Training
An established (ie. popular with many good/bright students) good training program will result in very good or even excellent results if it is integrated within the school hours. But, a similar good training program will result in only average or just enough good results, if it is an After the School Hours Classroom Program (ASHCP).
In the integrated setup, the number of input hours to the students can be substantially high in comparison to the ASHCP. Even if the number of input hours are somehow managed to be within reasonable limits in ASHCP, the main advantage in the integrated setup is the huge amount of time gain for a student relative to a student in ASHCP. With all the evenings and night left free for their studies, students in integrated program can utilize it very well to prepare their best.
But, their counterparts in ASHCP have to attend the school as well as the classroom program, roughly 3 to 4 days in a week in the evenings [say, around 12 hours per week]. With all the commutation time added up [around one hour per day], the number of hours available to a student in ASHCP for quality study becomes considerably lower than one in Integrated Program, when the routine for around two years is considered. With such around 12 hrs to 15 hrs of time gain per week, in the first academic year of June to March alone [Std. XI], a student in Integrated Program gains around 500 hrs to 625 hrs of additional time over a student in ASHCP. Similarly, one can calculate for the second academic year [Std. XII].
With such huge advantage of time, good students in Integrated Program work well to secure very good results. More so, the brighter ones shape up extremely well by working more on their own even if the training program is not of excellent quality, to produce excellent results.
So, with such great advantage, an institute running good Integrated Program in a city with strength of around 700 students, comprising of many good, very good and bright students, producing results like sometimes no one in top 100 All India Rank (AIR) and sometimes two in top 100 AIRs and may be around 10 in top 1000 AIRs is not at all a surprise.
But, in SMART, students in West Mambalam Batch where Prof KK Anand is teaching, have to attend almost all the days in both the Summers [Std. X to Std XI, as well as that of Std. XI to Std. XII], around mostly 4 days a week in the first year and around 5 or sometimes even 6 days a week in the second year – all after the school hours, with each day comprising around 3 to 3.5 hrs of class. Apart from this, they have to take up atleast one 3 hour test every week.
No other classroom program in Chennai offers that many class hours. Prof KK Anand deals each chapter quite comprehensively. More importantly, the quality of ingenious conceptual analysis and effective problem solving sessions dealing with many questions of higher order difficulty level makes his lectures stand apart.
Hence, even inspite of odds against the ASHCP students at West Mambalam Batch in terms of availability of time for studies in comparison to their counterparts in Integrated Program, they achieve results like 2 in top 100 AIRs and 10 within top 1000 AIRs in IIT-JEE, and around 40 students securing rank in IIT-JEE out of a meager strength of around 85 students etc year after year.
This is truly outstanding and stands testimony to the exceptional quality of the training program – It is not merely a good training program, it is indeed par excellence. Otherwise, students in ASHCP can’t achieve such results. A merely good ASHCP by itself can never yield such results as it is also evident from any other ASHCP offered by two institutes in the city. It is unthinkable for many in this field to produce such outstanding results consistently through ASHCP with a meager strength.
3. Integrated Program
In a major way, this facilitates the fulfillment of aspirations of students, who are interested and capable of achieving success in competitive exams, especially IIT-JEE & Olympiads. It avoids the redundancy in their learning since whatever required for CBSE level and beyond for competitive exams, are taught within the school hours itself in one go. Hence, there will be huge gain of time by the students, resulting in the following benefits of the integrated program :
- Strikes the golden mean by providing the best of school education [Proficiency in Language and Communication Skills, Expertise in Lab, Sound Knowledge in Computer Science and enhancement of many other virtues for holistic development] and competitive exam preparation under normal school hours.
- Provides competitive edge to compete with thousands of students across India in various competitive exams like IIT-JEE, BITSAT, AIEEEE and even the Olympiads, which have the greatest impact on their career.
- Increases the efficiency of preparation towards Board Exams & Competitive Exams in a huge way, as a student will be able to balance them very well.
- Relieves the students from enormous excessive stress & fatigue they’ll undergo otherwise by attending school and IIT-JEE classes separately.
- School life will be a pleasure instead of being a pressure.
Recently few schools have shown keen interest to have integrated program tie up with SMART, so that training for IIT-JEE is taken care within the school hours itself. It is indeed the best combination since high quality training by Prof. KK Anand and sufficient time for students back home to study as well, will become possible. If even through ASHCP, excellent results are produced by SMART, it is for sure that in the years to come, with Integrated Program picking up, and many good students joining, the results will be even better than the previous ones. From the academic year 2011, IIT-JEE Integrated Program for Std. XI students commenced at a school in Anna Nagar and Thirumazhisai (Residential Campus).
4. Need of the hour
There are two aspects of a successful training program. First, it is about teaching the concepts thoroughly, accompanied by rigorous problem solving sessions. The second aspect is about guidance to the students in the personal level possible addressing the issues inclusive of clarification of doubts which they encounter while solving various questions from the study material and the reference books prescribed, and the follow up regarding their progress in various tasks assigned periodically, apart from constant motivation and counseling through regular interaction regarding their performance in tests etc.
If one has to do proper justice to the volume and depth of IIT-JEE syllabus, lots of teaching hours are required as it is currently happening in regular ASHCP like in West Mambalam. The second aspect is addressed in the best possible manner within the time constraints. An Integrated Program can have more flexibility in terms of additional time to address this aspect – but still it falls short currently. The overall efficiency of the training program will enhance if the second aspect is given much more importance than what it currently deserves.
Actually most of the time is spent on teaching as it is inevitable being the first priority. Neverthless, it can be made much better, if we can find a suitable solution without compromising the primary aspect of learning. Such attention on the second aspect will be very important for the success of a student. Moreover, if we can offer more flexibility in learning and increase the efficiency of one’s time management, and can create more quality time for students, it will be the best way forward.
5. SMART e-Pad based Learning Solution
Prof. KK Anand has been constantly thinking about improving the efficiency of preparation towards IIT-JEE by his students. In this regard, he envisaged an innovative technological solution to address various issues in one stroke. It is certain that, this initiative will be seen as a revolution in imparting high quality education towards IIT-JEE. It will become a dream come true experience for students and will be a boon for not only bright students, but also for even average students.
So far, it has been a select few in West Mambalam batch, who are fortunate enough to listen and learn from Prof. KK Anand. Now, irrespective of center, any student of SMART enrolled for Two year IIT-JEE training program [Senior Smart Course] will have access to all of his lectures through SMART e-pad.
The recorded version of the live most sought after lectures of Prof. KK Anand will be uploaded in an i-pad like tablet PC with 7 inch screen [SMART e-pad]. Lectures will be classified into Chapters and Sub topics with the duration of Subtopic being anywhere from 10 minutes to even 45 minutes. All these precious lectures [Both the Theory and exhaustive Problem Solving sessions] which he has been delivering at West Mambalam will be henceforth accessible to any student of SMART from Std. XI. There will not be location specific barrier and any centre of SMART is now equally good enough in its delivery of quality training.
There will be a weekly timetable of what the students have to necessarily learn through the video lectures in SMART e-pad apart from weekly test schedule and completion of appropriate study materials or books for practice, and assignments to be submitted. Around 12 to 15 hrs of learning through video lectures on a weekly basis will be expected out of a student. Students, who are capable of learning more, can move forward and learn much more than what is assigned for that week.
6. Classroom Program Redefined
In this new version of classroom programs, there will be only a maximum of two classes per week. The class hours will involve quick revision of topics assigned for that week in a subject [which they must have learnt through video lectures], followed by detailed discussion on a specially designed quality Assignment in these topics. The faculty will now have the liberty to encourage more interaction and can gauge the level of understanding and application skills of various students, since there is no pressure of time to complete the syllabus.
A good amount of time will be spent for clarification of doubts related to the assigned topics and also the topics related to the upcoming test. There will also be spot tests of around 20 minutes duration to check their learning level. There will also be flexibility to segregate a batch of students into few groups and address each group separately for their clarification of doubts etc in a separate time slot of say 1 hour per group.
This solution offers so much flexibility which can be appropriately utilized by any student. For instance, students in ASCHP can suitably plan their learning hours. They can learn through the SMART e-pad video lectures every morning 5 am to 7 am for six days a week, which takes care of 12 hours of learning. They can well utilize the evenings and nights for their studies. If it is possible to take off couple of days in a week from the school, additional gain of 12 to 14 hrs will compensate for the time gain of students in Integrated Program as well.
Students can even start the learning process for IIT-JEE from January of their Std. X itself.
7. Integrated Program Redefined
Specific time will be allotted within the school hours itself to learn through the video lectures using SMART e-pad. There will be more number of faculty hours in the Integrated Program than the classroom program to discuss more assignments and for doubt clarification sessions. It will be flexible enough to have more personal attention than even in ASHCP. More number of tests will be conducted in both AIEEE and IIT-JEE level. Also, students will have all the time back home from evening for their studies.
8. Will it deprive one of the charm of regular Classroom based Learning?
A question that naturally arises will be, whether the charm of actual classroom based learning will be missing in a big way. Will the physical absence of Prof KK Anand make a big difference while learning through SMART e-pad?
This learning solution may not be a complete substitute to the physical presence based conventional classroom teaching. Hence, such conventional classroom sessions are certainly still a part of the overall learning solution. But, the advantage of this SMART e-pad device based learning is so overwhelmingly large, that it has to play its crucial role in the learning process.
The effectiveness of this solution depends on the quality of the video lectures in terms of its delivery by the lecturer, while technology will take care of providing the best possible video and audio. In our case, the lecturer is none other than Prof KK Anand, who is well known for his inimitable style of teaching with great precision and clarity in his explanations. He has been connecting extremely well with around even 150 students in one class while delivering his impeccable lectures.
Moreover, the videos are that of live class in which students do come up with questions wherever they feel so and Prof. KK Anand answers them back – which is also part of the video. So, as far as academic aspect is concerned, there will not be any difference. Anyway, the normal classroom sessions with the physical presence of either Prof KK Anand or his well trained expert faculty will take care of the rest.
9. Advantages of SMART e-Pad based learning
It may be a new methodology, but it is going to be a path breaking one. This mode of learning offers the much needed one-to-one connection factor between Prof KK Anand and the student. This mode will ensure that the lecture makes lot of sense and infact, students will get even addicted!!
- Boon to Bright Students:
This SMART e-pad based learning solution is a boon and a dream come true scenario for those students, who are capable of learning a lot with better grasping power. They can plan well ahead and prepare more efficiently for even Olympiads apart from IIT-JEE. With good time management, they will gain more time to work very well into the depths of all the topics. They can accelerate their learning process and be ready well ahead of time. They will have sufficient time for taking lots of revision tests etc apart from the regular tests, so that they end up securing much better rank than otherwise.
- Boon to Average students:
This learning solution will also be a boon to the average students since they can learn well at their pace even by repeated viewing. They can also skip advanced problem solving sessions in the e-pad if they feel them to be out of reach and can get good guidance from the faculty through doubt clarification sessions etc.
- Boon to students outside Chennai :
This will have tremendous impact in the learning process of interested students even outside Chennai. Many students especially in Tamil Nadu, because of sheer lack of opportunity, are not able to enhance their knowledge and skill-set, and compete with others in various competitive exams. This learning solution will certainly be a boon for many such deserving students.
- Ease of Adaptation to Changes in Selection Procedure :
In the event of a revised selection procedure for IITs or even NITs, as it is contemplated by the Government of India, with the inclusion of performance in some sort of Scholastic Aptitude Test, this learning solution will offer the much needed flexibility in time management to efficiently prepare for all the components of the selection process.
- Instantaneous Test Results & Test Analysis:
In many centres, students can use the SMART e-pad device to answer the test (ie. One can mark the choices in an electronically simulated OMR answer sheet in the e-pad). Instantaneous results with Test Solutions and analysis on the performance can be obtained after submitting the answer sheet. The SMART e-pad will also have the progress report maintained in terms of the grades / marks obtained for the assignments submitted and the tests taken. This progress report can be viewed by parents anytime.
This wonder device will also enable students to overcome various difficulties faced by them in the existing classroom program setup.
- Lack of Attention Span :
The attention span of many students is around 45 minutes to 1 hr. So, if the class extends to 3 hrs and beyond, concentration level will dip and hence they don’t learn well. Some indulge even in distracting others in the class or perhaps end up playing with mobile phones etc. This will now be avoided, since a student has the liberty to take few minutes off after completing subtopic(s) through SMART e-pad.
- Lack of Clarity upon First Hearing :
For certain concepts or problem solving strategies, students may feel lack of clarity upon first hearing, though it may have been presented and explained lucidly. But, while using SMART e-pad, they are at their liberty to rewind, and learn again, by listening to the explanations even more carefully. Hence, by multiple viewing if required, even whatever difficulty they have in grasping the lecture upon first hearing will be eased out.
- Lack of time for original thinking :
When the class is interactive and students are prompted to give solution to a conceptual question posed or to arrive at a strategy to solve a problem, the bright students of the class respond quickly, which derail the process of original thinking in many other students. Also, sometimes students are not able to think in parallel with the lecture. But, while using the SMART e-pad, one can get into the pause mode and can spend sufficient time to analyse originally upon the relevant issues before viewing the further explanations.
- Lack of Co-ordination to View/Listen, Grasp and take Notes :
Sometimes, students feel very difficult to listen, grasp and take notes simultaneously at the speed with which the lecture is delivered. They may even miss out noting down some key points in this process. But, by getting into the pause mode, one can solve this issue completely.
- Missing the lectures due to illness, domestic functions etc :
Students who are absent for a particular class due to genuine reasons like illness, functions at home etc, face difficulty in understanding the subsequent classes. This will be totally avoided by using the SMART e-pad.
- Difficulty in Balancing School-Work & Attending IIT-JEE Classes :
The pressure is very high when a student is especially in std. XII. They may need to attend at least 5 classes per week to cover the IIT-JEE portions in depth which is inevitable. As a result, they will be deprived of quality time at home. Schools may be dealing with certain chapters which are different in the order in which it is covered in IIT-JEE classes. Hence, student finds it difficult to cope up.
But, this problem can be overcome by viewing and learning only the theory sessions of a chapter taken by school, so that one is confident about the concepts and its applications. Detailed problem solving sessions and some subtopics with advanced concepts in that chapter can be viewed later, when it comes under the timetable for IIT-JEE classes.
- Spending lot of Time and Money in Commutation :
Many students commute from even far off places to West Mambalam since they don’t want to compromise in the quality of training they undergo. With Prof. KK Anand’s classes being the best and way ahead of others at Chennai in quality, it is natural that many doesn’t bother the inconvenience posed due to commutation – be it fatigue / stress, time , money etc. But, this learning solution solves this issue considerably.
- Lack of effective approach to Revision :
SMART e-pad will be quite handy during revision - mainly to seek clarification on relevant aspects of the chapter etc, esp. when one is in Std.XII revising the Std.XI syllabus.
Hence, we sincerely believe that our beloved Prof. KK Anand’s SMART e-pad based learning solution will be an e-revolution from 2012. We hope that many students become aware of the tremendous impact it can have in their IIT-JEE preparation and be immensely benifited.
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