Teacher Training in SSA - Field Reality

Training is one of the most important aspects which is either overlooked or over-emphasized in govt. departments. The latter is true for SSA. A lot of money goes into teacher training, a lot many people are involved, number of rooms are occupied and much time is spent in planning and implementation of the same. This process has a direct bearing on a major proportion of children who study in Government and Government aided schools. To speak the truth there are some very experienced resource persons who inspite of coming from the field and having a teaching experience of decades sit together and develop a very fine module, whose level is way higher than the solution to the issues in field. The reality of teachers and students in field has some of the very basic issues like basic subtractions problems, basic double digit multiplication, basic grammar skills, basic behavioral skills!! The focus must be on fixing the basic things rather than showing one's intellectual prowess in making a Phd thesis level of module.

There are many issues on field in implementing the training programme like trainee teachers coming awfully late and going back very early, chatting the time away, filling TA/DA forms, discussing Teacher Union demands etc. which completely mars the purpose of conducting training. These issues will be discussed in a later blog with sufficient evidence.

However, the question that one needs to ask is that are we filling the gap through these trainings? Or are we doing our 10-to-5 job by designing a gold chain where a small woodwork would do the job?

During my field visit to Adilabad district (5th-7th June, 2012) in Andhra Pradesh, I came across this block (mandal) level teacher training. I will soon put the subtitles in the video, but for the initial part one doesn't need subtitles, the quality of resource person says it all (apparently it turned out to be a gold plated chain!). The video below captures some of the points which need concrete answers:

ITDA Paderu and KR Puram Visit

As the schools are closed for summer vacations, the visit to ITDAs this time focused more on the sanitation issues, I wanted to check whether toilets in the ITDAs are being maintained during off season or not. Also, based on the school strength, whether enough number of toilets are there for the students or not. The report of the same would be shared with district and state level functionaries, so that corrective action is taken before schools open in June'12.

In ITDA Paderu (12-13th May) , I also checked the status of computer installations in KGBVs. Most of the KGBVs are undergoing construction work for the additional classrooms. The focus on sanitation is relatively low and running water is a major issue in most of the KGBVs.The observation is depicted through the photographs below:


ITDA KR Puram has no KGBVs, the focus of the visit was solely on toilets here. The good part about this ITDA is that it has running water in all the schools I visited. I also came across an absurd toilet construction in one of the schools. The ppt (link) and pics are attached :)

The good part about this job...

The ping pong balls

The district officials can also be termed as the ping pong balls, just like in table tennis, they can be called at any point of time to the State level Office for a game of data-data, sometimes even twice/thrice in a month! In an ideal world, they were  supposed to move in the field, implement schemes and report back issues to the State Office. It was the job of the State Office to plan and weed out inefficiency through this ideal reporting/feedback system but this rarely happened! Instead, it made them their bunnies, calling them at their whims and fancies. Now, the main job of ping pong balls is to remain in the district office, play with files and God only knows from where they get the data. Throughout the year, the cycle of monthly review meetings - > giving target - > collecting data - > reviewing some other target in the subsequent meeting!! - > collecting additional data goes on and on...

Learnings

An image I captured 2 years back

Calendar

Have added my official calendar on both my blog and facebook page :)

How to subtract

After giving a small question on subtraction to one of the kids, I asked him to do the same using wooden sticks. He took his time, and did it successfully :)