THOUGH enhancing students’ learning levels remains a serious concern for authorities concerned, several interventions made so far in this regard failed to bridge the communication gap between students and teacher.

“We have found a serious communication gap between students and teachers in public schools of Lahore as the former do not question, even if they do not understand a lesson,” said Parveen Saleem Syed, head of National Urdu Programme, Paratham, India. Parveen along with two trainers – Samiuddin and Nasim Bano – conducted a six-day teachers training workshop on “Accelerated Reading and Numeracy” CAMAL Methodology organised by Idara-e-Taleem-o-Aagahi, in collaboration with Dubai Cares at Directorate of Staff Development.

On the second-last day of training on Saturday, Parveen said the teachers in public sector schools were still using teaching methodologies they had learnt in their childhood. She said students in classes seemed afraid of speaking up – which is actually their right. In order to enhance students’ learning levels, she said teachers were required to develop child-friendly and learning-friendly environment in classrooms and motivate children to speak up.

In public schools, Parveen said children were found unable to speak full sentences and even their full names in the first go owing to “fear and hesitation”. She said the training participants also identified children’s shortcomings in reading, writing and listening.

During a field visit, the trainer from Hyderabad, India, said teachers were found unable to teach mathematics in a systematic way as they themselves did not know the step-by-step technique and how to explain it to children. “The teachers completely lacked ability to teach mathematics in a play-way manner,” she said.

Parveen said most teachers training programmes failed because they were hardly supported by practical activity and added that theoretical learning was rarely implemented.

“This six-day training featured half-day practical work in public schools on first four working days in the city that helped 30 participants to identify real life problems and resolve them in training sessions,” she said.

During the training, she said, participants were also educated about personality development of teachers. They were told how to stand in a classroom, create child and learning-friendly environment, bring clarity, instil motivation and taught usage of play-way methodology.

Parveen said the 30 participants belonging to DSD, NCHD, DCHD, IRC and other organisations from different provinces of Pakistan would be required to train teachers in public schools and low-fee private schools in their respective areas – to bring a marked change in teaching and learning processes in the country.

“In India, Paratham is developing unpaid volunteers to spread the cause of quality teaching and learning processes in classrooms at a large-scale,” she added.

Workshop participants from Swat -- Salma Naz and Khursheed Khan -- said the training seemed simple in the beginning but it was not so simple when participants were taken to field to identify real-life problems and finding their solutions. They said that after going through the training they realised why students failed to perform and how they could be taken along in learning process.

“We practically resolved students’ problems and ended their hesitation in classroom activities and in the end everybody was happy,” said Salma.

Tajamal Hanif from Islamabad said the training would help participants to become instrumental in improving students’ learning levels. He said the CAMAL (Combined Activity Maximized Learning) methodology focused more on minimising student-teacher communication gap.

Zahida Maheen from Karachi said the training had helped participants realise the ways and means to take weak children along. “I am really enthusiastic about implementing CAMAL teacher-training methodology to train schoolteachers in a smooth and interesting way combined with practical work in my area of work in Karachi,” Zahida said jubilantly.

Zulekha Bibi and Muhammad Farooq from Musakhel district in Balochistan said both children’s learning levels and teachers quality in their area were low. They hoped that they would be able to train teachers in a better way that would ultimately improve students’ learning levels in public schools at least in Musakhel. ITA Programmes Director Baela Raza Jamil said the training was a prologue to a nine-month “Learning for Access” programme to be run from this month in collaboration with the school education departments in all provinces of the country.

She said this project would help bring drop-outs and out-of-school children back in schools, besides stabilising students, who would be at risk of being dropped out.

“When enrolment will increase in schools, para-teachers (local educated youth) will be appointed against nominal salaries to play their role in helping children in their villages and have a say in public schools’ activities,” she disclosed.

Baela said public schools teachers would be imparted training using CAMAL methodology and provided learning materials to improve their quality. She said this project would also bring some madressahs (seminaries) and low-cost private schools in its fold.

She said the “Learning for Access” would be piloted in different districts, including Shikarpur, Multan, Rrahim Yar Khan, Kot Addu, Swat, Mardan and Musakhel and then respective school education departments would be requested to upscale the programme across the country to achieve enhanced students’ learning outcomes.

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THE Government College University is organising a three-day book fair from April 16 (Tuesday) at Bukhari Auditorium lawns to promote book reading among students.

The GCU spokesman says a large number of national and international publishers will set up their stalls at the book fair and offer up to 50 per cent discount.

Vice-Chancellor Prof Dr Khaleeq-ur-Rahman hoped GCU Book Fair would help flourish reading culture among youth. – mansoormalik173@hotmail.com