Students of a government-run primary and an upper primary school located next to each other in a remote village of Koraon, around 100km from Prayagraj city, are a delighted lot these days.
They now have the opportunity to learn and study using TABLAB—a tablet-based plug-and-play digital learning lab— thanks to a US-based assistant professor and a scientist.
Assistant professor Maanasa Raghavan from the Human Genetics department of the University of Chicago has donated Rs 1.65 lakh to gift knowledge for the children of these two Koraon schools—located in Hardaun village under Chapar Hardaun Gram Panchayat.
Upper Primary School science teacher Harduan Satya Prakash’s role is no less vital. He contacted Maanasa Raghavan in the US and Niraj Rai, a scientist at Birbal Sahni Institute of Palaeobotany, Lucknow, whom he know from his research days, informing them about the lack of infrastructure at these two schools and sought support for setting up this TABLAB. Satya Prakash, completed M Sc studies in Bioinformatics from Allahabad University and researched at the prestigious Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology at Hyderabad, before taking up a job as a teacher.
“The TABLAB that would be shared by students of these two schools located next to each other has been set up to enable these rural children to make the best use of modern technology to learn and enhance their knowledge. The interesting manner in which the technology and the course curriculum has been merged in the TABLAB, has generated great excitement and interest in learning among the children,” said Satya Prakash, as he described how he and Niraj Rai undertook research on TABLAB to determine its effectiveness before implementing it.
He said that the support extended by head teachers of the two schools, including Dinesh Kumar Singh and Santosh Kumar Mishra, also played an important role in making the TABLAB a reality. “Already the attendance of students has increased in the two schools with even parents more keen on their child being regular in the school, so that they could make best use of the facility.
The TABLAB, a brainchild of iDream Education, a Gurgaon-based firm, made available to the schools comprises of 10 tablets and a trolley with subject wise curriculum from Class 1 to Class 8 prescribed by the Basic Education Board, UP, in Hindi medium, fed into it. There are also 1,500 books of different subjects made available to students, Satya Prakash said.
The TABLAB edge
The beauty with the TABLAB is that it can work under any scenario. If there is a dedicated and a well-qualified teacher in a government school, the TABLAB with its local language and state Board-aligned learning content can seamlessly integrate into the school’s curriculum and become a personal assistant for the teacher.
The scenario where the teacher doesn’t wish to teach either because he/she is not motivated or has some personal work, TABLAB can be used to effectively engage the children without any disturbance to their work. The worst case scenario where the teacher is not even present, TABLAB can still ensure that the learning does not stop for the students.
TABLAB is a completely student-driven learning infrastructure for government schools and once they realise that learning can be fun, the students’ engagement level increases and they proactively involve themselves in the learning process.
OFFICIAL SPEAK
“This is a great initiative of our science teacher Satya Prakash that would benefit students and teachers alike. The teachers can get the aid and support they need in carrying out their teaching in a better manner, while the students can gain knowledge in a more interesting and effective way. We wish to extend special thanks to Maanasa Raghavan of University of Chicago, US and scientist Niraj Rai of Birbal Sahni Institute of Palaeobotany, Lucknow, for making TABLAB possible,” said Prayagrag Basic Shiksha Adhikari Sanjay Kumar Kushwaha.
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