Seated amidst rain water puddles in their classroom, more than a 100 kilometres from Hyderabad, in Jadcharla of Mahbubnagar district, Pushpa, Prashanti, Sivamma, Swapna, Rihana and their classmates are unlikely pioneers of an educational revolution.
These children of Mohamed Hussainpally Village School in Ghanpur mandal are glued to their I-slates as maths teacher T Srinivas guides them through a lesson in solving problems.
These first generation village learners wield the stylus on their I-slates with ease, using it like a magic wand, displaying creativity, identifying problems and brimming with knowledge of the web world opened up to them.
The school tucked away between hillocks in what was once a Maoist bastion, has transformed the lives of these young children with the new generation learning solutions. Farmer Pandha Narasimha watched his daughter Sirisha 'etch' his name and take his picture on the webcam with unconcealed joy. Mr Narsimha said “I do not want her to know of my farm debts, let her study and she will bring me joy.”
The I-slate has been a hit, said Ms Pingali Rajeswari, a descendant of Pingali Venkanna ( who designed the National Tricolour), who introduced the technology to this remote village in August 2011 through her ViDal (Villagers for Learning and Development) Foundation. Ms Rajeswari said, “ ..after all India lives in its villages; they (rural folk) only watch urban India grow . Now let the talent bloom from rural India.”
With the I-slate in their hands, the school children are into web designing and have shunned watching the television, said Mr Srinivas. “They take the I-slate home do their home work.” The I-slate has a software that allows the teacher to track how much time is spent on a particular subject at home.
Watching their children work on the gadget, their parents are keen to buy the high end I-slates for the children. For now 20 students have been given the I-slate free of cost. The school children have learnt about conserving energy as they charge their I-slates from a small solar panel installed over their school building.
Students Manjula and Ashok are keen to find a solution to reduce the heating of their I-slates and are very inquisitive about it, said Mr Srinivas.
Keywords: I-slate, ViDAL, rural education, Andhra Pradesh,
Hope will see next couple of years in all India schools...
I am extremely happy to see this happening. Could "THE HINDU" please follow up on this? I really want to know how successful this can be. If its able to solve the education needs and also encourages students to study then I-slate would be a super achievement. I would definitely like to support (finanically) such efforts.
great idea!but this is the only first step...this work should be expanded to other villages and states also...
I saw this news in the "HINDU" paper, but i didn't expect it is in Mahabub Nagar district, No words to express such a good news.
Because this district is very poor in Literature and specially in Usage of Technology.
Am vey happy as a Mahabub Nagar Person and i expected to see these I-Slates in all Schools in INDIA.
The revolution in education may seem all hunky and dory, but what seems to be unanswered is what difference has this made in terms of quality of education? The SCM guy in me asks, Have the students' performances been benchmarked with students of other schools in cities that most probably still don't utilise such a device?
Pingali Venkayya, not Venkanna.
wonderful. :)
Looks impresive.May i know where can i buy this i slates and cost involved in it.
No words to express happiness. Awesome. Not the technology, but in
taking it to the rural poor. The Hindu could have mentioned the cost of
the I-slate as well so that it gives an idea of possible penetration of
this device into other villages across the country.
Excellent peice of news.
It is foolish to bring costly electronic equipment for twenty (may be
for more) students and talk about it. What is the cost of I-slate, in
case of problems who services it, and many more questions arise? There
are many other innovative ways of teaching to make education easily
accessible to the economically weaker sections using a notebook and pen.
More popwer to them. Wait where are they getting Electric-Power from ?
What a wonderful story to read. If only every child in India especially rural India could get this and educate themsleves then India in 10 years time would be one of the most educated peoples nation. However congrats for those who organize this as you have changed 20 childrens lives as of now. You need to develop a program where people can sponser the donation of one of these to every child.
Welcome to anything which inspires people to learn. I am sure the
lives of those twenty people are now changed forever.
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