Nothing preoccupies Indian educators more than teaching children “akshar gyaan”, how to read and write the script. Most language learning time in early grade classrooms is spent in teaching the script – children copy down letters, then words, then sentences, and even entire passages. Over and over again. In the longitudinal research study conducted by my research team in Maharashtra and Karnataka, we estimated that two-thirds to three-fourths of the time in early grade classrooms is spent on teaching akshar gyaan (see Menon et al., 2017). Yet, every large and small-scale assessment will show that despite this enormous amount of time and energy put into it, most children cannot read or write the script very well.

This brings up a couple of questions. First, should so much of time be spent on teaching and learning the script in early grade classrooms? Or should we just immerse children in a “whole language environment” and assume that they will pick up the script, on their own given rich exposure to a literate environment, with some guidance?

The answer to the first question is fairly clear to readers of our earlier blog posts. Early educators cannot afford to ignore important parts of the early language curriculum, such as, supporting children’s home languages in the classroom, children’s literature, writing, and comprehension. They need to make the time - and the space - to attend to all these aspects, instead of spending a bulk of it on teaching akshar gyaan.

However, we also know from compilations of research in the West that the “whole language approach” is not a solution to teaching children the script. It turns out that all children do not learn to read and write the script simply by immersion into a richly literate environment. Many, especially those from socioeconomically disadvantaged backgrounds, appear to need explicit and systematic teaching of phonics and word study throughout the elementary grades, in order to learn it fluently. Therefore, the approach that the ELI supports is one that is closely aligned with the “comprehensive literacy” approach – where script acquisition is supported in the context of a balanced curriculum that also simultaneously attends to various other meaning-making processes. We neither recommend a narrow approach that focuses only on teaching children the script, nor one that assumes that it will happen automatically if the focus is kept on meaning-making. Both “higher order” and “lower order” processes need to be simultaneously addressed.

This brings us to the second question: we already spend a lot of time on teaching the script. Then, why do children fail to learn it? In our study, we found that only 18-24% of students were able to read a grade-level word list at the end of Grade 3, and only 10-25% of students were able to read a grade-level passage (Menon et al., 2017). What are we doing wrong here? What do teachers/curriculum designers/teacher educators need to know about teaching and learning scripts that would help them to do a better job? The answers to this set of questions lies at the heart of the new theme being launched by the ELI – teaching and learning the script in a way that students can become fluent readers and writers. By “fluent”, we mean familiarity to the point of automaticity with reading and spelling, so that they occur relatively effortlessly.

Educators need access to three kinds of knowledge-bases for teaching the script. First, they need to understand the script they are teaching. Many Indian scripts are “alphasyllabaries”, which are quite different from the English script, which is “alphabetic”. What do these terms mean? What is unique about the Indian scripts as compared to English? What do teachers need to know when they teach these scripts? Some upcoming blogs will address this question.

Second, educators need to understand how children develop as readers and writers of these scripts. Are there any developmental patterns that most children go through as they learn to read and write the script? Are there any typical difficulties that we can expect children to have as they learn a particular script? This, too, will be addressed by some of our next few pieces.

Third, educators need access to a variety of research and experience-based practices that support the acquisition of the script. What kinds of classroom strategies help students succeed? How are these similar to, or different from, the strategies and practices currently in place in many Indian classrooms? Several posts will strive to bring to educators such strategies that have either worked in or appear to be generalisable to Indian contexts.

Scripts are arbitrary symbols, or “codes” that different cultures have developed, which by convention have come to “stand for” something. In most Indian scripts as well as in English, the letters of the script stand for sounds. When we look at the symbols (letters, aksharas), and are able to recognise and articulate the sounds they stand for, we are able to read words, sentences, and passages. This process of looking at symbols and using knowledge of their sounds to read is called “decoding”. Likewise, when we think of a word that we wish to write, we are able to break it up into its constituent sounds, and remember the symbols that stand for each of those sounds, we are able to “encode”, or spell the word. Therefore, in order to learn the code, children have to learn both the sounds of their language, as well as the symbols used to represent them. At least one blog for this theme will address the issue of helping children to become aware of the sounds of language. This is called “phonological awareness”, which is quite an important predictor of success in learning the script.

Finally, we will include pieces that look at how scripts can be taught in the context of a balanced early language and literacy curriculum. Is it really possible to balance so many different concerns? Are there any examples in the Indian context we can learn from?

So please stay tuned, and do also look at our annotated list of related resources here.

Happy reading!