By Capt. Indraani Singh | CEO & Managing Trustee
Literacy India has been working with the migrant communities for more than two decades, where children with weak educational foundation are forced to follow their parents, irrespective of school session schedule. We have strongly advocated technology aided education and now its relevance is more than ever. It is only with technology and specially designed software that vulnerable and underprivileged children can be brought up to speed, given the situation.
Gyantantra Digital Dost has successfully been implemented by us to ensure out-of-school children as well as school dropouts, students weak in academics to get basic education for their better future and accelerate the learning process. However, with education centers and schools being shut, these children need devices to continue to push against the despair of the situation. The marginal communities cannot afford mobile phones or laptops, and this is the community which needs the crutches of educational foundation the most – not just to survive such unprecedented situation but also to ensure that the progress made by the country does not slip away.
The COVID 19 pandemic has impacted each one of us, the severity of which is yet to unfurl. As the world braces itself for what lies ahead, the Indian Government is struggling to ensure the security of the future generation. One of the key aspects, education – especially elementary education - is at a critical junction as experts worry that the progress made so far, has since suffered.
The recent migrant crisis and the continuity of schools being shut is a major blow to the 427 million children in the country. But especially impacted are children above 6 years of age, a critical age to create a robust educational foundation.
Literacy India has a robust solution to meet this monumental challenge. Not only do we have an intelligent educational software which focuses on individual learning capacity but also serves as a resilient and patient ‘teacher’. We started the project using Google Classroom with the children of these communities. Students made trained in Google classroom, assigned worksheets, assignments, recreational projects where these children can be engaged under the guidance of teacher.
Gyantantra Digital Dost in the time of Lockdown:
Literacy India has developed multimedia software called Gyantantra Udbhav as a part of the ICT-based learning program called Gyantantra Digital Dost (GDD). This software was conceptualized to be used in conjunction with classroom/text-book teaching. GDD is a revolutionary digital education model which develops & enhances children’s interest towards education. It has made the learning process more interesting, attention-grabbing and enjoyable along with increasing student retention. This self-paced learning software benefits underprivileged women and children.
In the time of pandemic, when schools across nations were shut to curb the spread of coronavirus, Literacy India made the digital education accessible to the students virtually. The GDD Google classroom has enabled the children to continue their education through virtual mode. They were able to continue their academic with same pace and able to compete with peer group.
Process Undertaken:
Activities undertaken during the quarter:
Story of Change
Veena ( Name Change) , Class III Location : Rajashthan India
‘The Harder you work, the greater you feel when you achieve it’
Veena, a student of Class III got disconnected with her education due to sudden shutdown of schools in covid pandemic. She had no access to education for months that made her unlearn many learnt concepts.
In the time of crisis, when student’s future surrounded with darkness, Literacy India (LI) came up with the model of digital learning, accessible to the underserved. Ravina made enrolled under the Gyantantra Udbhav program of LI. She was provided training on Google Classroom to make her understand the concept of live classes and method to operate it. In the Pre-assessment conducted to measure the students’ learning level, she scored below average and was not able to solve the questions of her level.
She has been proven as an active learner. She regularly attended live classes under the mentorship of teacher facilitator. She always completes her work on time. During the time, she also came across number of problems in her day to day life but didn’t give up but worked with focus and dedication. Initially, she faced problem in solving mathematical questions for which she took assistance from teacher virtually and cleared her doubts. Now, she independently solves the questions of addition and subtraction of 3-4-digit numbers without any difficulty. Her knowledge in Hindi and English language enhanced. She is able to read the story books of her level efficiently and attempt the questions of days of the week, names of the month, parts of body and word formation without any error.
Veena belongs to the farmers family, residing in Jhalawar, Rajasthan. Her parents are illiterate but understand the significance of education. They are happy with the progress of Veena in academics and overall personality development. They are thankful to Literacy India for supporting their daughter’s education.
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