We cannot create a level-playing field for children unless we take concrete steps to bridge the digital divide. Today the privileged generation-Y seems to have a innate ability to adapt to changing technologies where the disadvantaged lot don't even know how to switch on a computer...
One of our volunteer's Dr. Wagle describes his experience on the project execution:
"We live in a world today
that is increasingly moving to a service economy where computer literacy and
inter-personal communication are pre-requisites to landing a job (even as a
shop attendant). Computer Literacy and Spoken English are two skills that will
help the under privileged (BMC)Municipal primary school students to bridge the widening
gap between themselves and the private school students and give them a chance to live a better life.
It was in July, 2013 that
I stepped for the first time in a BMC school to conduct my first lesson in
computer literacy. I had no prior knowledge about the students, teachers,
curriculum, building or equipment, hence there was bit of trepidation at what I
may discover. First impressions are important. The new, spacious building of
BMC Petit school in Bandra (W) is as good as it can get as a healthy teaching environment
(granted there is no playing ground). Students in uniform also help as a study
enabler. Spacious computer room well furnished for a set of desktops means the
infrastructure for teaching computers is there.
It took a month to get to
know the following things:
1. Four mediums (Urdu,
Marathi, Gujrati and English),
2. Four schools within the
building,
3 Friday is a half day and
Saturday a full day for the Urdu medium,
4 Availability of only five
desktops (but of latest vintage from Acer),
and many more new things to assimilate.
Since we were teaching the
students directly, our contact with the teacher was minimal and only to the
extent of requesting them to send their class to the computer room.
The students were the
biggest surprise. Their enthusiasm to learn and work on a computer is
infectious. It has not diminished even after 8 months we have been with them – as
soon as one of us voluntary teachers enters the school students from different
medium and standards (4 to 7 which we cover) clamour up asking if today they
can come to the computer room.
We had to decide on the
pedagogy to be used. IIT, Mumbai has developed software called Spoken Tutorial
with funding from the HRD ministry to teach computer literacy which essentially
means teaching the Libre Office suite of Writer, Spreadsheet etc. I found the
IITB spoken tutorials good, but not tailored for the level of BMC school
students. I had to therefore look at an alternative.
CACR has various volunteer
groups to teach at multiple BMC schools, mostly in H-West ward. These groups
have been autonomous in selecting the pedagogy and thus there has been lot of
experience with different methodologies including teaching using IITB software.
I accepted the definition
of computer literacy to be student's ability to use Office Suite (Open Office,
Libre and Microsoft are three such suites, of which the first two are free). I
ended up writing lessons for teaching at Petit and quickly wrote up a mini-book
so that other volunteers could use it to teach. After four months, when I had
run through the Office related lesson I felt the need for more lessons and
decided that in today's age Computer Literacy (CLit) must include lessons on
internet. I added four lessons in that category. Fortunately or unfortunately
due to lack of any infrastructure to connect the multiple desktops to the net,
no lessons were actually delivered.
By November, 2013 and
after much study we finalized on the pedagogy for Spoken English (SpE) based on
a set of eight animation DVDs made by Tata Interactive.
By November, 2013 I had
enough experience and data to know the student population (possibly
representative of any BMC primary school) reasonably well in terms of their
education level, their knowledge of English, and their class behaviour, their
differing talent to learn and urge to study. The picture other than normal
spread of talent as in any group was dismal. Most students even upto 7th
standard, had difficulty reading English alphabet and in differentiating the
use of capital letters and when to use them. The vocabulary was virtually absent
which means that any word in piece of text is nothing more than a sequence of
letters. Teaching CLit often became frustrating and seemed hopeless.
In January, 2014 a
development took place which in retrospect was for the better. When our
organization, Citizen Association for Child Rights (CACR) started teaching at
BMC schools the desire was to be able to get volunteers who had to go to a
nearby school. Since Bandra (W) was the closest to us (I and my wife Archana)
living in Mahim among the initial set of schools we had been going to Petit
school there. In October, CACR decided to take on additional schools, made
representation to BMC's education department and got permission to teach in more
BMC schools.
Dharavi Trasit Camp (DTC)
school was in that new set. It is a very large school group with over 10,000
students studying there in primary alone. Going to Dharavi is fraught with poor
transport (narrow and crowded roads being one reason). I started going to DTC
from December, 2013. By then, I had realized that I was pegging the CLit at a
level higher than needed. What was basic to CLit is an ability to type and edit,with
calculations (spreadsheet) not being as important.
I completely revised my
approach to CLit and began with asking the students to type in simple two
paragraph text in multiple repeat lessons. Not withstanding having taught upto
Presentation tool at Petit, I started this approach at Petit too. By the end of
January, 2014 I began to see the benefits of my new pedagogy. Students across 4
to 7 standard and across medium were on the whole were beginning to type and
edit the text given to them on a piece of paper. I then got them to graduate to
a more complex and longer piece of text to type and edit. Finally, I got them
to save the text to a file of their own and re-open it to check.
Today, at the end of
current academic year and before the students at both Petit and DTC schools go
on summer vacation, I have the satisfaction that the students have become
computer literate even if it is only to type and edit.
There was one major
difference between Petit and DTC. At DTC there was BMC appointed full time
teacher for teaching computers. He was a part of mass adoption by BMC to use
the IITB software with 100+ teachers so appointed. This teacher was not able to
teach anything other than letting students play with Paint tool till I volunteered.
He then learnt the use of Writer program while I taught and then used that
knowledge to teach other medium and other standards which I could not teach
directly in my limited 2-day per week schedule. This teacher also made a
regular schedule of such lessons for the entire week.
Spending just two hours
per week in a social cause such as teaching in BMC schools should be no problem
for any person even when he or she is working. But despite sizable population
among us of senior citizen (who should have plenty of spare time) getting
voluntary teachers is the most difficult problem that we have faced. This
problem has remained unsolved and constrains CACR from expanding its school
coverage.
CACR also believe that it
is best that the school teaching is best imparted by school teachers rather
than through the crutches of outside teachers. In DTC, both these goals came
together. There is a clear pointer here. Get BMC to appoint full-time teachers
for CLit (and also for SpE). Train the teacher (and be guide in some of the
lessons he or she teaches) and you reduce your need for voluntary teachers and
get BMC to do its own work. I suggested this requirement to the AO of H-West
ward and am happy that a full time computer teacher has been identified at
Petit for the next academic year.
The Petit and DTC models
are potentially scalable. 100 teachers have already been identified (BMC has
300 school buildings and therefore the need is for 300 teachers and trainers
and mentors for each of them). Lot more planning will be required and it may
take another full academic year to get the scaling up right. But at the end of
it 80+% of BMC students would be computer literate (and that would include
spreadsheet and possibly more).
I hope CACR is able to persuade the BMC
education department to go along and put its will behind this experiment."
Dr. S.Wagle _CACR
I had been a professor of Computer Science once and had authored drafts
of two textbooks. I was again inspired to write a CLP textbook of sorts
for the current set of students. I wrote it in parts as I progressed with
teaching CLP. I was optimistic and felt that the internet is an integral part
of computer literacy in current times and included 4 lessons in that area too.
CACR continued to grow rapidly to become a robust non-profit. We even celebrated our first birthday in style. CACR now has partnered with
many complementary NGOs and institutions who could enrich the lives of BMC
primary students. What is remarkable about CACR and what sets it apart is its resolve to
get the MCGM School System to work for itself and also deliver quality
education. If it keeps to this resolve I am sure that in the next few years
it will bring a significant change not only in the MCGM’s Primary Education
System but equally important improve the quality of teaching that is imparted.
That in turn should turn the tide of parents back to the MCGM schools and
enable talented students from these strata to avail of free education and
rise to whatever they are capable of in life.
