|
Many of the children in these isolated rural villages do not speak the language in which their teachers will attempt to deliver the curriculum. Many of the Lamanni Tribal people in this area do not speak or understand Kannada the state language, and there are many quarry working communities who speak Telgu, the language of Andhra Pradesh. The isolation imposed by distance, poor transport and caste means that these children have little opportunity of acquiring the language of their ‘teacher’, which must make the business of going to school a particularly frustrating experience, and acquiring literacy a skill beyond fathoming. Although the Government does occasionally run literacy campaigns for adults these rarely go beyond teaching people the letters of the ‘alphabet’ and how to write their names. Literacy levels in this area of Kanataka are very low and even lower in the targeted villages. Many parents remain unaware of the potential benefits of education for their children and are all too aware of the difficulties of daily existence. Birds Heal are in the process of arranging for local tuition groups with bilingual teachers who will be able to give these children the basic skills they need to make progress in the local government schools where available.
|
|
