A child’s learning begins at month zero, emphasises the National Framework of Early Childhood Stimulation 2024, which lays down month-by-month activities to be conducted by parents, anganwadi staff and ASHA workers for children from birth to the age of three.
The framework document has been finalised by an internal committee comprising representatives from the Ministry of Women and Child Development, the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, the Department of School Education and Literacy, the Ministry of Education, the National Council of Educational Research and Training, the Institute of Home Economics, the Delhi University and civil society organisations.
Titled ‘Navchetana’, the activity-based curriculum follows the National Education Policy 2020 that calls for a continuum of learning. Staff in 14 lakh anganwadis will be given training on the curriculum.
The curriculum involves talking, playing, moving, listening to music and sounds, and stimulation of all the other senses — particularly sight and touch in order to reach developmental milestones across domains, and develop “early language, and emergent literacy and numeracy”.
As much as 75% of the brain develops in the first three years of a child’s life, says Namya Mahajan, a member of the internal committee and founder of Rocket Learning. The national framework provides detailed information on the importance of brain development in the first three years, and step by step instructions for caregivers and frontline workers on conducting early stimulation activities, she said.
This involves getting the child’s attention, communicating with and responding to the child, introducing age and skill appropriate activities for play, and following the child’s lead during the activities. It also involves helping the child with a new task, and praising the child for her efforts.
For instance, if a baby is holding a ball, the caregiver observes the baby’s action, then points at the ball and acknowledges the baby’s interest by asking questions such as “What is baby playing with?”, then saying, “Baby is holding a red ball”, and making positive reinforcements such as “Very good baby” and adding phrases like “ba ba ball”. The baby could then start imitating monosyllables like “ba ba”.
The document entails 36 sets of activities for children from months 0 to 36. It encourages the use of household objects like cups, bottles or leftover pieces of fabric. Activities involve reaching for objects, imitating sounds, spinning bangles, putting objects in and out of a jar and removing knots in a handkerchief in the first year.
After a year, the activities include encouraging children to feed themselves and explore the house, involving them in the kitchen, playing with dough and introducing them to a mirror.
At the age of 18 months, children are encouraged to scribble with a crayon and at 24 months, the recommended activities include shoe sorting and matching. By the age of three, children are introduced to a cycle, asked to say their names and identify colours.
The framework says the activities will help identify children with developmental delays. In such a situation, the anganwadi worker or parent can adapt by picking up activities recommended for children a few months younger.
