Category Archives: Early childhood education

Do We Need to Follow Alphabetic Order to Teach Literacy?

November 13, 2014   Adult education, Early childhood education, Education and cultures of Pakistan, Education in Pakistan, Fast track literacy, Girls' education, Khoj methodology, Non formal education, Primary education, School education, Teacher training, Women's education   8 Comments

Recently a comment was made about Khoj methodology that it didn’t follow the alphabetic order in teaching literacy and it was a problem that needed to be rectified. This statement prompted me to raise the following questions:

  • Is there a logic in following the alphabetic order to teach literacy?
  • Does this order yield sequential milestones in learning? Is a child able to write certain words and sentences after learning a given number of letters in the alphabetic order? For instance, can they make any given number of words after learning from ا to ث ہ or from ج to خ?
  • Is learning is at a faster pace if the letters of alphabet are first abstractly learnt?

The answer to all the above questions is an emphatic no.

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Against All Odds – Story of a Struggle

April 30, 2013   Adult education, Early childhood education, Education and cultures of Pakistan, Education in Pakistan, Fast track literacy, Girls' education, Khoj methodology, School education, Women's education   No comments

It was the sweltering heat of May 1999 in the plains of Punjab. The vehicle struggled on the narrow dusty pathways spiraling through the crop fields. There was not even a semblance of a road. The moment the vehicle entered the village of Kot Dina in the district of Sheikhupura children of varying ages flocked after us. Seventeen kilometers away from the main road, like majority of the surrounding villages Kot Dina, with its mud thatched houses, had no functional primary school either for girls or boys. The area was the hub of ghost schools – the schools which were functional only on paper according to a government commissioned survey. The girls were the most deprived of the most basic educational opportunities as they were not allowed to go out of the village. The situation was breeding perennial illiteracy and, understandably, the area could not produce teachers. The fact that the villages were amongst the worst crime hit areas in the country made the prospects of availing the opportunities of getting educated very bleak. School buildings were in the personal use of the village elite – as meeting or storage places.

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Let’s Revive Our Cultural Heritage for Early Childhood Education

December 31, 2012   Early childhood education, Education and cultures of Pakistan, Story telling and education, Teacher training   22 Comments

Children learn most effectively and fruitfully when when they are taught through their culture; mother tongue, stories and games play a critical role. Instead of throwing them to the unknown and threatening world of imported games, stories, poems and role plays it is imperative to embed the early childhood care and development in the richness of local cultures.

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