On Children’s Day, can we imagine a system that values empathy, not just exams?

 

Education should be about cooperative growth, managing feelings and differences – not passing exams.

Some time ago, a group of high-school students were asked to name their greatest fear. “…being scolded for what I did accidentally,” “ …being rejected by friends,” “ that I’ll fail ,” “losing my temper,” “…disappointing my parents.”

Had these things had been discussed in class?

Silence.

Children need to share their worries and doubts, talk about why they get angry or cannot control themselves. Though every adult knows that an emotionally stable child will be a more focused student, such is the tyranny of expectation that most teachers are too hard worked and weary to tell their managements that a child’s understanding of himself is as important as his grasp of academic subjects.

When universal education based on textbooks was introduced into an oral and traditional culture like ours, it had no room for an attendant mentoring the development of a student’s personality. No one thought children needed anything other than order and discipline. The more the student studied the more distanced he became from his natural environment, community and native culture. This tradition has continued with the entire training between the child’s 5th and 15th years concentrated on the material world around her about which she is relentlessly tested. The higher order of thinking skills — dare one say spiritual growth, a zone of intimacy impossible to describe but in need of discussion — has faded. Education has become a way of life to pass examinations.

Children need to share their worries and doubts, talk about why they get angry or cannot control themselves. Though every adult knows that an emotionally stable child will be a more focused student, such is the tyranny of expectation that most teachers are too hard worked and weary to tell their managements that a child’s understanding of himself is as important as his grasp of academic subjects.

When universal education based on textbooks was introduced into an oral and traditional culture like ours, it had no room for an attendant mentoring the development of a student’s personality. No one thought children needed anything other than order and discipline. The more the student studied the more distanced he became from his natural environment, community and native culture. This tradition has continued with the entire training between the child’s 5th and 15th years concentrated on the material world around her about which she is relentlessly tested. The higher order of thinking skills — dare one say spiritual growth, a zone of intimacy impossible to describe but in need of discussion — has faded. Education has become a way of life to pass examinations.

Over the last decade or so, as teenage suicides and child-against-child violence began to rise, a question has repeated itself:

On the road to academic excellence, did we miss something? We know that we cannot reverse this system but surely, we can modify it with the support of teachers and other stakeholders. In a civilised society (and we congratulate ourselves endlessly about our heritage) each generation is expected to make the society better and safer for the next one. Hence, the tremendous societal role schools have. Training in understanding the value of cooperative growth, empathy and managing feelings and differences has to start early. Countless hours have been spent discussing how personal and social transformation is possible through a well-designed course on social and personal ethics. Hardly anything is said about training the teachers, the agents of awakening.

Recently, I watched a video describing millennials and their socio-emotional disabilities. A chilling list of features: Entitlement, self-obsession, narcissism, low tolerance, inability to focus on anything for any length of time. This might well be true of some of them but not all of them. Many youngsters everywhere are responding warmly to outreach messages for help. Any request sent out on behalf of students in distress or appeals for food or donations to animal shelters is almost immediately met with a flood of calls and assurances. Some of the respondees are school goers.

What does that tell us? Someone inspired them. Something other than their textbooks brought out the best in them. A routine counter to the idea that values can be taught is that they can only be imbibed (“We learnt from our parents.”) But what if family members are too busy to spend time with children?

A policy to foster the idea and importance of the self in harmony with wider and wider circles can be implemented through schools to influence at least those children who get to attend school who will one day lead their communities and society; they will write and teach, build cities, patent new medicines and technologies; they will enact policies and laws.

This is especially important when millions of Indian children below the age of 10 have no hope of an education. Disadvantaged by illiteracy, they are vulnerable to all the negative forces around them. Doesn’t that leave the rest of us with a duty to overcome our limited knowledge based on traditions and prejudices? The intense competition that contemporary life fosters has already left many youngsters with no inner resources to counter anxiety, fear and rage. Some young children are so lonely and edgy they take their own lives when they fail entrance exams, do not get the kind of clothes they want or feel inadequate in English-language classes. It is clear that the skills necessary to manage feelings of anger and disappointment have become extremely urgent and are as important as academic achievement. No single plan of action will fit everyone. Each region, possibly individual schools in consultation with neighbouring institutions, will need to devise what works for them.

Educating for peace seeks to nurture a moral vision about the role of the self in the family, society, nation and the world. A six-year-old cannot understand the term social justice. A 14-year-old can and must. But the former can understand the idea of sharing and fairness, which in turn will develop into a grasp of what the latter understands in five seconds. An eight-year-old can only be told that he must not destroy leaves and plants for fun or stone a pup for fun. A 15- year-old understands that leaves, birds, insects, people and climate are all linked. If we are to survive on an impoverished planet that cannot manage its food-stocks or famines, its water resources or forests, we must, as quickly as possible, see ourselves as a global family and sensitise children to understand that what affects one group in one part of the world, will eventually affect everyone everywhere else. We have already learnt how to make children healthier but we have paid less attention to their hearts and minds.

Surely the goal of education is to equip people to lead meaningful lives and not only to make a living.

Written by Mini Krishnan

The writer was Editor, Translations, at Oxford University Press and Macmillan India and currently co-ordinates a project of translations for the Tamil Nadu Textbook & Educational Services Corporation.

Source: Indian Express, 14/11/22

Boys at greater risk of repeating grades, failing to complete education than girls: UNESCO

 Boys are more likely than girls to repeat primary grades in 130 out of 142 countries, with data indicating their poorer progression through school, according to a new Global Education report by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO).

The report titled ‘Leave no child behind: Global report on boys’ disengagement from education’ pointed out that no less than 132 million boys of primary and secondary school age are out of school.

It said boys are more likely than girls to experience physical bullying and are often targeted because of their real or perceived sexual orientation and gender identity or expression (SOGIE).

“Boys are more likely than girls to repeat primary grades in 130 out of 142 countries, with data indicating their poorer progression through school. In 57 countries, with data on learning poverty, 10-year-old boys fare worse than girls in mastering reading skills and adolescent boys continue to fall behind girls at the secondary level.

“While girls are more likely than boys to never attend school, boys in many countries are at higher risk of failing to advance and complete their education. As it stands, 132 million boys are currently out of school,” the report stated.

Shedding light on the factors driving boys’ disengagement from education, the UN report attributed the trend to harsh discipline, corporal punishment, gendered norms, poverty and the need to work, among major reasons.

“Poverty and the need to work, for instance, can lead boys to drop out. Gendered norms and expectations can also affect their desire to learn. In particular, certain subjects can run counter to traditional expressions of masculinity, making them unpopular with boys. Harsh discipline, corporal punishment and other forms of violence at school also negatively impact boys’ academic achievement, while increasing absenteeism and dropouts.

“In many countries, boys are at greater risk than girls of repeating grades, failing to complete different education levels and having poorer learning outcomes in school. Where previously boys’ disadvantage seemed most notable in high- or upper-middle-income contexts at the beginning of the millennium, this has shifted and now includes several low- and lower-middle-income countries,” it said.

The report noted that secondary education is where boys’ disadvantage is most prevalent.

“The right to education remains unfulfilled for many boys. Far too many children and youth of primary and secondary school age are out of school. Just over half of them are boys. It has been a concern that COVID-19 pandemic would lead to an increase in school dropouts. In 2020, the last school year before the pandemic, an estimated 259 million children and youth of primary and secondary school age were out of school, 132 million of whom were boys.

“There will not be a clear picture of Covid-19 effects on enrolments before the end of 2022,” it said.

At the global level, almost no country with data has achieved gender parity at the tertiary level.

The gender parity index data in 2019 for tertiary enrolment showed 88 men for every 100 women enrolled at tertiary level. While previously boys’ disengagement and dropout was a concern mainly in high-income countries, several low- and middle-income countries have seen a reversal in gender gaps, with boys now lagging behind girls in enrolment and completion.

“In 73 countries, less boys than girls are enrolled in upper-secondary education. In Mathematics, on the other hand, the gender gap that once worked against girls at the start of the millennium has narrowed or equalised with boys in half of all countries with data.

“Practices such as streaming of classes and gender segregation contribute to boys’ low motivation, underachievement and disengagement from education. Conflict and forced migration exacerbate challenges in accessing and completing education. Language barriers, mobility and discrimination contribute to educational exclusion,” the UNESCO report mentioned.

Experts pointed out that prolonged school closures and longer-term impact of COVID-19 on learning loss and school dropout are likely to exacerbate existing gender disparities unless steps are taken to address the learning needs of all.

“Despite boys’ clear disengagement from and disadvantage in education in certain contexts, there are few programmes and initiatives addressing this phenomenon holistically, with system-level, gender-specific policies even more rare. Scarce policy attention has been given to gender disparities in education that disadvantage boys. Existing policies are predominantly in high-income countries. Few low- or middle-income countries have specific policies to improve boys’ enrolment,” it said.

Advance equal access to education and preventing boys’ drop out, reform traditional practices or adapt their timing, such as initiation ceremonies, which pull boys and young men out of school, building on lessons of the extensive work identifying and addressing barriers to girls’ education, making learning gender-transformative, safe and inclusive for all learners and create gender-transformative and inclusive learning environments that address all learners’ needs, are among the recommendations made in the report.

Source: Indian Express, 11/04/22

Only 19% schools have access to internet: UNESCO report

 

The teaching workforce has a deficit of over 1 million teachers and the need is likely to grow, given the shortages of teachers in certain education levels and subjects such as early childhood education, special education, physical education, music, arts, and curricular streams of vocational education.

While the gross enrolment ratio (GER) for elementary schools has increased from 81.6 in 2001 to 93.03 in 2018-19 and stands at 102.1 in 2019-2020, overall retention is 74.6 per cent for elementary education and 59.6 per cent for secondary education in 2019-20, states the UNESCO 2021 State of the Education Report for India: No Teachers, No Class.

“Quality of education is the core challenge of the next decade when it comes to improving overall educational standards, retention, transition, and equity in academic achievement. Hence the focus of this decade on teachers and teaching,” read the report, which was launched today.

Since March 2020, schools in India have not been functioning physically. Foundational learning, which is the focus of the early classes, is set to slide even further down from current low levels.

The report added, “The use of technology in education for the purpose of teaching and learning has emerged as important, but this has also exposed a range of issues – lack of devices and Internet bandwidth for a significant proportion of students, lack of preparedness of teachers in the use of technology, and lack of resources in Indian languages.”

According to Unified District Information System for Education (UDISE+) data for the 2018-19 school year, a total of 9.4 million teachers were employed across 1.6 million primary and secondary schools (class 1-12) in India. The figures for 2019-20 were nearly 9.7 million and 1.5 million, respectively.

Lack of digital infrastructure and internet connectivity

The overall availability of computing devices (desktops or laptops) in school is 22 per cent for all India, with rural areas seeing much lower provisioning (18 per cent) than urban areas (43 per cent). Access to the internet in schools is 19 per cent all over India – only 14 per cent in rural areas compared to 42 per cent in urban areas.

“In about 15 years, 27 per cent of the current workforce will need to be replaced. The workforce has a deficit of over 1 million teachers (at current student strength), and is likely to need to grow overall given the shortages of teachers in certain education levels and subjects such as early childhood education, special education, physical education, music, arts, and curricular streams of vocational education,” the report said.

Pupil-teacher ratio improved in government schools

The total number of teachers in the system grew by 17 per cent from 8.9 million teachers in 2013-14 to 9.4 million in 2018-19. The overall pupil-teacher ratio (PTR) – reflecting the effort of the state to meet the RTE Act teacher-requirement guidelines – changed from 31:1 in 2013-14 to 26:1 in 2018-19.

In the same period, the proportion of teachers employed in the private sector grew from 21 per cent in 2013-14 to 35 per cent in 2018-19. The proportion of private schools with teacher requirements (as per a PTR of 1:35) has gone down by 10 per cent, while that of government schools decreased by 6 per cent.

Single-teacher schools number is 1,10,971, that is, 7.15 per cent. About 89 per cent of these single-teacher schools are in rural areas. States with a high percentage of single-teacher schools include Arunachal Pradesh (18.22 per cent), Goa (16.08 per cent), Telangana (15.71 per cent), Andhra Pradesh (14.4 per cent), Jharkhand (13.81 per cent), Uttarakhand (13.64 per cent), Madhya Pradesh (13.08 per cent), and Rajasthan (10.08 per cent).

Women make half of the teacher workforce

Half of India’s 9.43 million school teachers are women. State to state variation in the proportion of women teachers in the workforce is considerable.

States and union territories (UTs) where over 70 per cent of teachers are women include several that are ranked high in the Performance Grading Index (PGI). These include Chandigarh (82 per cent), Delhi (74 per cent), Kerala (78 per cent), Punjab (75 per cent) and Tamil Nadu (75 per cent). Other states-UTs with a higher proportion of women teachers are Puducherry (78 per cent) and Goa (80 per cent). Five states have a low proportion of women teachers (40 per cent or less): Assam (39 per cent), Bihar (40 per cent), Jharkhand (39 per cent), Rajasthan (39 per cent) and Tripura (32 per cent).

The data suggests that the teaching cadre is generally young, with over 65 per cent of teachers aged less than 44 years. The median age of school teachers is 38, and the average family size is four.

On average, 86 per cent of schools across the country – 89 per cent of urban schools and 85 per cent of rural schools – are accessible by road. In hilly or mountainous states and union territories, such as in the north-east, Himachal Pradesh, and Jammu and Kashmir, the proportion drops to between 59 per cent and 68 per cent.

Source: Indian Express, 6/10/21

Kerala tops Niti Aayog’s report on school education index while UP ranks last

The Apex government policy think-tank on Monday launched the school education quality index which was aimed to evaluate the performance of states and Union Territories (UTs) in the school education sector.

States including Kerala, Rajasthan, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Gujarat and Assam were ranked as the best-performing (among large states), each achieving an overall performance score above 60.0% while Uttar Pradesh was ranked last according to Niti Aayog.

The Apex government policy think-tank on Monday launched the school education quality index which was aimed to evaluate the performance of states and Union Territories (UTs) in the school education sector.

As Per the report, Kerala has the highest overall performance score of 76.6% while Uttar Pradesh was last among large states, with an overall performance score of 36.4%.

In smaller states, Manipur ranks first among the Small States on the outcomes category, with a score of 82.1%. Arunachal Pradesh has the lowest score, at 27.2%. In the Governance Processes Aiding Outcomes category, Mizoram has the highest score of 47.5% while Arunachal Pradesh ranks last with a score of 18.3%.

Manipur, Tripura and Goa are the top-performing states, each achieving an overall performance score above 55%. Manipur has the highest overall performance score of 68.8%. Arunachal Pradesh ranks last, with an overall performance score of 24.6%.

Among Union Territories Chandigarh has the highest overall performance score of 82.9% while Lakshadweep ranks last, with an overall performance score of 31.9%.

Chandigarh and Dadra and Nagar Haveli are the top-performing UTs, with each achieving an overall performance score above 50%.

Delhi, Daman and Diu and Lakshadweep performed better on the governance processes aiding outcomes category, the report noted.

The School Education Quality Index (SEQI) aims to bring an outcomes focus to education policy by providing States and UTs with a platform to identify their strengths and weaknesses and undertake requisite course corrections or policy interventions.

It was developed through a collaborative process including key stakeholders ministry of human resource development (MHRD), the World Bank and sector experts, the index consists of 30 critical indicators that assess the delivery of quality education.

“Quality school education is a function of a targeted focus on learning outcomes, efficient governance structures, provision of necessary infrastructure and ensuring equitable academic opportunities.

SEQI exists in a symbiotic ecosystem, which converges efforts across the government to evolve an education landscape which resonates with the ideals of a youthful nation and which realises the potential of every single child across India,” Niti Aayog CEO Amitabh Kant said.

To facilitate like-to-like comparisons, states and UTs have been grouped as large states, small states and UTs.

States and UTs are ranked on their overall performance in the reference year 2016-17, as well as on the change in their performance between the reference year and base year (2015-16).

“Most States and UTs perform better on Outcomes than on Governance Processes Aiding Outcomes, but there is variation within these categories in terms of specific areas of strength and weakness. It is, therefore, important for States and UTs to strengthen their capacity to address their specific areas for improvement,” the report noted.

Source: Hindustan Times, 30/09/2019

36% rural youth can’t name India’s capital, finds survey

Pratham’s 2017 study focusses on teenagers; flags falling enrolment with age

Fourteen per cent of rural youth in the age group of 14-18 failed to identify the map of India, says the 2017 Annual Status of Education Report (ASER), brought out by Pratham.

Significantly, 36% of those surveyed did not know that Delhi is the capital of India.

The report underlines that 79% answered the question ‘Which State do you live in?’ and 42 % could point to their home State on the map.

Change in focus

“ASER 2017 focuses on an older age group: youth who are 14 to 18 years old,” the report says.

“The survey looks ‘Beyond Basics’, exploring a wider set of domains beyond foundational reading and arithmetic in an attempt to throw light on the status and abilities of youth in this age group.”

Whereas previous ASER reports have reached almost all rural districts in the country to generate estimates that are considered representative at the district, State, and national levels, ASER 2017 was conducted in 28 districts spread across 24 States and generated only district-level estimates.

Tapering enrolment

“Most 14-18 year olds are in the formal education system — only 14.4% are not currently enrolled in school or college. However, this number varies a lot with age,” says the report. “At age 14, only 5.3% are not enrolled, but by age 17 this percentage quadruples to 20.7% and further increases to 30.2% at age 18. With almost 10% of India’s population in this age group, these percentages translate into large numbers of youth who are not in the formal education system,” the report says.

The report also highlights the gender aspect of enrolment, with the number of girls falling sharply with age. While the enrolment ratios for boys and girls are almost the same at 14, at 18 years 32% of girls are not enrolled, as against 28% for boys.

“About 25% of this age group still cannot read basic texts fluently in their own language. More than half struggle with division (3 digit by 1 digit) problems. Only 43% are able to do such problems correctly,” the report reveals. “53% of all 14 year-olds in the sample can read English sentences.”

Source: The Hindu; 17-01-2018

Project Khel: For him, education is just a child’s play

Akshai Abraham to start Project KHEL (Kids Holistic Education and Lifeskills), after working for around eight years in the development sector.

While mugging up for almost every exam, I wondered when in life I would use what I learnt about kinetic energy, or which career would require me to draw an obtuse-angle triangle. I’m not against learning History or Geography, but what about knowing how to resolve conflicts, or communicating effectively?

It was thoughts like these that led Akshai Abraham to start Project KHEL (Kids Holistic Education and Lifeskills), after working for around eight years in the development sector. Having studied in a boarding school where sports were given much importance, Abraham realised that his personality and character were shaped by what he learnt outside the classroom. That’s where the idea of sports for development came from.“After college, I worked for a year in Austria and living in a developed country motivated me to return home and work in the social sector,” says Abraham. Since 2012, Project KHEL has been helping underprivileged children reach their potential through play.

Abraham and his eight-member team work with around 1,200 underprivileged children, between 8-18 years, from slums, shelter homes, orphanages, low-income schools, and with children of domestic and migrant labour, of rickshaw pullers and paan shop owners, across 19 locations in and around Lucknow. Using the concept of play, “we use team sports (football, volleyball, handball, basketball, kho kho, kabaddi), games, theatre, music, dance, and art, to teach them life skills,” shares 38-year-old Abraham.

Each of the hour-long sessions, conducted twice a week, comprises two parts. Out of 60 minutes, 25 are devoted to playing a sport, after which “we have a debriefing for five minutes. As facilitators, we observe and encourage the kids to talk about their behaviour and what they’ve learnt. For example, when we’re playing dodgeball, the boys generally have a tendency to reach for the ball, even if it’s headed toward the girl standing next to them.

When a boy does this, but realises it and gives the ball back to the girl, we appreciate it. It is this behaviour that moulds character and teaches things like gender sensitivity”. In the next 20 minutes, the kids learn life skills, such as empathy, through an activity-based curriculum, followed by a debriefing session once again. There are four levels, and as “we go higher, these kids who would not even play with the opposite gender, later have heated discussions on serious topics,” says Abraham, who plays all sports except golf and is now falling in love with ultimate frisbee, a mixed-gender sport with no referee that closely matches with what Project KHEL tries to teach.

“At stage four, we had introduced the concept of ultimate to other sports, including kho kho, kabaddi and volleyball. With this variation, they have to learn to communicate and resolve their conflicts,” he says.

Talking about the way in which the programme is customised to a high degree, Abraham says, “We assume that different groups will progress at different speeds. Even within groups, since every child does not learn at the same pace, the fast learners are given leadership opportunities as peer leaders, who help the facilitators conduct sessions, while the slower ones are given more time to learn.”

“A lot of people think, ‘what are kids going to learn from playing?’,” says Abraham, who believes that if we let boys and girls play together today, we might change things 20 years from now. Through these interactions, the children learn to follow rules, teamwork, discipline, strategies, communication, leadership, gender sensitivity, and to win and lose gracefully, which can’t be taught in a classroom. “There’s no need to lecture about women empowerment when a girl, who is otherwise not allowed to play with boys, kicks a ball in a mixed-gender team. They realise that girls can play as well as boys, and if she can’t the guys give up their game to coach them,” says Abraham, whose favourite sport is basketball.

With state, national and international-level players on team Project KHEL, the kids learn rules, techniques and enjoy the game, albeit not with the aim of creating sportspersons. It’s not just the children who learn; the team members undergo a facilitator-to-facilitator learning programme too as well as intensive weekly trainings on Sunday mornings.

Role play

Project KHEL also conduct workshops across the country. “Ours is a preventive approach. In a menstrual hygiene session, we talk about myths and restrictions, such as not eating or touching pickle, not sleeping on the bed, not entering the kitchen... They can challenge these myths once, but if they live in a joint family they shouldn’t suffer. We ensure they understand that one day when they’re mothers, they shouldn’t let this continue. When we do role plays, the boys take up women’ role and understand what the women in their homes go through.”

Source: DNA, 10-02-2017

Teacher frames 50L sentences with 170 words; sets record





Balasaheb Chavan recognised by India Book of Records

Asecondary school teacher from Dahanu has set the national re cord for framing the `maximum sentences using minimum words' in English language. Balasaheb Chavan, 37, framed 50 lakh sentences using only 170 words while creating teaching techniques to help his vernacular-medium students understand and retain the language. The teacher was granted recognition by the India Book of Records recently. Chavan said the project started in 2010 when, as a teacher at K L Ponda High School, he realised the difficulties his students faced while learning English words and using them to frame sentences. “Our school is located in the heart of the rural region where most students don't know basic English words, let alone frame basic sentences. So retaining English was a task for them,“ said the Dahanu resident, who took up the responsibility of developing tools to make the learning process easier.
The `sentence bank' -as he calls the collection of sentences -started off with a small table of eight to10 words that the students were asked to learn. From there, students would move on to using the words in different permutations and combinations to frame sentences.
Since the basic premise of the endeavour was to ensure his students understand the language easily, Chavan used simple nouns, pronouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs to frame the sentences. “I would change just one word of a sentence to form the next sentence. For instance, `I am a good boy' became `I am a good girl' which then became `I am a nice boy' and `I am a nice girl'.“
“The process of juggling the words to frame complete sentences got me hooked and even as I was developing the tool for students, I started constructing more sentences by adding few words to the list. The process was addictive and I continued until I had a bank of 50 lakh sentences,“ he said.
Around three months ago, Chavan approached the India Book of Records -an annual record book that is registered with the Registrar of Newspapers for India (RNI) with his work.
In December 2016, the school teacher received a letter granting recognition of the record.“Balasaheb Chavan made 50,00,000 meaningful and error free sentences using only 170 English words,“ states the letter.
The principal of K L Ponda High School is all praise for the young teacher. “Chavan's approach towards teaching the language has benefited our students. They are no longer scared of grammar as they are learning with the help of techniques he has developed,“ said MG Tajne, Principal at KL Ponda High school.
Chavan, however, is not one to rest on the laurels of setting a national record. The educator is now working on making grammar easy for his students by teaching them the technique he used in his `sentence bank'. He is also aiming for recognition from the Guinness World Records as he has “never come across such a record at the international level.“

Source: Mumbai Mirror, 24-01-2017

Union HRD Minister launches ShaGun - a web-portal for Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan 

New Delhi: The Union HRD Minister Shri Prakash Javadekar launched a dedicated web portal ‘ShaGun’ for the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan at New Delhi today. ‘ShaGun’ aims to capture and showcase innovations and progress in Elementary Education sector of India by continuous monitoring of the flagship scheme - Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA). The Union HRD Minister also unveiled the ‘Toolkit for Master Trainers in Preparing Teachers for Inclusive Education for Children with Special Needs’, which has been prepared by World Bank in collaboration with Ministry of Human Resource Development.

 

On this occasion, the Union Minister also reiterated government’s commitment for improving the ‘Quality’ of Education. He said that in this direction Ministry of HRD will be codifying the learning outcome to set assessment standards for abilities with regards to comprehension, mathematics, language etc. and thus ensuring that “all children acquire at least the minimum levels of learning” from Class I to Class VIII under Right to Education Act, 2009.

Learning Outcomes are assessment standards indicating the expected levels of learning that children should achieve for that class. These outcomes can be used as check points to assess learning at different points of time. The learning outcomes would help teachers to understand the learning levels of children in their respective classes individually as well as collectively. Learning outcomes should be the point of reference for conducting achievement surveys. Hence it is necessary that the defined Learning Outcomes are also shared with parents and community at large. Ministry of HRD has uploaded draft document on its website in this regard to invite comments and suggestions through email address given. (feedback.lo@ciet.nic.in)

Shri. Prakash Javadekar, Hon’ble Minister of Human Resource Development launching this e-initiative termed it as a global democratic forum enabled by technology which will give a peek in the Indian elementary education scenario

and spread constructive lessons. He highlighted that this first-of-its kind platform will give due recognition to people, State governments, schools, teachers working towards improving Elementary Education across the country. The Union Minister further emphasized that ShaGun will help monitor progress of implementation of SSA by assessing performance of States and UTs on key parameters and thereby serve as a platform for the central government for effective planning and deliver on the promise of providing quality education to all.

ShaGun, which has been coined from the words ‘Shala’ meaning Schools and ‘Gunvatta’ meaning Quality, has been developed with a twin track approach.

First, is the Repository with an engaging interface that focuses on positive stories and developments in the field of School Education. In this repository, best practices will be documented in the form of videos, testimonials, case studies, and images, which will display state-level innovations and success stories that are driving improvements in performance under SSA. This repository has a decentralized management structure that enables State governments to choose, upload and manage their own content.

Secondly, it has an online monitoring module to measure state-level performance and progress against key educational indicators. It has been developed to collect and report data which will enable the government and administrators to track the efficiency with which SSA funds are being utilized and the results that this is delivering. SSA is a centrally sponsored scheme providing universal access to education to children in the age group of six to fourteen years of age.

 

Also, ‘Toolkit for Master Trainers in Preparing Teachers for Inclusive Education for Children with Special Needs’ is the series of five training modules will provide the teachers with practical information on effective inclusion of CWSN and build those pedagogical practices that would address the needs of all children with special needs.

Shri Upendra Kushwaha, Hon’ble MoS, School Education and Literacy,  MHRD, also addressed the gathering and appreciated ‘ShaGun’ as right step forward to understand the program implementation and evaluate the gap between policy and action, which will supplement the government decision making.  

The event also saw live interaction with Mr Junaid Kamal Ahmad, Country Director, World Bank India through a video conference. He expressed his appreciation towards Ministry of Human Resource Development for introducing this platform that will allow for global learning from SSA lessons being shared.

Shri. Anil Swarup, Secretary, School Education and Literacy, GoI; Smt. Rina Ray, Additional Secretary, School Education, GoI; Smt. Shabnam Sinha, Lead Education Specialist, World Bank; senior policy makers and representatives of Autonomous Bodies such as NCTE, NCERT, CBSE and NUEPA, also attended the programme.  The SSA ShaGun web portal can be accessed at http://ssashagun.nic.in.

 

Source: Indiaeducationdiary, 18-01-2017

Pratham audit paints mixed pic of rural education





A private audit of school education in rural India paints a mixed picture of hits and misses ­­ increase in enrolment, no increase in private school enrolment, improvement in reading ability and arithmetic, but not so much in reading English. After a gap of a year, Pratham's 11th Annual Status of Education Report (ASER) was unveiled on Wednesday in the presence of Delhi education minister Manish Sisodia and chief economic adviser Arvind Subramaniam. The survey was carried out in 17,473 villages, covering 3,50,232 households. Children's attendance shows no major change since 2014. Also, the proportion of small schools in the government primary school sector continues to grow.
The report that largely looks at enrolment pattern and learning abilities highlights that at the all India level, enrolment in the age group of 614 has marginally increased from 96.7% in 2014 to 96.9% in 2016. Similar increase can be noticed in the enrolment for the age-group of 15-16 from 83.4% in 2014 to 84.7% in 2016.
In states like Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and UP, the fraction of out-of-school children has increased between 2014 and 2016. In MP, it has been the highest ­­ from 3.4% to 4.4%. In three states, the proportion of out-of-school girls is higher than 8%. This includes Rajasthan (9.7%), UP (9.9%) and MP (8.5%).
There has been no increase in enrolment in private schools in the last two years.Enrolment is almost unchanged at 30.8% in 2014 to 30.5% in 2016. Gender gap in private schools has decreased slightly from 7.6 percentage points to 6.9 percentage points.
As for learning ability , na tionally the proportion of children in Class III who could read at least Class I text has gone up slightly from 40.2% in 2014 to 42.5% in 2016. Overall, reading levels in Class V are almost the same year on year from 2011 to 2016. However, the proportion of children in Class V who could read a Class II-level text improved by more than five percentage points from 2014 to 2016 in Gujarat, Maharashtra, Tripura, Nagaland and Rajasthan.
However, in Class VIII, reading level has shown slight decline since 2014, from 74.1% to 73.1%. Except for Manipur, Rajasthan, Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu, reading level does not show much improvement.
In 2014, nationally 25.4% of Class III children could do a two-digit subtraction which has risen slightly to 27.7% in 2016, mainly in government schools. However, in Class V , the arithmetic levels of children measured by their ability to do simple division remained almost the same at 26%.But among Class VIII students, the ability to do division has continued to drop, a trend that began in 2010.
Ability to read English has slightly improved in Class III but relatively unchanged in Class V . In 2016, 32% children in Class III could read simple words as compared to 28.5% in 2009. Worrisome is the gradual decline in upper primary. In 2009, 60.2% in Class VIII could read simple sentences in English; in 2014, this was 46.7% and in 2016, it has declined to 45.2%.

Source: Times of India, 19-01-2017

The widening class divide

Children from the RTE quota are often left feeling small as equality seems to be lost in monetary disparity

Thirty-two-year-old Uma Devi (name changed) is conspicuous in a crowd of parents who have come to pick their children up in swanky cars. She works as a Group D employee at a government hospital, but thanks to the 25 per cent reservation quota mandated by the Right to Education (RTE) Act, her seven-year-old son goes to a “big” CBSE-affiliated private school in in Bengaluru.

Waiting for her child outside the school, she says she is thrilled that he can speak English. “My husband who is a driver studied only till Class X and I studied till Class XII as the circumstances at home forced both of us to discontinue our studies,” she says.

But “big” schooling has come with a deeper and disturbing reality. “Aunty, English ma’am says he doesn’t read properly!” shouts one of her son’s classmates as the children run towards their parents.

Keeping up with the Joneses

The innocent comment of her son’s classmate wipes the smile away from Uma Devi’s face. “I work overtime and pay Rs.900 for his tuition classes. What more can I do?” she asks helplessly. Her child has to “compete” with children from well-to-do families and she simply cannot afford expensive birthday parties, picnics or even tuitions.

“While the government reimburses tuition fees, schools still ask us to pay for miscellaneous fees such as smart class fees, picnic fees and transport fees and we cannot afford to pay,” says another parent whose child studies in a school in south Bengaluru.

The discrimination begins thus: children from the RTE quota and their parents are often left feeling small because the spirit of equality seems to be lost in monetary disparity, and this is not just the story of Uma Devi.

Every family has a humiliating experience to tell. Ten-year-old Raghavendra (named changed) spent all night studying for his Kannada test, but he was in for a rude shock when his teacher told him that he could not sit for it as his parents had not paid their fees. They simply had no money to spare, and the school was not willing to make an exception.

In July, a private school in the city charged all students Rs.35,000 as food fees. Parents of students admitted under the quota along with RTE activists complained to the education department. Under pressure from the government, the school offered to refund the fees but said that parents would have to send lunch and snacks from home.

“Very often when we question school managements for some of the decisions they make, schools feel they are doing charity by admitting kids under the quota,” says B.N. Yogananda, general secretary of RTE Students and Parents Association, a support group of 400 members formed for and by parents of children enrolled in schools under the provisions of the RTE Act.

A teacher at an ICSE school said that she had asked the school management why the “burden of adjustment” always falls on the child. “Doing simple things like ensuring that nursery rhymes in Kannada are taught until all students pick up English or putting a cap of Rs.10 for project work can go a long way in ensuring that students do not develop an inferiority complex,” she says.

But inclusivity goes beyond the classroom walls.

Discrimination in and outside school

Nagasimha G. Rao, convener of the RTE task force formed by NGOs in 2012 to address cases of discrimination against students admitted under the quota, says that parents of other children too need to question their actions. “It is not just during school hours; parents need to ask themselves if they have invited a child under the quota to their homes for a birthday party or a play date.”

The RTE Act does not address the issue of social inclusion. “My child asks me why he is not chosen to perform in the annual day celebration or why I do not come to his classmate’s birthday celebration. It is going to be hard to explain all this to a seven-year-old,” says a parent helplessly.

Private school managements, however, argue that the State government’s annual reimbursement ceiling — Rs.11,848 a year for a child admitted to Class I and Rs.5,924 a year for a child in preschool — is not adequate to meet all the facilities that they provide. But discrimination cannot be the answer.

While some schools deny RTE students access to certain facilities, others have blatantly discriminated by introducing separate teaching sections with clear lines of demarcation between the haves and the have-nots. Unable to bear the price tag that comes with “free education”, many parents have pulled their children out of these schools.

If the RTE Act is not embraced in spirit by parents, teachers and schools, its legacy will be overshadowed by prejudice, discrimination and a reaffirmation of the class divide.

tanu.kulkarni@thehindu.co.in

Source: The Hindu, 23-11-2016

UN: India 50 yrs behind edu goals

Manash Gohain

New Delhi:





India will be half a century late in achieving its universal education goals, according to a Unesco report released on Monday .This means the country will achieve universal primary education by 2050, universal lower secondary education in 2060 and universal upper secondary education in 2085.The 2030 deadline for achieving sustainable development goals will be possible only if India introduces fundamental changes in the education sector, the Global Education Monitoring (GEM) report says.
The report says over 60 million children in India receive little or no formal education and the country has over 11.1 million out-of-school stu dents in the lower secondary level, the highest in the world.
At the upper secondary level, 46.8 million are out of school, while 2.9 million students do not even attend primary school. The report says that by 2020 there will be a shortage of 40 million workers with tertiary education.
GEM report director Aaron Benavot told TOI, “Striving for development will mean little without a healthy planet. So, the new 2030 agenda for sustainable development unites global development and environmental goals.“
The report says 40% of students worldwide are taught in a language they don't understand. While the curriculums of half of the countries do not explicitly mention climate change, in India some 300 million students currently receive environmental education.

Source: Times of India, 6-09-2016

Over 1L schools in India have just one teacher

Yogesh Kumar

Dehradun:





MP, UP Worst With 18,000; Delhi Has 13

A report on single-teacher schools across the country , tabled in Parliament on Monday , has thrown up some alarming statistics on the education scenario in India. A solitary teacher is running the show in as many as 1.06 lakh government elementary and secondary schools in the country .Madhya Pradesh fares the worst, with 17,874 such schools. UP has the second-highest number of elementary and secondary schools -17,602 -where single teachers are performing the role of educators for multiple classes. UP is followed by Rajasthan (13,575), Andhra (9,540) and Jharkhand (7,391), according to the 2014-15 report of the HRD ministry that was tabled by MoS Upendra Kushwaha. Last month, TOI had focused on 41 such schools in Gurgaon.
No state can boast of having no single-teacher schools. UTs fare better, with Daman & Diu, Pondicherry , Chandigarh and Lakshadweep recording no single-teacher schools in two categories.Delhi has 13 such schools. Bihar, which was in the news after the infamous “topper scam“ surfaced in June, has 3,708 singleteacher schools.
The MHRD report comes close on the heels of a TOI report last month which had revealed that 41 primary and middle schools in Gurgaon are one-person wonders with teachers doubling up as administrators, clerks, caretakers, wardens, midday meal servers, nurses and sundry crisis managers. The report was based on a recent UDISE (unified district information for school education) survey , an annual exercise conducted by the state education department in association with Sarv Shiksha Abhiyan.
While successive central governments have stressed the right to education, the ground reality is far from the specified objectives, with states flouting norms of the RTE Act.

Source: Times of India, 9-08-2016

Maharashtra Govt wants School Teachers on WhatsApp

The education department of Maharashtra has decided to use WhatsApp to ensure faster reach of new policies and information on teaching techniques to teachers in remote areas of the state. The department has asked all government-run schools in Maharashtra to create groups exclusively of teachers for this purpose. The primary education department has issued a circular and asked teachers in each taluka of the state to form a WhatsApp group of 100 members each. The details of these WhatsApp groups will have to be provided to the education officer and the group education officer of respective districts.

Briefing about the initiative, Mahavir Mane, Director, Primary Education, said, “The aim is to ensure that we are able to reach out swiftly to teachers residing in the most remote corners with new policies that the government is formulating. Rather than waiting for days for government circulars to reach schools, we can provide such information directly to teachers through WhatsApp.”

However, Mane informed that joining such groups was not mandatory. “We are not expecting every teacher in the state to join. Those who do not have phones can’t do so. However, the idea is that even if one school teacher from a particular place joins, he can then pass on the information to other members of his school,” he added.

Source: Elets News Network (ENN) Posted on January 16, 2016