Dhir Jhingran

Dr. Dhir Jhingran, Founder & Director of Language and Learning Foundation has conceptualized and implemented early literacy and multilingual education programmes for over two decades. He has worked in policy positions within the government in India and also advised several Ministries of Education in South Asia. He is on the Advisory Boards of several national and international organizations including UNESCO’s Global Education Monitoring Report. He speaks regularly at international conferences on primary education and literacy.

Shortchanging children in multilingual settings: Cookie-cutter design and implementation strategies of large-scale early literacy programmes in South Asia

Early grade literacy programmes need to include children’s languages in the instructional design, keep a strong focus on oral language development and build on children’s local contexts and experiences. At present, many such programmes in South Asia fail to take in to account schools’ multilingual settings and children’s home contexts and languages.

Early grade reading or early literacy programmes (ELPs) are being implemented at scale in India and other countries in South Asia with funding from bilateral and multilateral agencies and other international donors. These ELPs typically follow a rigid scope and sequence of curriculum and classroom activities, often with lessons scripted to varying degrees. This helps in standardization and ‘replicability’ in different regions and countries with minimum additional investment. Three very important, and what I would call non-negotiable, elements of early language and literacy teaching and learning are undermined by these ELPs.
First, young children’s learning is rooted in their experiences. Also, elements of guided play should be an essential part of classroom learning experiences in early childhood. Many ELPs undermine the development of a contextualized curriculum and focus on ‘serious’ repetitive practice by children.

Second, early literacy programmes need to build a bridge between the orality of children’s homes and the writing-focused environment at school. In most parts of South Asia, children who attend government schools come from low literacy and print-poor environments. However, some ELPs do not focus on development of oral language because they build their design exclusively on the so-called ‘Big-5’ components of early literacy, viz. phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary and comprehension.

Third, inclusion of children’s home languages in the teaching and learning process is crucial for promoting language comprehension, providing a scaffold for learning the language of instruction as also for promoting self-esteem and confidence for learning. In a large proportion of schools in South Asia, the medium of instruction at school is very different from the children’s first languages. Most ELPs assume that children need to be only taught to read and write and disregard the crucial need of bridging the gap between children’s home languages and the languages used in school.