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by Isai Ambalam School Staff
In May 1997 a group of Aurovilians interested in education visited Rishi Valley in Andhra Pradesh. This visit was suggested by Mr. Krishnan, a Governing Board member then and organized as a part of Management Training Programs funded by FWE. This group observed the use of Multi Grade Multi Level Study Cards System of education adopted in the Telugu rural schools there. In that system the Study Cards of all the subjects were stacked in a sequence. The students themselves took out those cards in that sequence, performed the learning activities in those cards by themselves and learnt the subject content contained in them. The staff of Isai Ambalam School in that group found the method suitable for the Young Adults of their school. On their return they conveyed the information to the rest of the school staff and the entire staff prepared such study cards in Tamil. On using those cards the Young Adults, who were struggling to learn to read and write in Tamil for over four months, learnt them in one month. All staff members were enthused and in the course of 4 months prepared study cards for Tamil, Math and Environmental Science for the first four standards in the primary level. A primary section was opened in the school in 1999. In the course of 5 years, with a lot of trial and errors, the Study Cards system got established. This system instills self-learning capacity in the students from the 1st standard itself and enables all the primary students acquire all the essential competencies in Tamil Language, Math and Environmental Science. All this was made possible by the grant got from FWE through Project Coordination Group.
In 2001 October the Education Department of Tamil Nadu Government convened a meeting to learn about this method and invited the staff of Isai Ambalam School to explain it in detail. Mangai, Stella and Vincent Raja of the school went to Chennai and presented the details of the method and its working in Isai Ambalam School. The meeting lasted for the entire day. The Education Department decided to send a team of 25 resource people from Tamil Nadu to Rishi Valley to get training and prepare Study Cards in Tamil for the primary level. The team included 5 teachers from Isai Ambalam School, 2 from New Creation School and 2 from Village Action. In 15 days the team prepared the texts and drawings for the primary level. It was decided to implement the system on an experimental basis in some areas in Tamil Nadu. This could not be done as the Government changed during the election in May and the concerned officials were transferred to other departments. However, again with the help of a grant from FWE through Project Coordination Group, Isai Ambalam School made arrangements to make computerised version of all the texts prepared in Rishi Valley, and the school was using these cards thereafter.
In October 2003 Chennai Corporation Commissioner, Mr. Vijayakumar, IAS decided to introduce this system in all the 264 Corporation Primary Schools. Again Subash and Shankar of Isai Ambalam School were invited by him to be part of the meeting, convened in Chennai, to work out the strategy of introducing this system there. As a result a team of Corporation School teachers and other school teachers from the rest of Tamil Nadu prepared study cards afresh and got them printed in color by the end of 2004. But the use of the new system started in January 2004 itself and till the printing of the new cards were over the Study Cards used in Isai Ambalam School were used by all these schools. In the course of one year all these schools found the system working quite well with their students, as it was very student-friendly.
On seeing this result the Education Department of Tamil Nadu has decided to introduce this system in all the districts of Tamil Nadu, and they had selected some 3000+ government primary schools for this purpose. In May 2005 some 3000 Teacher Educators were trained to give training in the use of this method to these school teachers. From 11th July some 7000 primary school teachers from these schools are getting a 9-day training in the use of this System. They all will start the use of this System from the 2nd or 3rd week of August.
Out of these schoolteachers 30 teachers belonging to Vanoor block primary schools are now getting trained in Isai Ambalam School. In this training 5 teachers from Nadukkuppam and 2 from New Creation have also joined. After this training is over 200 teachers belonging to 100 primary schools in Villupuram district of Tamil Nadu will come in 8 batches for a field visit to Isai Ambalam School.
Isai Ambalam School staff is happy that such an outcome has resulted for the work they were doing in the school. The staff members feel that a need for student-friendly methods is growing in India, particularly in Tamil Nadu, by leaps and bounds since the Indian Government started its SSA (Universal Education for All by 2010) scheme in 2001, and as all Auroville schools are following only student-friendly educational practices in a variety of new forms, there is plenty of scope for teachers from outside schools to get trained in Auroville schools in the use of those practices. If we all can manage to design and give such a training to such needy people, a nice and strong and smooth bridge can be built between Auroville and Indian Schools.