Field notes

Jharkhand

EARLY February 2004, I was part of a team on a routine review mission visit to Jharkhand to look at budgets, revised plans and possibilities of extension of the District Primary Education Programme (DPEP) for another year. Many positive developments were reported. Over the past two years the pace of the DPEP programme has picked up. Separation seemed to have helped as Jharkhand was in fact moving ahead of its erstwhile parent state Bihar, at least in the implementation of the project. All habitations have a school, large teacher recruitment have brought the teacher pupil ratio to more favourable levels, and textbooks reach on time. Remarkable gains were reported in enrolling children, with an unbelievably small number of around 25,000 out of school. Nothing new here. This is a litany that one hears nowadays in most states where DPEP is being implemented.

In an otherwise tedious meeting of numbers and more numbing numbers, the discussion turned to interventions at the classroom level to improve learning. Even here one was skeptical. It had all been done or said before. Most strategies for improving quality in the teaching-learning process have a predictable trajectory – teacher training focused on child-centred pedagogy, better infrastructure, improved textbooks, classrooms often painted in hideous colours for ‘joyful learning’. I remember visiting a school in Bihar where in class I the sketch of a burly man twirling his moustache and wielding a gun loomed large over the tiny children sitting on the ground. The resemblance to the president of the village education committee was uncanny. No one felt that there was anything wrong with this. Every intervention claims to be child-centred and sensitive to the needs of children, but the child is most often not in sight.

There was talk of practical science learning, introduction of worksheets for curriculum coverage and to serve as a tool for daily assessment of what is taught and what is learnt by the child, and so on. Then began a discussion on how several programmes have been started for overall development of the child – regular organized sports and games, yoga, vipasana, libraries and radio programmes for children.

One listened with a degree of cynicism to the talk of how children and their needs were kept central to setting up of libraries in schools. The libraries set up in the name of children often fall in one of two categories. Either the money is used to buy newspapers, magazines and books of interest for the teacher and other adults, or if a school has been supplied with a set of children’s books, the criteria for such selection often eluding any logic, the books are carefully locked in cupboards so that they do not get spoilt in usage!

So what was new in Jharkhand? A totally different and exciting process was adopted. It would perhaps have been easiest to have gotten a list from the National Book Trust and other publishers of children’s books and purchase titles tailored to the available budget. A common enough occurrence. Here, however, a rare sensitivity to the needs of the child was displayed – a recognition that an adult is perhaps not the best person to select books for children. A totally radical process to involve children in selection of books was decided on.

All booksellers, including the National Book Trust, were invited to set up an exhibition of their books. 300 children from different schools were invited to peruse the exhibition and select around 100 titles to be bought for school libraries. What the children selected were comics, science fiction, fairytales. No books on great warriors or heroes. The children’s list was not wetted by adults and became the basis for the purchase of books for the libraries.

This simple process has given greater meaning to the much touted concepts of child participation and child-centred education. A library hour has been added to the regular school timetable, with every child having access to books. Children are encouraged to record their views and comments on what they have read. It’s too early to assess the extent to which the books will be used. But the sheer possibility to touch, feel and handle a book which is not a textbook will perhaps do more for stimulating an interest in reading than anything else. By now, of course, one was fully awake and began to regret that there was not enough time to visit the field to talk to children, to see what was happening in schools.

Another area seems equally promising – the use of the radio for teachers and children. The radio is being used for teacher training as well, a popular pilot programme being the one on learning English. In some states, radio programmes have been designed around the formal textbooks. Here in Jharkhand, a children’s storytelling programme, suno kahani is aired everyday on AIR. A story is narrated with an unfinished ending. At the end of the programme a question is posed. Children listening to the programme are invited to send in their answers by post. Letters received in a week are assessed by a teacher’s committee and a storybook posted to all those who answer correctly. This took me back to the days when I was an avid listener to the plays and stories broadcast over BBC.

The reach of the radio across state boundaries was amply demonstrated in a letter the programme received from Suman in Bihar. She writes, ‘I heard your story for the first time today. It was very nice. After Jharkhand state has been formed separate from Bihar, there seem to be many good programmes for children. The situation here is as is. I am sure you send storybooks only to children who live in Jharkhand. Even so, I am sending answers to your questions as I believe what the Gita says: that one should do one’s duty without expecting any fruits…’ Suman, of course, will get her storybook. The number of children writing back has started mounting. One only hopes that the expectations of the children are met and they all get their storybooks.

With all the talk of India Shining and all the dark spots that belie this shine, these vignettes from Jharkhand give some hope that people, even in government, are exploring and pursuing creative ways of approaching children’s learning. There is a rider of course. Will this be sustained by the next person who handles the project?

Kameshwari Jandhyala

 

Gauriganj dairy

January 21, 2004 – The sky was dark. A cold drizzle covered villages in Sultanpur in Uttar Pradesh. The hard wet tar road turned into a soft muddy path as soon as one stepped off the main road and headed into a village. It was hard to see anything; it was difficult to talk to people because everyone was huddled at home staying out of the cold and rain.

Sultanpur is halfway between Lucknow and Allahabad. It is close to Amethi and Rae Bareli – well known places. The Gandhi family has fought elections from here. Pratapgarh is not far: infamous because of the recent Raja Bhaiyya episode. Former Uttar Pradesh chief minister Rajnath Singh’s constituency, Haidergarh, is next door. This is the heartland of Uttar Pradesh.

When the opportunity arose to work in a rural district in Uttar Pradesh we were intrigued. The idea was to go from zero to reaching and teaching 10,000 children to read in a short period of two months. Could this be done? Would we find enough local young people who wanted to work with children? Could we transfer our accelerated reading technique to the local volunteers so quickly? In all of this, could we make fast progress but stay out of the politics and dynamics of elections in the region?

A small team wandered through Sultanpur trying to understand the topography and the educational situation. Even though it was raining heavily, we learnt some things about the district: villages are clustered together – small and mid-sized habitations around a larger village. The whole cluster together is called a mauja. Roads and canals crisscross mustard fields. Standing anywhere on a road, you can see at least three or four clusters of villages in the distance. Schools are prominent everywhere, distinct in their white and green appearance.1 Most children are enrolled in school. But in the schools and in the villages, there are lots of children, school-going children, who cannot read even a simple sentence.

We returned to Lucknow. In a few days, we would plan strategy, harness our resources and return to meet the challenge of getting every child to read in Sultanpur.

February 20, 2004 – It is about 9:30 in the morning. Our jeep winds its way through lush yellow and green fields. It is a beautiful winter day. The sun is bright and the air crisp. Children are running behind the jeep smiling, laughing and shouting ‘Didi namaste, Didi namaste’. We drop off their ‘didi’ Neelam by the side of a canal near Vishnudaspur mauja in Gauriganj block. Children immediately surround her. Some are holding her hand, others are running ahead. Neelam heads towards the school with the children and does not even look around to wave goodbye to us.

Half an hour later we reach Majhwara, another large village about 10 kilometers from Gauriganj. Shikha jumps out of the jeep and goes into the school. She is a slim, confident girl from Allahabad. There is one teacher in this school. The official enrollment is 238. It is exactly 10 am. Most of the enrolled children are already there, sitting in the sun in rows in the courtyard. The teacher is distracted today because he has lost his glasses. Shikha says namaste and goes to her own group of children. They are waiting, sitting in a circle inside one of the rooms. They jump up as soon as she enters. Bright faces, boys and girls. About 10 days back these children could barely read words but now they want to show off their newly acquired reading skills. Books are opened to the story of the day. Turn by turn they start to read aloud, often looking up eagerly to smile at Shikha. Four young women and one young man are standing around this circle of children looking intently. These are local volunteers who want to help.

The strategy we have adopted in Sultanpur is simple. We decided to concentrate our work in one block – Gauriganj. It has 57 revenue villages, 78 government primary schools with a total enrollment of about 12,000 children. We estimate that at least 40% children cannot read; that makes our target about 5000-6000 who have to become readers in two months.

For a start, we targeted 20 of the bigger villages or maujas in the block. We figured that it would be easier to find and mobilize young educated people in the bigger villages. A team of 15 experienced Pratham instructors from Lucknow and Allahabad went into these villages for the first time on 9 February. Although they had all worked in urban slums, none had ever been to a village, much less taught rural children. They had several tasks to do: first, they had to meet the local pradhan or panchayat member and ask him whether they could start work in the village. Next, they had to find 25 children who could not read and immediately start teaching them. Third, they had to start looking for potential volunteers from the village or nearby villages who would want to teach children to read.

‘I was really nervous on the first day,’ says Ratan Manjusha earnestly. ‘How would I find people to talk to, how would I know what to say? What if people get upset with me? They may think it is strange that a city girl is in their village. How would I find the village that I was to go to? There were so many questions on my mind.’ Sitting on a haystack in the middle of a field, eating a packed lunch of poori-aloo, listening to her, it is hard to imagine that she had been nervous 10 days back. ‘People were very polite and helpful. They listened to me and encouraged me to start teaching,’ she said. Then shyly looking up, she continued, ‘I feel so proud that I could do this by myself. Now I am ready to go anywhere and talk to anyone.’

Within a day or two, the Pratham team had started teaching 400 children. After discussions with the pradhan and the school headmaster, it was decided that the reading programme should happen during school hours in the school. In Gauriganj, enrolment of children in the age group 6 to 12 is high. Daily attendance is also high. In school after school one can see lots of children. Not only are children keen on coming to school, but they also come well before school time. Since children are in school and enthusiastic, the school was the best place to start.

We began our direct demonstration classes with children (age seven and above) in 16 big villages. Initially out of about 400 children, only 5% could read simple paragraphs and 95% were struggling with simple words and letters. Today (20 February), 47% are reading simple paragraphs, some can even read stories. Another 33% are confidently reading words. The reading revolution is well underway.

In less than a week, the 15-member Pratham team has also convinced about 150 local volunteers to join in this effort. For a week, local volunteers have been watching the demonstration class and learning how to teach. They are being asked to assist: they are learning how stories should be read aloud, how word games are to be played, how to help children use the barahkhadi chart. Most of these volunteers have already located 25 children each who cannot read. In a few days they will start to help their village children to read. The numbers of children who are starting to read will swell to 3000 by the end of February.

Local volunteers are enthusiastic but they have questions. It is around noon in the courtyard of Basupur primary school. There are two young girls, one older woman with a dupatta around her head, one shy young man and a smart older boy in jeans. ‘Will you be able to teach like these girls?’ I asked pointing to a Pratham teacher. The group nods energetically. The smartly dressed young boy moves closer, ‘Are we only going to do this for two months. What will we do after that?’ he asks. One of the girls starts tentatively, ‘Will we be paid? How do we know you will pay us?’ The older lady has a firm voice. She says, ‘These are our village children. We don’t want money but we need to know what to do. Will you stay with us to make sure we are doing it right?’

On 18 February, another 12 Pratham people from Delhi joined their colleagues in Gauriganj. They are targeting another section of the block. Immediately they fanned out to a different set of maujas, teaching children and looking for volunteers as they move around. By the time we reach Muharram and Holi, in the first week of March, we should have helped another set of 300 children read and created a net of local volunteers who in turn will help another 3000 children.

Transferring our technique, approach and attitude is the challenge. Will the local volunteers stay focused and feel the pressure of time like we do? Will they be able to elicit support from the village to encourage these children to read and to learn more? Will they be able to replicate the experiment to reach larger and larger numbers of children so that in a few months all children in the entire district are reading?

By Holi, Pratham’s ‘fast action jump-start’ team will return to Lucknow, Allahabad and Delhi. Hopefully by the time they leave they will have demonstrated with 1000 children that fast visible change in reading is possible. Baseline tests with children were validated by the school principals. We will ensure that the final tests with children of the demonstration classes will be done in front of the pradhan and people from the village. A core team will stay behind to work with the large number of local volunteers. The core team and the local teams will aim to have all children above the age of seven in Gauriganj block reading fluently by the end of April.

There is much more ahead. Once children learn to read, immense horizons open up. In school after school and village after village, the enthusiasm and energy of children is infectious. Children who can read and write well are vying for attention. The Gauripur school is beyond a long stretch of mustard fields. It is just after lunchtime and children are returning to school. Seeing us they run up and want to chat. ‘Sarso kaise nikalta hai?’ I ask, looking at the mustard fields that we are walking through. The girls giggle. They can’t imagine that there is someone who doesn’t know. One of them leans across and shows me where the seeds are.

The school has a huge yard that looks white because of the colour of the fine soil here. There is a large blackboard propped up against a chair. ‘What is the name of your village.’ Children rush to the blackboard to write. In large letters, a boy writes ‘Belkhariyaan ka poorva’. ‘What is the name of your block?’ More children want to write. ‘Gauriganj’. ‘The district?’ At least 50 children are crowding around – all want to come and write. A left-handed boy writes ‘Sultanpur’. We move to state. There is some controversy about how the joint letters in ‘Uttar’ should be written, but the argument is resolved quickly. Then we come to country. One girl writes ‘Bharat’. Another one quickly adds ‘desh’. Eyebrows knitted, tongue taut between her teeth ‘Where is our country’ I ask. A boy says ‘Prithvi’. Very knowledgeably he adds, ‘You know the world is round.’ ‘Really?’ I ask. We all look around at the flat, lush farmland around us. ‘Masterji says so,’ states the boy emphatically.

Today there are almost 40 Pratham people all over Gauriganj block. Every morning people go off in different directions. They teach and they reach more and more people every day and talk to them about the importance of helping children learn. Some people argue, some help, others are quiet but everyone listens. In the evening they all return to Gudiya Bhawan in Gauriganj where the entire team is staying.

There are so many little and big stories everyday. Sanjay and Shabana come back from Darpipur. The panchayat is impressed with little Shabana’s style of teaching. The pradhan and the school teachers have watched her all day. The villagers have loaned Sanjay a bicycle for the duration of his stay in Gauriganj. Tasleem, Radhika and Rahul have had a productive day in Amethi talking to students of the colleges. Student volunteers are keen to help after their exams. Maya returns tired but triumphant. She has been to Trilokpur and neighbouring maujas. There are no demonstration classes there but she wants to find local volunteers. Not only has the pradhan accompanied her to two schools in different maujas and participated in assessing children’s reading skills, but he insisted on giving Maya a ride on his bicycle all the way back to the main road. Most pradhans and panchayats have been supportive. All gram panchayats meet on Wednesdays. Sanjay and Sanjeev have started attending these meetings to make ‘reading’ an agenda for the block.

Every day is a learning experience: for us, the children, the school, the panchayat and the village. The adults are watching keenly, observing closely. Some are skeptical. Schemes and programmes have come and gone and nothing really changes, they say. Can people’s participation be sustained? Will people really rally round to solve simple problems together? Our young team is very straightforward. Things change when you change them, they say. The school is the village’s own school. The children are the village’s own children. It seems natural that village people should assist in helping children to learn.

It is almost dark. The sabzi bazaar is Gauriganj town is still crowded. A young college girl rides her cycle determinedly through the maze of shoppers and thelawalas, scooters and tongas. Her pink salwar kameez stands out brightly in the dark. The sharp breeze makes her dupatta flow behind her. Perhaps she will go back to her village and think about all the children who cannot read. Perhaps she too will come forward tomorrow.

Let us watch and see how this story unfolds.

Rukmini Banerji