EasyNow Techniques: Empowering teachers to create contents using information and communication technologies

Abstract

India is trying to achieve complete literacy through Sarv Siksha Abhiyaan programme (http://ssa.nic.in/). This involves teaching each and every child in all the parts of the country. The success of the literacy programme will be decided by the number of children who continue with the education. At the same time we will never be able to achieve complete literacy without teaching the adults who have missed the opportunity to study as children. This section of the population can be made literate under the adult literacy programme. For achieving all this, schools need to be set up within easy reach of each child. More importantly sufficient number of qualified teachers should be appointed in each school. Generating such a huge infrastructure requires a lot of time which means another generation not getting access to education. Therefore, to bring education to the door step of every citizen of this country within next few years, it is time to make use of technology. However, technology without educational content is meaningless. So the need for the hour is to use the skills and expertise of available teachers to develop educational content and spread literacy. Since these teachers cannot be present physically in each corner of the country, information and communication technology (ICT) has to be used. The real classroom teachings can be recorded and then enhanced with other multimedia tools to create educational content in various delivery formats. These content can then be made available to the students who do not have access to formal education. The learning can be made interactive by giving the facility to the learners to interact with the teachers through mail or telephone.