Warwick Laksh Project, Summer 2013 Feedback

Jessica Conrad

Warwick Laksh Project, Summer 2013– Feedback

I would just like to say a big thank you to everyone who organised the project and made such an amazing experience possible. I really did have an amazing time and the work Ila is doing is brilliant!

1)Laksh School.

The current setup and schooling situation at/around Laksh

During our visit the setup was centred around three different schools and locations. In the mornings the older children received tuition in the school located next to the Laksh Farm. In the afternoons there were two separate schools in the two neighbouring villages. The school in Manger was located outside one of the teacher’s family home. In Silakri the school was within a rented building, with only one of the rooms available for use. The rest of the children had their lessons on the veranda outside. During our final week at Laksh Farm Ila opened another school in Manger village, within a building which she has rented. However, as we were the first group we did not get to spend any time within this school, or see how it functioned. Therefore, I cannot provide feedback on this particular school.

The number of pupils and age groups of pupils

The number of pupils varied massively between the different schools. In the morning tuition with the older pupils there were on average 6 or 7 pupils between the ages of 16 and 22. In this tuition the attendance was pretty much consistent which meant that lessons could be easily planned and developed. In the afternoon tuitions the amount of pupils present would vary quite a lot. In Silakri school attendance could reach up to 150 pupils. The age range was from around 3 to 16 years old. In Manger village the number of pupils was much smaller, normally around 40 pupils. The age range was much the same, with the youngest being around 3 and the oldest pupil around 15 years old.

Numbers of teachers\volunteers working at the school;

In Silakri School there were initially 3 student teachers, Shokeen, Ramesh and Jagamohan. Obviously with 150 pupils this was not enough. Whilst we were there we would take a class of around 40, whilst the other three teachers took other classes outside. When the new school in Manger village opened Ramesh moved from Silkari to teach there. Ranjit was being prepped in order to take over. However, this still means that the school only has 3 teachers. Although they are doing a brilliant job, and obviously care greatly for the children, they simply cannot teach to their full potential whilst teaching such large classes. Whilst we were there we discussed this with Ila and she was aware of this problem and was trying to find more teachers to help out.

In the Manger Village school there were 3 student teachers, Sangeeta, Ritu and Sandeep. This was a nice amount, and the teachers there complimented the atmosphere at the school. Although it may seem a little strange that Manger school has the same amount of teachers as Silakri, even though it has 100 less pupils,I do not think that this amount should be lowered. Whilst we were there we saw Sandeep grow from strength to strength with his teaching and his confidence levels grew massively. Whilst Sangeeta and Ritu were also developing they were still perhaps lacking in confidence and if they were to be left within the school teaching on their own I do not feel that they would be able to teach to the standard needed. However, they were both very dedicated to the children and eager to learn and I am sure that with time they will be able to develop further. For the time being though Sandeep is definitely needed within the school to help.

Madan had been recently employed by Ila to help run everything. He took the tuition in the mornings and went between all of the schools.

Type of classes;

When we were not there the children were taught English, Maths, Hindi and Domestic Science. What was lacking were any lessons which encouraged creativity within the children. There were no art lessons, no drama lessons. There was also a lack of general world knowledge and geography. The children would have perhaps benefitted from some knowledge of the environment and recycling, as they had little or no knowledge of this. It was with hindsight that I wish I had perhaps brought up environmental issues with them more.

The maths lessons were taught to a very high standard and were executed very well. You could see that the children were very proud of their mathematic ability, which they definitely should have been!

Standard of English of pupils;

In the morning tuition the level of English varied between the pupils. Ramesh, Jagmohan and Shokeen spoke English confidently from the beginning. Sandeep after a while also began to speak with confidence to a reasonably high standard. Sangeeta had very good written levels of English and spoke reasonably well, although she did not understand a lot of the technical concepts. Ritu struggled with English, but this did not stop her trying or having passion for it!

The standard of English in Silakri was much lower in general than in Manger. I’m not sure if this was a product of the classes being smaller in Manger. In Manger school, even the really young pupils could say ‘hello my name is…’. The pupils from around 6 upwards could form whole sentences and were able to pick up different topics confidently.

In Silakri there was a wide range of ability in the standard of English. Some children could not speak any, whilst others were able to confidently form sentences. I cannot say why there was such a big difference between the two schools. I do not believe that it was a reflection on the level of teaching they were receiving. It may have been a by-product of having such large classes. It also seemed as though the children in Silakri lacked confidence, whereas the children in Manger were much more outgoing. This may be why we did not get to see their ability as much.

However, we were informed by the University and former volunteers that we would be lucky if the pupils would be able to say their ABC’s by the time we left. I can confidently say that the level of nearly all of the pupils was a million times higher than this. They provided us with much more of a challenge than we were expecting! Pupils such as Sandeep were able to read Martin Luther Kings ‘I have a dream speech’ within a few weeks of us being there. What may have been perceived as the pupils low standards of English may actually have been a lack of confidence.

Resources available / detrimentally absent.

I think the BIGGEST and most prominent problem which we experienced in this respect was PENCILS AND BOOKS! Ila provided ample amounts of supplies of both to all of the schools. The issue was not the resources but the lack of places to store them. The pupils would forget to bring pencils and books back to school with them. This meant that at least half an hour of each lesson was spent handing out pencils (finding pencils!) and handing out paper to those who forgot their books. After a while this began to get quite repetitive. If there was perhaps a way of storing their equipment in the schools, meaning they cannot take it home and forget it, this would be brilliant!

Stored away in the school next to Ila’s farm was an abundance of art and craft materials which could be used, however, the student teachers did not really know what to do with it! People were donating things to the school, but the teachers had no real idea what they could be used for. This was something which I hadn’t really considered. We are obviously privileged enough to have all of the resources we need, and have used them all of the way through school. At Laksh this was obviously not the case. Therefore it needs to be taken into consideration when donating resources to the school that they may need some guidance as to how to use them.

Space was another very big issue. In Silakri there was one class room and 4 blackboards. Obviously this was not enough. The heavy use of blackboards was also due to the lack of card to make other teaching resources. Something which I didn’t realise until I got to the schools was that what the schools really needed were resources for the teachers. Flash cards, balls to use in circle time, white boards would all really benefit the school and the pupils.

In Manger Village School the only resources the teachers had were one blackboard, and some posters with the alphabet and numbers on. The children did not have desks or seats. Although this is not ideal, and I understand that they are doing their best in the given circumstances a few more resources could really make a difference. If they had equipment to help make games and fun ways of learning then it really would not matter that they did not have a traditional school set up at all.

2)Your role at the school during the placement.

Thesubjects/broad areas you taught;

When we arrived we decided to split into two teams of two, myself and Julia were one pair and Hannah and Inger another. Our teaching styles and topics were very different and this was perhaps beneficial to the programme. Julia and I mainly focused our attention on English and History. Whilst Inger and Hannah brought more attention to maths.

Within English we covered the present and past tense, connectives, articles and other grammatical points in the morning tuition. The level of English spoken was very high so we tried to make the lessons as interesting as possible. We noticed that the pupils in the morning tuition knew a lot of the grammatical rules and understood the principles, but were not using them, or were not using them correctly. Therefore we focused a lot of our attention on oral lessons. We made sure that every day the pupils would have to present something in English in various different tenses.

In the morning tuition Madan asked us to teach history. We decided that as some of the pupils, such as Ramesh, had a basic understanding of politics and political systems, we would try and teach history around a frame work which would teach them about different ideologies and the way the world has developed. We decided as they were older they could deal with more complex themes and ideas so we covered the Civil Rights Movement in America, the Suffragettes, Roman History and the French Revolution. We also did some lessons on culture and different religions.

In Manger Village and Silakri School we just focused on English. We taught many different topics:

• Colours
• Emotions
• Sports
• Clothes
• Animals
• Directions
• Transportation
• Family
• General Conversation
• Age

Any new methods/approaches you employed. Comment also on what went well/not well and why;

Straight away we adopted a more interactive approach. We introduced circle time, where the children would have to all interact and mix. This was especially important in Silkari as the girls and certain boy members of the class were set aside, and the class did not feel united. Therefore we felt it was important that everyone worked together. Once we did this the girls became much more confident and were more willing to participate. It also meant that every pupil had a chance to participate, no matter what their ability was. There was a tendency amongst the teachers to simply ask the higher ability members of the class to answer questions, and forget about the others. This was something which we tried to stop, although I do not think by the time we left the teachers were practicing this.

Another problem was that the children were learning by rote, and early on we realised that although the pupils could read the word ‘red’ if we pointed to a red object they didn’t know that it was red. They simply knew the words and not the meaning. Therefore, we asked the teachers to stop using the blackboards and the rote method of teaching. We wanted them to interact with the pupils. Introduce songs and be more hands on with their approach. One day in Manger Village school, two of the little girls took themselves off with the ball we used in circle time and started passing it to each other, asking each other questions in English, mimicking what we had been doing with them. It was great to see this, and it showed that the children obviously enjoyed this way of learning. This worked to a certain extent; however by the time we left some of the teachers were still relying on teaching by rote and blackboards.

Methods which really worked were flash cards. We used these to introduce a topic and words. We would then ask the pupils to draw pictures. They were not normally allowed to draw so this meant that they were excited and it made the learning fun and memorable. After this we would introduce circle time and ask the pupils one by one to stand up and say a sentence which we had been learning. Then we would ask them to write it down. We wanted the student teachers to see that different methods were good and that creativity helped to make learning more fun.

When we left we felt that the student teachers had begun to take on some of these methods and were understanding that they could be creative and try different things. These methods did work on the pupils and encouraged them to keep coming back to school.

Any improvements in the understanding and ability of the students, in particular in English and Mathematics.

The most notable change in Silkari was amongst the students who were of a lower level to begin with, especially the girls. Once the girls were given attention and brought up to speed they could show that they had a good ability. The class as a whole was quite difficult to gage in improvement. There was a wide range of abilities within the one class. This meant that one day the lower abilities would improve, but the higher ability pupils would become bored. However, the understanding of English did improve and you could tell this by the way the children used the words. One of the children, on the first day, could not tell me the colours on the number line we had made. Second week in he took me to the front and pointed to the colours correctly. It was small moments like this that really made you feel as though you were making a difference.

In Manger the children were very receptive and picked up concepts very quickly, and retained the knowledge well. At the beginning of the lesson we would recap other topics and they would remember them very well.

In the morning tuition we saw the pupils come on leaps and bounds. Whether this was their ability or confidence improving, or perhaps both, I am not sure. However, you could tell a really big difference from when we arrived to when we left and we were really proud of them.

3)Your work with the current teachers at Laksh.

The standardof English of the teachers;

Initially I was slightly apprehensive about how the teachers could be teaching the younger pupils English when their English was not at a fluent level. To a certain degree I still have that uncertainty, as at times we would see them teach the younger pupils something in English which was incorrect. Ramesh was very good at English and Shokeen was very good at the technical grammar and they were both confident English teachers, and their standard of English was perfectly adequate for the level they were teaching. Jagomahan was at a fairly high level, but on certain occasions he was teaching the kids incorrect things. Ritu and Sangeeta were of a lower level than the rest of the class and if they were to teach English to the older pupils then I think that they would struggle. Sandeep’s English was also pretty good. However, they were able to teach the children basic concepts well, and with time and more practice they will be absolutely fine.

The methods of teaching in place on your arrival. Please identify the strong areas and where you thought there were gaps/room for improvement;

The methods used were simply to teach by rote and to use the blackboard. It was also common that the teachers would pick the higher ability pupils to answer the questions. However, the content which they were teaching was very good and they had confidence in what they were doing. They all showed that they cared for the pupils greatly.