Showing papers in "Contemporary Education Dialogue in 2005"

Para-teachers in India: A Review:

Abstract: This paper provides an overview of ‘para’ teachers in India. It traces the origins of para-teacher schemes in the country and analysis the changing policy context where-in poorly paid and trained para-teachers on contract are increasingly being recruited in place of regular teachers in government schools. Drawing upon available research studies, the authors draw attention to the detrimental implications that para-teacher programmes have for professionalisation of teachers, the quality of schooling and equity concerns in education.

Gender and Social Equity in Primary Education: Hierarchies of Access:

Abstract: Over the past decade, the system of primary education in India has undergone drastic structural changes. Increas ing pr ivat isa t ion, ins t i tu t iona l i sa t ion of differentiated systems of schooling, non-formalisation of the formal school system through appointment of para-teachers and setting up of new monitoring structures at the local level in the name of decentralisation and community mobilisation — all these have crucial implications for issues of social equity and pose a challenge to long-held notions of the relationship between education, democracy and social change.

A Questioning Approach: learning from Shankara's pedagogic techniques

Abstract: The pedagogical techniques of Shankara focus on the importance of questioning, reasoned argument and complex citation and discussion of sources give us an example of a learning process embedded in a dyadic teacher-pupil relationship where respect for the teacher is shown not in rote learning and the reproduction of the teacher's ideas but in critical engagement until the desired epistemic shift occurs. Such a focus can enable modern educators to help pupils, colleagues and parents interrogate stereotypes about appropriate learning; engage pupils in their own learning in a way which decreases the desire to plagiarise; consider the effectiveness of their own pedagogical aims and techniques; and set these in a longer view.

Quality and the social context of rural schools

Abstract: This paper operationalises a characterization of 'quality' that is relevant to rural schools. It uses this set of indicators in the study of schools in nine villages to explore the interlinkages between the quality of schools and their social context as characterised by the occupational and caste profiles of the village

Paradigms of Learning: The Total Literacy Campaign in India

Abstract: This volume uncovers several d imensions of the DPEP, demystifying the acronym haze t ha t DPEP h a s come to be identified with, a t least for those not familiar with the new terminology of educat ional adminis t ra t ion in India. It provides a useful resource for scholars interested in examining i ssues of equality and equity in educat ion, whether it is with regard to the working of new interventions like al ternative and EGS schools, s trategies unde r t aken to promote social and gender equity unde r the aegis of the DPEP, the changing sociology of teachers and pr imary school s tuden t s , or the role of the communi ty in educat ion in the postDPEP scenario. For those scholars interested in pedagogical i ssues , Vandana Mahajan 's essay (Chapter 6) provides a useful meta-analys is of c lassroom process s tudies unde r t aken by the DPEP. The ques t ions thrown u p by both the quanti tat ive and qualitative s tudies in the volume are disturbing; a particularly t roubling quest ion is w h a t these new processes of reproducing social inequality th rough educat ion hold for the future, and how they square with the State 's obligation to ensure equal educat ion for all children.

Education as Dialogue: Martin Buber

Abstract: artin Buber, the Jewish existentialist thinker, was born M Vienna in 1878. After his parents’ separation at the age of three he was brought up by his grandparents in Galicia. Later he studied in Vienna, Leipzig, Berlin and Zurich. He became involved in the cultural aspects of Zionism and was influential in Jewish intellectual circles both through his writings and lectures. He became Professor of Religion and Philosophy at Frankfurt University in 1923, a post that he held until 1933. He resigned at the time of Hitler’s rise to power and became actively involved in responding to the educational needs and critical re­ orientation of Jewish children and students who were gradually being marginalised from government educational institutions. This policy culminated in the total exclusion of all Jewish children from the public education system in the Nuremburg Laws of 1935. After leaving Germany in 1938 he moved to Israel, where he was Professor of Social Philosophy at the Hebrew University

Classics with Commentary: Vygotsky on Mediated Cognition:

Abstract: Although Lev Semonovich Vygotsky lived and wrote in the early years of the twentieth century, his work in cognitive and developmental psychology began to be discovered outside of the USSR only after the 1960s with the publication of Thought and Language in 1962. However, interest in his work continued to remain confined to small circles for more than a decade and it was the publication in 1978 of his second major work entitled Mind in Society that launched him as a major thinker in Western psychology. Why Vygotsky's ideas and theoretical framework have assumed such importance, both in the philosophy and practice of psychology at this juncture, is related partly to the history of the discipline and partly to the contemporaneity of his ideas and their potential to offer an explanation to the study of what is amongst the most elusive areas of enquiry the human mind.

Between Love, Domination and Reason: Civic Education and its ‘Others’ in Central India

Abstract: This paper examines local interpretations of some key themes in a democratic education against the backdrop of a changing social structure. It sees the discourse of a rational democracy as being severely challenged by practices of domination and an ideology of love. At the same time there may also be observed concrete contradictions which would welcome a democratic education that has concepts and morals that challenge the status quo. A strategy of principled cultural dialogue is advocated rather than one of isolation.

Some Milestones in Language and Cognition Studies

Abstract: Language and cognition both appear in humans not in their raw form, but framed in a certain pedagogy. In his classic work on the relation between early linguistic development and early cognitive de...

The Political Economy of Education in India: Teacher Politics in Uttar Pradesh:

Abstract: the campaign itself. At the same time, the question remains : are such effects primary or secondary to literacy itself? Is literacy to be const rued a s simply the ability to replace the t h u m b impression by a s ignature? The book is unable to rise above ambivalence in respect of the role of social mobilisation in literacy efforts. While the campaign mode , the p rocess of social mobil isat ion a n d transformation are held as significant in their own right, there is also the regret that , '(a)t t imes, the literacy factor seems to get lost in the involvement with developmental activities' (p. 238) and tha t the excitement and energy of the campaign mode ' impacted negatively on motivation' (p. 337) for sus t enance of literacy efforts and retention of reading and writing skills.