I came, I taught

I came, I taught

By Dhwani Jain

The last three weeks spent at the Pratham School at Kadipur, Gurgaon were the most gratifying and eventful of my life. Here Pratham tests the government school students for their English and Hindi capabilities and the weak ones are enrolled into the Pratham class where Pratham teachers work on them. I got an opportunity to teach English to children from class 3, 4 and 5 who were lacking in the language.

Pratham provides the teachers with a weekly manual that clearly specifies all that’s to be taught for the weak. Some interesting Pratham material is ‘note cards’ with pictures of children doing different activities and ‘flash cards’ with alphabets. Such fun material makes it very easy for the teacher to teach and the children to grasp concepts. If a first time teacher like me, with no teaching background could grasp the teaching methodology and successfully deliver at the class, I think, anyone can join Pratham and engage in teaching.

Every morning, a recapitulation of the previous class would help the children revise all that they learnt the previous day. I was thoroughly impressed with the kind of structured learning module we followed at these classes. Very gratifying was the fact that they quickly caught on with the lessons and moved ahead at a great pace. Each day a new letter was introduced ensuring ample practice and recapitulation. I was surprised with myself, just how quickly I moved into the role of a teacher and was doing rather well! It’s most satisfying for a teacher to see her student learning well.

Lunch Time: this was the best time to bond with the children. I would engage with them by playing their games which soon became my favourite too. One interesting game worth a mention is “Gabbar Says”. All children would stand in a circle and if I said, “Gabbar says dance”, everyone would have to start dancing. Those who would fail to comprehend the activity correctly would step out of the game. What a fun way to learn English!

I also leant games like kabaddi and baraf pani (children act frozen at the call of baraf and get back to motion with paani).

One observation: during their formal daytime school, the children would often make excuses to get out of the class and while away time. However, while in the Pratham class, they would just not want to leave. Now, having spent time with Pratham, I really believe that if every child got the kind of structured and fun way of education that Pratham delivers, no one would ever think of dropping out from school. I’m grateful I got an opportunity to connect the wonderful work that Pratham does.