EnglishHelper and The English Language

We have always been engaged in using technology in to teach the English Language. They can start our programs at their level by taking an English test, which ensures more effective English learning and improvement in spoken English, reading, comprehension, fluency, and confidence. Our goal is to make our programs affordable, convenient, fun to use, and therefore very effective. Each aspect of our programs is designed keeping this goal in mind. Our relentless focus on the customer will help make ours the story the world talks about.

Fiddle and Fire

A few weeks ago, my flight arrived late. The gentleman who drives my car has an invigorating sense of curiosity. Though he has made countless trips to the airport he has never been on an airplane. Why, he enquired, do planes get delayed? Driving in the NCR, which registers thousands of new vehicles each month, is no easy task. Perhaps, as he looks up at the vast expanse of sky he wonders what it must be to pilot a vehicle without the cacophony of horns and desperate motorists?

This fine man has never received formal education in the English Language. He can barely read Hindi, his mother tongue. Though Archimedes discovered the principles of buoyancy more than 2000 years ago, my driver friend does not know what makes an object sink or swim.

When I ask him, he says if he had to relive his life, he would definitely want to be literate and educated. “When I first came to Delhi 30 years ago, I did not know how education could make a difference. Now I realize it is the key to immense possibilities.”

The ASER Report

On 13th January, the latest Annual Status of Education Report (ASER) was released. The survey, conducted across 577 rural districts, measures the health of basic education (including reading abilities) of students attending government schools. Not surprising yet deeply disturbing, ASER confirms that over half the students in government schools in grade V are unable to read grade II text in their native language! When it comes to English Language, the situation is obviously worse. In grade V only one fourth can read simple English sentences and of those who can read almost half cannot comprehend what they are reading. What is being done to help these students learn English?

The findings relating to the ability of these students to undertake simple math (e.g. subtraction or division) are equally alarming.

Let us come back to the story of the curious driver. Living alone in the city, his family in the village, this man has toiled the years and ensured his children attend school. He would have it no other way. His son, after completing his school education, is undertaking an engineering program at a college a few hours from Delhi. I know the young man; energetic and enthusiastic, he wants to be the dream that keeps his father going. The problem is he is one of those millions of students who have not received the quality of English language education that ASER laments. Though he has passed the school examinations, it is evident his language and math skills are weak. Thus, despite the Rs 75000 college tuition fees his father invests annually, it is hard to imagine how he will escape being one of the 80% unemployable engineering graduates of India.

The Delhi election campaigns are at a crescendo peak. A powerful politician promises citizens’ uninterrupted power to their homes and business establishments. It would appear this leader does not recognize nor is responsible for the plight of almost 600 students in a government school not more than 2 hours, as the crow flies, from the President’s Palace. This school boasts just 1 teacher and is not connected to any source of power supply.

The day ASER was published (actually making the front page of some newspapers) I browsed the various news channels at prime time. The debates, that hallmark our democracy, were vigorous. How do we solve the mystery that shrouds the death of the socialite?

History, some fact some fiction, claims the emperor Nero fiddled while Rome burnt around him. Such was his callous attitude. How many hopes of how many children will it take for us to put away our fiddles? The fact is the fire is truly upon us.

The original article has been published by The Economic Times