Sister Jagarani Toppo supervising students at St Xavier’s School in Gurap
GURAP, India (UCAN) – An innovative Jesuit system is revolutionizing education among tribal people in the eastern Indian state of West Bengal.
“All our children can now read and write in Bengali, and recite mathematical tables up to 10,” claims Father Amulya Kannanaikal, headmaster of the Jesuit-run St. Xavier’s School in Gurap, some 60 kilometers northeast of state capital Kolkata.
The Jesuit priest credited the Skills Targeted Academic Growth (STAG) system for the upturn in education standards.
STAG is an alternative method of teaching-learning his confrere Father Mongal Kumar Das developed among Santal tribal people.
Father Kannanaikal said his school introduced the system in March 2009 after it realized traditional classroom methods were not effective for Santal tribal dropouts and adult learners. The traditional system, he said, cares only for bright students.
The new system allows children to learn in peer groups with the teachers acting as facilitators. It helps identify each student’s intellectual capacity and group them accordingly. It then helps people learn reading and writing using small learning modules.
Father Das said he began experimenting with primary education in 1971. He said he kept improvising over the years the system of “ladder of learning” that allows each child to progress at his or her own pace. “This helped meet all the needs of the dropouts and adult learners,” the 79-year-old priest added.
Over the years, some 3,000 students have gone through his “integral system where one who is successful in learning teaches others,” Father Das said.
The STAG system teaches skills related to Bengali, English and mathematics. A child would usually take about one year to complete the course and get admitted to grades three or four in a formal school, he added.
The Gurap school took on 30 dropouts this year, all aged 8 to 12, Father Kannanaikal said. “Intelligent students have the opportunity to progress, instead of waiting for the entire class to finish its lessons,” he told UCA News.
Sister Jagarani Toppo, who teaches in the school, said the new system has generated greater determination among students to complete the lessons and proceed further.
The Charity of Jesus and Mary nun told UCA News she was surprised to see a 10-year-old learn 15 new words in an hour. The children progress at their own pace and even small ones compete with their seniors, she added.