Spoken English and India’s Reading Challenge
At EnglishHelper, we have always been obsessed with Education and the English language. Our Spoken English courses are designed with a keen understanding of our customers need. We believe that language is best learnt when it is in the context of the learners. Keeping this in mind, the content of each of our courses is designed to be relevant to their context and level.
India’s Reading Challenge – the Technology Compulsion
India has a reading crisis. Year after year, the Annual Status of Education Report (ASER) highlights that more than half of the students in government schools are unable to read text books of lower grades. It is important to note this is the measure of their reading ability in their first language of instruction. Given the plethora of languages in India, it is also important to remember students quite often are being instructed in a language that is not their mother tongue. Spoken English, an aspiration for most, is obviously a greater challenge for these students.
As per ASER 2014, in middle school only a fourth of the students could read a simple English sentence and, a large number of those who could read did not comprehend what they were reading.
The problem is beyond argument. This is a national crisis that has profound social and economic implications. Solutions have to be designed and implemented to improve Spoken English amongst students, and there is no time to just experiment. The challenge is magnified by the sheer scale of the issue (India has about 1.2 million government schools with almost 180 million children enrolled).
Before we start discussing possible interventions let us take a look at some of the major factors that contribute to the current situation. Our government schools, for the most part, cater to students from BOP families. In many cases, parents and other family members are illiterate and are unable to provide any learning support to their children. Add to that the shortage of qualified and skilled teachers and the resultant picture starts telling its own story. A visit to the average classroom will typically offer the following scene – a harassed teacher trying to manage a large group of students of varying ages, who are attempting to comprehend a book that is clearly too complex for them.
To solve this vexing problem, a number of causes need to be addressed. However, the first port of call must be to make the forty plus minutes of each class period count. While, human resource oriented efforts must continue they will neither be scalable nor affordable immediately or in the moderate term. Technology is the only way to scale across the country at the pace that is needed.
The Role of Education Technology in India
Central Square Foundation, a Delhi based advocacy organization, has published The EdTech Promise: Catalyzing Quality School Education at Scale that highlights the role education technology can play in India. The research paper Teaching with Technology: Early EdTech Adoption by Indian School Teachers reports “more than 75% of teachers who found pressure to complete textbook syllabus a barrier to adopting technology indicated that increased availability of curriculum-aligned resources would enable them to use technology more.”
Interventions that operate with the principles of minimum change and sustainability as their core tenets will have greater chance of success. For example, if existing text books are supported by the technology solution; teachers and educators are not agonized about the syllabus and pedagogy. If additional classes are not required, the acceptance and deployment in schools is much easier. Finally, if teachers continue to lead the process of English learning, the technology is easy to use and makes them more effective in class; the battle is ready to be won.
Improving Spoken English with Technology
Under the ICT Scheme, more than 100,000 government schools have been provided with computers. Technology enabled reading interventions could be spread to these schools with almost zero additional infrastructural investment and at great speed. Overtime, with the growing penetration of the internet the potential for expansion will be further enhanced as schools and students get connected.
Our children must not be denied their right to read and be given every opportunity to learn English. Technology is not just a plaything for smart retail. We have an opportunity to fix India’s literacy challenge quickly and efficiently. Technology offers the compulsory opportunity to do so.
The original article has been published by The Economic Times
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