Ravindra Kumar Mishra
(The author is former Chief Consultant, MHRD, GOI. He can be reached at email: rkmishrajee@gmail.com, and phone: 8473052472)
There are schools. There are children in schools, few out of school, and few leave schools in between without completing elementary cycle of education. There is plethora of reasons for children being out of school whereas something is less than desirable in schooling system for those who leave school in between. Achievement and learning outcome of those who complete the cycle remains a challenge. Enhancing learning outcome of children largely depends on availability of teachers and their integrating skills. It is observed that the expectation from teachers today is different and includes many new attributes. They are expected to be aware of enabling learning environments, the provisions regarding 21st century developments, gender, the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act and the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act, and leadership qualities too.
The teachers are the powerhouse of the nation and they must be of the highest quality and command worldwide respect. In view of this, National Initiative for School Heads’ and Teachers’ Holistic Advancement (NISHTHA), an initiative, first of its kind and one of the largest teacher training programmes in the world, wherein 42 lakh elementary teachers are to be trained across the country and about 1.9 lakh teachers including head teachers in Assam, has been started in the State. This training brings standardized training modules developed at national level for all States and UTs with flexibility and openness to contextualize the training modules and use their own material and resource persons also, keeping in view the core topics and expected outcomes of NISHTHA by minimizing the transmission loss. Thus, the programme aims to train all school heads and teachers as first level counselors to be alert and responsive to the needs of the students, in addition to promoting joyful learning and taking special care of the requirements of special children. It expects to improve awareness and upgrade their skills on various aspects related to learning outcomes, competency based learning and testing, learner-centered pedagogy, school safety and security etc.
In context to impart training to teachers in Assam, a pool of 1,506 State resource persons (SRPs) and key resource persons (KRPs) have been trained in five batches by National Resource Group members of NCERT and NIEPA, the apex academic authority and apex leadership academy respectively of the country in collaboration with SCERT Assam from 10th October to 15th November, 2019. These SRPs and KRPs will impart training to teachers to develop their skills on various aspects related to learning outcomes, competency based learning and testing, learner-centered pedagogy, school safety and security, personal-social qualities, inclusive education, information and communication technology (ICT) in teaching-learning including artificial intelligence (AI), health and well-being including yoga, initiatives in school education including library, eco club, youth club, kitchen garden, school leadership qualities, environmental concerns, pre-school, pre-vocational education and school-based assessment in a joyful learning manner.
The prominent features of this integrated programme are activity based modules including educational games and quizzes, social-emotional learning, motivational interactions, team building, preparation for school based assessment, in-built continuous feedback mechanism, online monitoring and support system, training need and impact analysis (pre- and post- training).
In order to ensure sustainable impact on Block level training in districts, beginning from 2nd week of November 2019 and thereafter classroom transactions, this integrated training programme is embedded with post-training interventions including provision of mentoring. national resource persons and faculty and consultants of SCERT Assam and officers of SSA will regularly be in touch with KRPs This will help in building pedagogical skills and connecting with peers, thereby leading to improvement in learning outcomes of the students. It is expected that this will help in better classroom transaction and transformation of the head teachers into providing academic and administrative leadership for the schools for fostering new initiatives.
The demography and topography of Assam is unique. It comprises hills, plains and forests on the one hand and different language speakers and cultures etc. on the other. This diversity is the State’s distinctiveness and accordingly, the requirements are diverse. Owing to geographical constraints, limited availability of space and infrastructure, availability of electricity, mobile and internet challenges and insufficient ICT resources – physical and human both, etc. at district and sub-district level, necessitates “nishtha”, close coordination among stakeholders to accomplish the objectives in letter and spirit, leading to scintillate the faces of children by their mesmerizing learning outcome.