Abdul Malik Sofawala
Maths by experiment. Twelve awards in a year.
Maths by experiment, and 12 awards in a year.
- Teaches
- Mathematics
- Programme
- PgCTL
- Awards
- 12 in one year
Abdul was not happy with the results he was getting, and felt traditional methods would no longer work. He now teaches maths through experiments and inquiry, has received 12 awards in a year, and when another school selected him, his own school would not let him go.
Group study in class 12.
Abdul Malik Sofawala first taught his friends, in group study in class 12. They told him they understood him better than their teachers. “That was the first time it clicked in my mind, yes, I can be a teacher,” he says.
Traditional methods, he says, won’t work in the classroom. “You need to plan it out when you go to the class, because right now, kids are smarter than the teacher.” He wanted to upgrade himself and came across Suraasa. His one regret is not joining two years earlier, in 2023.
Experiments in a maths class.
Abdul now brings experiments, interaction and inquiry-based learning into maths. His students noticed. “They said, sir, maths was not a boring subject, but you were not taught in this way.”
During the course he received his first award, the Bharat National Award in Delhi, and received it again this year. In the last year he counts 12 awards, three of them in September, including the Rashtriya Ratna Samman at the Constitution Club of India and Educator of the Year 2026 at the National School Awards. Last February another school selected him, but his trustee would not let him go. “We are observing the way you teach the students,” he was told.
Right now, I don’t hesitate to try any kind of experiment or new kind of teaching in the classroom.
From 7:30 until 9.
The course was not easy to fit in. Morning school was followed by personal coaching, and he was busy from 7:30 in the morning until 9 o’clock, coming home low on energy. “I had one thing in my mind: I have to do this thing, that’s it,” he says. His advice to others is to treat it as more than paperwork. “Don’t join the course just for writing the assignments or getting the certificate.”
