Knowledge-Sharing Workshop on Quality Schooling for the Poor

Report by Rajashree Srinivasan

June 29, 2019, Azim Premji School, Kalburgi

You can read this article in Kannada here. 

Introduction

The purpose of the series, Teachers for Inclusive Society as part of the Quality Schooling for the Poor project has been to document the work of those teachers in government schools, who are doing exceptional work in providing access and quality education to children from the disadvantaged sections of the society. Our work with these teachers included two components:

a) A reflective documentation of their experiences through conversations with individual teachers.
b) A knowledge-sharing exercise where teachers were invited to a forum to share their experiences and inspire others to engage in similar practices.

A few members from various District Institutes, Azim Premji Foundation, Karnataka and few faculty members from the Azim Premji University, Bengaluru, interacted with teachers and documented their stories of hope, courage and inspiration. These teachers, who are part of our public education system, engage in work that goes beyond conventional descriptions of their roles within the four walls of their classrooms. These stories provide up-from-below stories of teaching, learning, everyday school practices and life inside a school. These stories have been captured from first-person interviews and re-constructed to reflect the lives of these teachers who cross the borders of caste, religion, class and other institutional and bureaucratic structures as they intermingle daily with the life of their students and the immediate milieu. Besides providing us insights into the range of efforts made by them to include the children from the marginalized sections, these narratives carry the imagination of children in the classrooms, teachers’ knowledge of a range of aspects besides their pedagogical content knowledge, an understanding of beliefs and attitudes in the context of their work, challenges and resilience in going against the odds of their profession, their socio-political and economic contexts, their professional identities and their wisdom emerging from the experiences in their relationship with students, parents and the local community. These stories allow for an alternative imagination of the public school system that the majority of the nation’s children go to.

These teacher stories are available here.

The knowledge-sharing exercise on June 29, 2019, at the Azim Premji School, Kalburgi was a sequel to this reflective documentation. The Workshop proposed to bring together these project-participant teachers, some selected teachers from each of the districts, field members and the university faculty to engage collectively; share and learn from one another ways to strengthen the quality of education for children.

Rationale and Objectives

The multiplicity of practices, varying cultural and institutional contexts, and a barrage of socio-political and economic factors that impact school education require rigorous deliberations in our country. Such a dialogue can contribute to the development of knowledge in the area that is of central importance to the work of the Azim Premji Foundation, including the University. The event provided an opportunity to bring together, on a common platform, the DI members, faculty members from the University and teachers from different government schools, with whom the District Institutes (DIs) work on a continuous basis. The objectives were:

1) To listen to teachers who had done exceptional work in providing quality education to the marginalised;
2) To bring together a pool of committed teachers from the same state, who may wish to strengthen or replicate the work of these exceptional teachers;
3) To strengthen the understanding of faculty members of the University and the DI members about the work and practices of these teachers in the public school system and work collectively towards nurturing quality education in the schools.

The Workshop aligns with the commitment of the Azim Premji Foundation and University to bring about change in the public education system. Further, this event was envisaged as a step towards building a ‘learning collective’ of elementary and secondary teachers, DI members and university faculty members. We felt that by inviting thoughtful and committed members from the teaching community, we could foster professional peer interactions that would enhance collective commitment towards bringing about quality schooling for children. The project and the ensuing knowledge-sharing workshop were an opportunity for faculty members to explore the possibilities of bringing educational research and practice together.

Scope, format and participants

The workshop was a one-day event on a Saturday. The morning session was planned to provide the eleven key teachers with a space to converse and interact with other participants of the workshop about their work. Two panel-discussions were planned, with each panel having five teachers share their experience. Apart from the views of the participating teachers, it was felt that the views of a few more committed teachers also need to be heard in such a forum. So, each of the eight DIs of Karnataka identified five committed teachers and 45 such teachers were a part of the entire day’s event.

The afternoon session aimed at providing a context for other (non-project) participating teachers to share their thoughts and experiences of providing quality schooling. It was thought that such peer-to-peer conversations would help gather deeper insights into other teachers’ practices about working with children from the marginalised sections. The afternoon sessions were planned as small group discussions with a facilitator. The audience of the workshop included eleven project-participant teachers from the districts Koppal, Raichur, Bellary, Kalburgi, Bagalkot, Bijapur, Mandya, Yadgir; five other teachers from each of these districts; and the Gulbarga DI members. The audience also included DI members and the University faculty members who had conversations with the teachers. There were almost seventy participants in all.

Workshop planning

The workshop was conceptualized to provide a forum for sharing the experiences of teachers who had done exceptional work. Narratives of the teachers that were initially written in English were translated into Kannada by the Translations Initiative of the University and were compiled as a booklet titled ‘Hoogucchu’ meaning, a bouquet. The eleven stories were sent to the teachers and the participating DI members and faculty members. Facilitators were identified for the morning sessions and afternoon session. Three significant overarching themes emerging from the eleven narratives were chosen for small-group discussion. The focus was on a community-school partnership, learning beyond the classroom and girl-child education. Few pointers as questions for the discussions were developed as follows:

I. Community-school partnership

1. What are the specific efforts made by teachers/school in partnership with the community that have influenced children’s enrolment/regular attendance in school? Can they cite specific examples?
2. What challenges and success stories have teachers experienced in the process?
3. Do they have ideas that they have not tried out but believe may work? What kind of support do they need or envisage?

II. Learning beyond classrooms

Broadly, this theme includes efforts made by teachers to go beyond the usual expectations of classroom teaching. These could include specific efforts of preparing children for exams (not just coordination or filling up forms for children etc.), setting up a laboratory, preparing learning materials, taking them on specific educational trips; specific efforts to teach children with disability or other learning difficulties beyond the classroom hours.

1. What are the specific efforts made by teachers outside their classrooms to work with children that have influenced children’s enrolment/regular attendance/retention/learning in school? Can they cite specific examples?
2. What challenges and success stories have teachers experienced in the process?
3. Do they have ideas that they have not tried out but believe may work? And what kind of support do they need or envisage?

III. Girl-child education

Education of girls has been a challenge at North-east Karnataka, given the range of social practices and other expectations from the girl child. How do schools and teachers respond to this challenge?

1. What are the specific efforts made by teachers outside their classrooms to work with girl children that have influenced children’s enrolment/regular attendance/retention/learning in school? Can they cite specific examples?
2. What challenges and success stories have teachers experienced in the process? How do they deal with the situations of child marriage and child labour, which often push children out of school?
3. Do they have ideas that they have not tried out but believe may work? What kind of support do they need or envisage?

It was hoped that these discussions would lead to peer interactions and develop some insights about ensuring quality education for children from the marginalised sections.

Event description and highlights

Teachers at the registration desk.

Opening remarks

Umashankar Periodi, who leads the institutes of Azim Premji Foundation in Karnataka, presented a broad overview of the vision, purpose and work of the Foundation in general, and the work in North-east Karnataka. He shared that working towards achieving the constitutional mandate of ensuring quality education to every child was a central task to which the Foundation has been committed. He welcomed the teachers by saying that the ten teachers present whose work was the central focus of the day’s program were no ordinary teachers, but teachers who had done exceptional work. He outlined the objectives of the workshop, stating that the workshop was not only a forum for sharing the (ten) teachers’ experiences of working with children from the marginalised section but also for recognizing the contribution of these teachers who worked beyond the expectation of their conventional roles to ensure that children receive good schooling. He referred to their work as a great achievement (saadhane).

Opening remarks by Umashankar Periodi.

Morning Session

The first panel-discussion in the morning was facilitated by Sharad Sure, faculty member, Azim Premji University. Sharad shared briefly each teacher’s contribution and called upon them to share their work. The second session in the morning was facilitated by Rudresh, who leads the Gulbarga DI. The session saw five more teachers speaking about their work. Each teacher was given twenty minutes to speak. They spoke with great passion about their work. Interspersed with a lot of humour, the teachers’ stories were truly inspiring. They spoke with ease and confidence about their day-to-day relationships with children, the efforts they make to capture the interest of children in the classroom, in preventing child marriages, understanding the life-world of migrant children, aspirations to make their schools a ‘model’ and how they go about solving the problems of children who come from difficult situations. The two morning-panels gave other teachers a ray of hope that good work is recognised. Listening to the ‘yashogaathe’ (Kannada word for ‘success story’), which was replete with narrations of hope, courage, encouragement, open-mindedness, yearning to learn continuously and resilience, left the audience to reflect on what makes these teachers persevere inspite of all the challenge.

Morning session: Panel Discussion 1

A teacher sharing his thoughts.

Morning Session: Panel Discussion 2

During the lunch break, there was a good informal interaction amongst the teachers. The ambience of the Gulbarga school was appreciated by the teachers. Some of them went around the school with great enthusiasm.

­Afternoon Session

The post-lunch session involved discussion around the three selected themes: Community school partnership, learning beyond classrooms and girl-child education. Each group consisted of 15 teachers. These parallel sessions were moderated very thoughtfully by Uday, Sunitha and Mahadev from the DIs of North-East Karnataka.

Parallel Session-1: Community-school partnership

Community school partnership with regard to enrolment and retention of children was central to the discussion. Some of the things that teachers did towards this aim were discussed. For example, community members were involved directly in admission campaign. They conducted prabhat pheris, which are advocacy marches that involve going around the villages and spreading awareness about the importance of education. Data of children to be enrolled in the school was collected from the anganwadi centre. Community members and teachers reached out to the parents of these children and motivated them to admit their children to the schools. During admission campaign, the school and community members worked together in printing and distributing pamphlets describing the facilities and advantages of the schools. Parents of prospective students were invited to school while distributing school uniform, books, bag and shoes. SDMC members were entrusted the responsibility to regularly follow-up with parents to ensure children are enrolled.

Teachers shared that besides making classrooms interesting, there were other efforts made to retain children at schools. Makkala Grama Sabhas were organised to develop awareness among children about topics like banning child marriages. Regular parent-teacher meetings were organised. On the occasion of the School Day, national and regional festivals, parents’ participation was actively sought. Parents were encouraged to participate in cultural programs. They also implemented the Prerna yojana, which involves a multi-ability grouping system. Children who can provide support to other children are identified as leaders and they are given small affordable incentives like a pen, pencil, small books etc.

Teachers also spoke about a few ways of strengthening the contribution of the community. The believed that it is important to constitute SDMC as per the norms of the government and entrust them with specific responsibilities. Meetings could be organised with parents who have shown their concerns about the school and their help taken to improve instructional and infrastructural facilities of the school, like renovating and painting the school, getting electricity connection, toilet facilities, procuring desks, benches, podium, computers, plates and tumblers, water filter, sports uniform, which are essential for the children. Teachers were of the strong view that the head teacher and the assistant teachers need to establish rapport with the community by being committed to the school work, maintaining transparency in school administration, updating the progress of children and also being more accountable in carrying out their responsibilities.

The anchor sharing thoughts after the parallel session.

Parallel Session-II: Learning beyond classrooms

The focus of this session was on identifying efforts that teachers make to help children sustain their interest and continue their education. Some of the interesting things that teachers have done were shared. For example, children were taken to nearby historical places and such visits increased their interest and motivated them to explore such places in their locality. In some districts, they organised a ‘gramotsava’ in the village to create awareness among community members about the importance of education and children’s learning and to involve the community in the school activities. It also helped to mobilise resources for the school.  Motivational activities were conducted for first-grade children (for the first three months) to create interest for school and make them attend regularly. These activities removed fear among children about school/teacher and reduced the dropout rate in first grade. Some teachers suggested that an analysis of the village (children, parents, community) should be done to understand the socio-economic, educational and cultural background of the community. This may help in designing activities in the school based on the analysis. Along with children, developing the community was also seen as an important responsibility of the teachers. The teachers also shared that they needed to develop some interpersonal skills to work with children, parents and community, which could reduce issues and problems and smoothen the school processes.

Parallel Session-III: Girl-child education

This group discussion was around the various efforts made by the teachers towards strengthening the education of girls. Teachers shared their challenges and their efforts at mitigating the problems. Teachers spoke extensively about beliefs, social conventions and practices of parents with regard to the growing girl child. Parents were unwilling to send girls to school after they attained puberty. Sometimes, they were sent to school to collect clothes, books, cycle etc and then not allowed to continue. Citing an example, teachers shared that they had conversations with some of these families and took seven of these girls to an all-girls’ school and got them admitted there. Many of those girls have gone ahead to do post-graduation. Parents do not feel comfortable sending girls to educational tours once the girls reach grades VI and VII. Teachers remarked that care has to be taken to reassure them about children’s safety and make sure that everyone is taken to tours. Similarly, girls often have not been allowed to go for competitions as photographs of these children are clicked and shared on WhatsApp. Dialogue with these parents to make them understand the importance of the curricular activities has helped. Some teachers spoke about how girls and boys would not sit together. So, they arranged for separate interactive sessions with girls and boys on ‘good touch’ and ‘bad touch’. It helped students understand what is okay and what is not. It helped them sit next to each other and also play sports together.

In most villages, there are strict rules against girls’ cutting hair although maintaining them is very difficult. In one such school, the teacher made it compulsory for all girl children till grade V to cut their hair short so that children can come to school early. Long hair meant it had to be plaited and since mothers are busy in the mornings, girls would come very late to classes. Further, he gifted them hairbands and also provided mirrors for the girls to get ready at school. Starting from giving hairband or cash prize, teachers spoke about the need to constantly think of novel solutions to ensure that girls continue to come to school and study.

Another set of problems shared by the teachers included the preference for boys’ education. Boys were admitted in private school, whereas girls were enrolled in the government school.  Sometimes when the girls come back after long holidays or migration, they would be married and not allowed to come to school. Even when families migrate, they leave behind girls to take care of their younger siblings or grandparents. Teachers shared that allowing these girls to get their siblings to school helped them continue in school.  Teachers shared that children of devadasis go through a lot of emotional trauma for not having their father’s name. Teachers shared that these children needed extra compassion and care. Consistent efforts were needed to tackle the challenges of educating the girl-child.

Following the discussion, the moderators presented the ideas from the group discussion to the larger audience. The day ended at 5.15 pm with Umashankar Periodi thanking all the participants for sharing their experience. He shared that the positive narratives will be shared widely in various platforms so that more teachers can be influenced by this work.

Anchor sharing the summary of discussions on Girl-Child Education.

Feedback

The workshop generated considerable enthusiasm among the presenters and the participants. Some of the teachers expressed that this was the first time that they were sharing their work among peer-group teachers and were happy to have been given the opportunity.

Some significant remarks from the workshop participants are as follows:

• We get to talk with teachers within a district but not with teachers from other districts. We should continue this.

• Hearing others, we understood what has been achieved is less, what needs to be achieved is so much more.

• It is a mind-changing workshop.

• Identifying the success stories is in itself a big job. Recognizing the work of the teachers has probably doubled their motivation and doubled our encouragement to do such work too.

• You have recognized their good work and by listening to them, we are encouraged to replicate their work.

• Sometimes we are convinced we are doing some good work, but at times we feel disappointed. When somebody comes and identifies our work, we feel reassured.

Feedback session

It was very refreshing to note that while teachers shared their positive experiences, they could also share their challenges in a very candid way. Some of them spoke using a great deal of humour. Although a few teachers expressed that they were not sure what they were going to speak during the panel discussion, they shared that the interactions were friendly and assuring. The workshop was not rushed, but it seemed as though teachers needed more time to share their work. Teachers may have probably been more comfortable if some specific questions were given to them beforehand rather than requesting them to speak in general about their work. It may have been good to share the translated narratives with all the teacher participants at least a week in advance. The teachers were extremely happy to see their work documented and in print. The Azim Premji School as a venue was absolutely befitting the occasion of such a meeting of various participants of an education system – school teachers, field institute members, University faculty.

Way forward

• To identify specific action points for follow up with all the participating teachers. We need to lay out a plan for follow-up.

• To identify more teachers in these same districts and carry out reflective documentation. Over a period of time, it may be possible to capture some practices or some patterns in practices. This could result in a meta-analysis of some specific themes and provide for some positive directions towards ensuring quality schooling for all.

• From the afternoon discussions, a stark challenge appears to be girl-child education. The faculty members involved in the Quality Schooling for the Poor project could gather substantial analytical documentation with specific reference to the girl child.

• There was considerable synergy between the field members and University faculty; we could explore more ways to strengthen the collaboration and co-authorship.

• To finalize the compilation of the draft narratives (write-ups) and bring out a booklet in Kannada for wider circulation. If there is a need for shorter versions of these documents, then necessary planning for editing of such work needs to be pursued.

We take this opportunity to express our sincere gratitude to members of different teams for supporting this knowledge-sharing workshop. We thank the teachers from different schools who made this workshop possible.

A collective pursuit towards developing teachers for an inclusive society.

By: Rajashree Srinivasan, Faculty, Azim Premji University