Stepping Stones: Enhancing the quality of primary

education

CONTENTS

CURRENT SCENARIO CONCERNED ISSUES

PROPOSED SOLUTION IMPACTS AND CHALLENGES

Team Satanics Anusha Mandavilli (XLRI)

Anushri Bansal (IIM Shillong) Mrigendranath Debsarma (XLRI)

Nancy Goyal (XLRI) Ravi Goyal (IIM Calcutta)

Team Satanics

Primary Education in India

Indian education system

• Nursery

• LKG

• UKG

Pre Primary

• Class 1 to Class 5 (Age 6-11)

Primary • Class 6 to

Class 10 (Age 11-15)

Secondary

• Class 11 to Class 12 (Age 16-17)

Higher Secondary • 3-4-5 year

courses

Undergraduate

• 1-2-3 year courses

Post Graduate

Enrolment rate Scale

If-100 71 40 21

Some of the changes that Indian school system witnessed includes: • Approx. 3.5 lakh schools opened over last decade • 99% of India’s rural population has school within a Km radius • 11 million more children are enrolled from 2009-10 to 2011-12 • Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan budget has increased from Approx. Rs. 13k Crore in 2009-

10 to Rs. 27k Crore in 2013-14

Current Scenario

Concerned Issues

Proposed Solution

Impact and challenges

Team Satanics

Despite such a huge expenditure and so many govt. schemes, • Enrolment rate drastically decreases from primary to secondary to higher education • Among enrolled students, attendance ratio has been 85% • Average schooling years by Indian kid is 5.1 yrs (Pak- 5.6, Bangladesh- 5.8, US (12.6) • 53.2 % students in class V cannot read class II level text and declining (by ASER) • Over 99% of 7.95 lakh teachers failed Central Teacher Eligibility Test • Infrastructure including electricity, drinking water, toilets etc. are in bad shape

Government Schemes and Issues

Flagship Schemes of MHRD for Primary Education where expenditure is most: • Mid day meal • Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan • Teachers training institution • National bal Bhawan

Current Scenario

Concerned Issues

Proposed Solution

Impact and challenges

Team Satanics

Reducing the learning gap

• The improvement in infrastructure and schemes like mid-day meal has drastically improved enrolment rate but learning outcome rates are drastically lagging behind

• Our education system is focused on exams and marks and is little concerned about actual learning

Teachers

• Teachers are the missing link in Indian education. The teaching profession has become a profession of last resort attracting either low calibre individuals or people for whom teaching is a hobby or only a supplementary source of family income.

Lack of Infrastructure and resources

• Lack of toilets lead to drop outs of girls

• Lack of options for secondary education nearby also is a motivating factor for more dropouts

Concerning Issues

Current Scenario

Concerned Issues

Proposed Solution

Impact and challenges

Team Satanics

Tree Concept

Primary Education (Building Foundation <10 yrs) • Exposure to Sports (Showing cricket matches,

swimming, hockey, chess, etc. and their videos) • Exposure to universe/science/concept through visits to

science city, museums, videos, etc • Teach agriculture, carpentry, computer, etc. (Video etc.) • Teach music concepts, dance classes, painting, etc. • Teaching basic Maths, English and Language through

books and Art, play way, etc.

Secondary Education (All knowledge 11-14 yrs) • Book and practical teaching of all the subjects • Continuous feedback in terms of gauging his interest

Higher Secondary/Undergraduate (Deciding focus >14 yrs) • Gauge his talent and allow him to choose the field he

wants to go in, be it literary, engineering, medical, hospitality, agriculture, sports, etc

• Provide facilities (Both theoretical and practical) to let him specialise him in the sector with full focus and succeed at international level

Current Scenario

Concerned Issues

Proposed Solution

Impact and challenges

Team Satanics

Adapt the learning to each child

• Each child has a dominant learning style – VAK (Visual or Auditory or Kinaesthetic)

• Therefore, each new concept should be taught in multiple ways to reinforce and cater to each child’s dominant learning style

Educate to Learn

Increase Education through learning

• Impart knowledge through activities like visits to museums, sports matches, outbound trips, games, plays, Videos, movies

• The values with particular emphasis on moral values should be taught using the local folklore and books like Panchtantra

Let Child be exposed to all the sports, movies, swimming. Painting, carpentry, etc. and allow him to decide preferably what he wants to study in secondary level

Current Scenario

Concerned Issues

Proposed Solution

Impact and challenges

Team Satanics

Use cluster school system with private

schools

• Each core school should be a private school to better facilitate transfer of knowledge, technology

• Sharing of resources like books would be possible

• More accountability of teachers as there would be central

Educate to Learn

Provide Proper Infrastructure

• Proper bathrooms should be provided as it is the major source of dropouts for girls

• E-toilets should be provided

• Drinking water facility should be provided

Provide collective books to schools, well managed infrastructure to school, given such a huge spending

B

C

E

D

School A

Private School

Current Scenario

Concerned Issues

Proposed Solution

Impact and challenges

Team Satanics

Implementation Plan

Teachers

• Local teachers should be hired

• Proper training program to train local teachers with other school teachers

• Teachers should be provided training in basic behavioural skills in order to deal with children

• Performance – linked pay should be brought in

Governance Policies

• Make learning outcomes(functional literacy and numeracy) an explicit goal of primary education policy

• Invest in regular and independent high-quality measurement of learning outcomes instead of setting the education indicators such as school access, infrastructure, enrolment rate

• Pay urgent attention to issues of teacher governance including better monitoring & supervision as well as teacher performance measurement and management

Current Scenario

Concerned Issues

Proposed Solution

Impact and challenges

Team Satanics

Impact

Better Learning Outcomes (financial literacy and numeracy)

Since, now each concept is taught using multiple techniques like audio, video and some activity better learning outcomes of the children

Capturing local teachers:

> Many rural teachers have the desire to teach. They are interested in acquiring new skills and are more open to inculcating innovativeness in children

> This will also help in increase the number of teachers and thus increasing student-teacher ratio

Infrastructure and resources

These are shared by the use of cluster system, therefore better availability of these to everyone

Current Scenario

Concerned Issues

Proposed Solution

Impact and challenges

Impact

Team Satanics

Challenges

Changing the perception of

jobs of teacher to a coveted

job

Lack of transfer of technology

from urban to rural areas

Teaching methods

inculcated discourage creativity

Low inclination towards

teaching of next

generation

Current Scenario

Concerned Issues

Proposed Solution

Impact and challenges

Challenges

Team Satanics

References

• UNICEF statistics on Indian Education

• Statistics on Elementary School Education in Rural India, Vikas Rawal, Review of Agrarian studies

• World bank data on School enrollment

• Forbes India- Primary Education in India needs a fix

• IDFC report on Public expenditure on Education in India

• Agastya International foundation report on Primary Education

• Opinions from thehindu.com

• Articles from livemint.com

• Ideas for India: The case of primary education in India

References