Foundational Literacy and Numeracy
Introduction
With close to two decades of experience working closely with the students enrolled in the government schools through Prerana, we have been able to identify the specific challenges that prevent them from understanding FLN concepts. Sikshana is proposing to take an approach with the focus on improving foundational literacy and numeracy among the students of grades IV, V, VI and VII in Karnataka.
Highlights of the proposed solution:
- While NIPUN Bharath calls the nation to get into mission mode regarding FLN, we need the schools to get into mission mode with very specific tasks. With this in mind our solution proposes to have the entire school ecosystem focus on achieving the desired outcome.
- While most government school children do not get the necessary academic support from their parents, here the age group of the children we are looking at, will have parents who have likely completed middle school and will be able to at least support their child’s FLN attainment effort. Our solution proposes to tap into this very important resource.
- Normal remedial interventions tend to run for a short period of time in a year. Our solution keeps the focus on for the entire duration of the academic year.
Pedagogy:
To ensure every child accomplishes FLN while sailing through the regular grade level curriculum, a robust pedagogy needs to be formulated. The key elements are:
- The inputs
- The methodology of engaging with the inputs
- Reinforcing learning over a longer period of time
Stakeholder Engagement:
The role of stakeholders is key in the overall success of the proposed program. In the proposed structure, all the key stakeholders have equal participation influencing the overall child’s learning progress. Sikshana is setting up a process by defining roles of each stakeholder in building a conducive environment resulting in a positive transformation.
Students Readiness Program:
Students are made part of the FLN mission by bringing awareness about the importance of the program and setting expectations about their roles. The students work towards their level specific goals leveraging peer support along with guidance from teachers and parents. The whole class gets into a mission mode in not leaving anyone behind in FLN and getting into action via peer-learning practices (already structured under Prerana).
Teachers Readiness Program:
A teacher is an important part of the mission and is the primary influencer in the classroom. Teacher readiness includes the teacher's understanding of the objectives, processes and responsibilities. Teachers will be oriented to
- facilitate learning in the classroom,
- creating and maintaining student portfolio,
- leverage “My Learning Journey Certificate” (issued to all children under the Prerana program) as a mechanism to track individual child’s progress in acquiring FLN competencies and
- provide remedial assistance as needed.
Education Department Staff Readiness Program:
Role of Cluster Resource Person (CRP) in tracking the learning process will be very critical for the success of the program. In addition to a set of processes, robust technology solutions will be given to the CRPs to track the cluster level improvement on FLN among the students and school. Sikshana mentors will coordinate with the CRPs and Block Resource Person (BRPs) to provide the necessary handholding on the tech solution and also extend the support in tracking the students’ progress at the cluster level and block level.
Parental Readiness Program:
As it is evidenced that the child does acquire a variety of experiences through various activities from the people the child cohabits, parental participation will further help them progress well in the overall learning journey. At the start of the program, the parents will be given an orientation on their role and responsibility towards their child acquiring the FLN competencies. They will be made aware of how to engage with their child with the activity book, participate in predefined activities with the child and keep track of the child's progress through the learning journey certificate. They will also be required to regularly participate in PTM to understand monthly competencies to undertake corresponding support to children at home through reading books, solving simple problems, playing games, singing, reciting rhymes and narrating stories and appropriate use of digital devices to provide exposure to online digital resources and periodic visits to Gram Panchayat Library with the child.
School Development and Monitoring Committee (SDMC) Readiness Program:
SDMC, a committee formed by the government which has been given the necessary power for governing the overall functioning of the school, will be effectively involved in the overall implementation of the program and monitor the progress, allowing children to showcase their work by involving community members (Panchayat Development Officer, Panchayat Members or older students) to evaluate and motivate the child. Also track the child's progress by reviewing “My Learning Journey Certificate” on a periodic basis and also involve in the peer learning process. One nominated FLN member from the SDMC committee will be involved in tracking the overall progress of the program.
Measure, Evaluate and Motivate:
Sikshana firmly believes that for a program to be effective, replicable and sustainable, a strong M&E system is very essential. From the beginning, Sikshana has ensured that all its products and processes will have an M&E framework as part of the design itself. Unlike most other systems where only the eventual program output is measured, the focus here is on measuring the input, its usage by the stakeholders and the resulting output. All these aspects and the outcomes along with the eventual impact, is all considered within the framework. Over the years Sikshana has been using a hybrid approach to monitoring, with digital devices or just plain paper (OMR) to gather data as appropriate. The tool itself is projected as a mechanism for the schools to share their best practices or success which in turn motivates the stakeholders to provide timely and reliable data.
Impact:
We intend to have every child moving out of primary level to be adept with FLN competencies.