She loves Maths, loves more teaching it to children

Many times we hear children say Maths is so difficult or Maths is boring. For someone to do well in maths, many skills need to come together. Some kids may have a good understanding of concepts, but are inconsistent at computing, few may be unable to easily connect the concepts with reality, others may find it difficult because of language development issues. As a result, a child starts to dislike maths during schooling. Yogini Gandhi was one such child who did not have much interest and was not aware of her skills in Maths until she was in Grade 9 when she met a teacher who made it interesting and fun for her. She ended up loving Maths so much that she not only opted for Engineering but also decided to make a career in teaching Maths. Her passion for Maths made her start Creative Learning Lab, a child centric creative learning centre in Pune for students from 4 to 14 year old. With over 100 students already reaping the benefits of her teaching style, Yogini has also started delivering online courses on demand for Indian students studying abroad.

Post her Engineering in Computer Science from Walchand Institute of Technology, Solapur, Yogini worked as lecturer in Polytechnic colleges of Latur and Pune till 2004. She took a break from lectureship after giving birth to her first child. Later, she came to know about Abacus and liked it so much that she started teaching it and continued it for around 5 years till 2010. During this time, her students won many District, State as well as National level competitions and completed 8 levels of abacus with great zeal and interest. However, she had to discontinue her Abacus classes after giving birth to her second child as she was unable to devote enough time for her children. She then preferred a job and worked as a Marketing Manager in a private company till 2013. She soon realized that it was not something she loved to do and so she left the job and went back to pursue her passion – teaching Maths.

Learning is a process. When we are able to do something, we like it and we do it again and again and we like it more. Actually it should be a “Do-Understand-Like-Do” cycle.

Yogini Gandhi

While she was teaching Abacus, Yogini observed that Abacus is not meant for every child. When the mathematics content being taught is not adjusted to student’s ability and experiences, it can result in serious performance issues. Children like to learn new things always, something challenging and encouraging. So she decided to create modules that will be useful for every child irrespective of his grades in Maths. Modules that will evoke interest in learning Maths and help to improve mathematical skills. She also knew that without intervention strategies, students could remain lost for the duration of their education. Armed with her experience of Abacus, Yogini was curious to understand child and parental psychology towards learning. She attended Child counselling and parenting course at Baya Karve Women’s Study Center in Pune. It has helped her to fine tune her modules to match the expectations of the child and parents.

Yogini has been running Creative Learning lab for a little over 3 years now. She has taught over 100 students in the age group of 4 to 14 and many of her students have got IMO scores and are also preparing for Maths wisdom scholarship exam. She teaches Indian students living abroad as well and conducts on-demand online learning courses for them.

Contact Yogini Gandhi