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Urdu Teachers Workshop (Whiff of Fresh Air into Musty Corridors)
By A Staff Writer
Bangalore
The Karnataka Urdu Academy wakes up to take the first thing first.
Karnataka has as many as 4,035 Government Urdu Schools which teach nearly six lakh children. For all practical purposes, Urdu schools currently teach only Muslim children. And these kids belong to the most underprivileged classes which cannot afford expensive English medium education. Given this background, the Government Urdu schools cannot be ignored.
If teachers could be motivated, curriculum updated, ambience around the schools improved and these schools could be equipped with teaching aids, they can prove a boon to the community. So when the Karnataka Urdu Academy organised a 10-day Urdu Teachers Workshop, first of its kind in the State in November 2005, it was hailed as a welcome initiative.
Though several trainers lectured during the period, there was consensus among the teachers that such motivational measures provide the much needed injection of elixir for the system that has been victim of apathy for long. The knotty pile of issues that the workshop threw up, may require a full-fledged seminar to discuss. But it emerged that the schools are in advanced state of dereliction by an administration least geared to translate the policy of ‘education for all’ into reality. At the same time, the community to which it is meant to serve, is totally oblivious of its existence. It was therefore a welcome sign that the Urdu Academy, which till last year was merely engaged in felicitating and awarding, perhaps, the last generation of Urdu writers, poets and critics had woken up to blow some soul into the schools which are the only guarantee for Urdu’s survival in the State. It was like taking up the first thing first.
The new chairman of the Academy, Prof. Meem Noon Sayeed was clear that unless Urdu schools produced an intellectual class and a wide body of practitioners, the blood supply system to the body of the language will not survive for long. Sayeed though heads the Academy, is a pragmatic person. He recognised the fact that developing communication competency in English was the key to success and therefore Urdu schools should rather stress on excellence in English. In a chat with Islamic Voice, Sayeed said the Muslim kids would do better if they switched over to English medium of education after 7th standard as Urdu linguistic skills are largely unapplicable in practical life in a Kannada primary State of Karnataka or for that matter in the entire South India. For instance, an average Urdu speaker does not use Urdu in courts, bazaar, malls, colleges, post offices or railway stations. He also pointed out the dichotomy between Deccani Urdu dialect and the Urdu used in writing which causes abundant confusion among students. For instance, plural of chappal in Deccani would be chappalan and for chawal(rice), chawalan. But this is limited to speaking. When it comes to writing, one has to perforce use chappal and chawal even in plural form.
Maqbool Ahmed Siraj, journalist, also elaborated on the theme of developing excellence in English in Urdu schools as an average Urdu speaker has to inevitably use mainstream languages in practical life. He said all modern sciences are currently evolving in the West and vernacular languages are adopting the terminology without much amends. He said while litre, metre, kilograms and centigrade became part of Urdu vocabulary long ago, there is no effort to do the same for newer terms such as bio-oxygen demand (BOD), ppm for dissolved matter, micron for thickness of plastics, light years for celestial distances, KBPS for bandwidth, gauge for railway lines, cusec feet/metre for flowing water, etc. He said Urdu students should be provided visual learning and hands-on experience by outdoor visits to post offices, airport, railway stations, parks, zoos, museum, banks, etc. He said their poor background deters them from learning about gadgets, gizmos and modern services which renders them unemployable and retards their capacity to go further in education. He said Urdu students do not find access to year books, almanacs or encyclopedias, let alone Internet where Urdu websites are few.
Mr. Azam Shahid, a member of the Urdu Academy explained the significance of newspapers in continuing education. He said his survey found only two-fifths of Urdu teachers scanning newspapers at homes. However, Hilal High School in Bangalore which adopted Deccan Herald’s NIE programme, exhibited high level of awareness among its teachers. He said constant updating of knowledge would lead to improved coaching.
Iftikhar Ahmed of Salar Daily took the teachers on a journey through Urdu newspaper office and the layout.
Education officer with Department of Public Instruction, Shahida Parveen said monotony could be avoided by teaching the children by playway method where competencies are developed by performing rather than just speaking. She also stressed the importance of theatrics in education where children could be taught by voice modulation, body language and facial expression.
The teachers were unanimous that Friday holiday in Urdu schools effectively reduces the working days to four as children play truant on Sunday. They said Friday prayers hardly involved 40 minutes and for this sake, the whole day need not be sacrificed. They urged mainstre-aming of holiday pattern with Sundays and Saturday also being applied as weekend holiday for Urdu schools. However, there was a view that since most Urdu schools hire mosque premises, the Government would need to provide alternative accommoda-tion for such schools prior to scrapping the Friday holiday.
According to Prof. Sayeed, the younger teachers were open to absorbing new techniques and therefore more of them were involved. He however pointed out that one of the participants was transferred to another school by the old headmistress of a school as she felt slighted at the induction of new techniques by-passing the old generation of teachers.
Mohd. Kaleemullah of Education for All Trust, Prof. Iqbalunnissa of Bangalore University and Maharaj Koul of Urdu Teaching and Research Centre, Lucknow, also lectured on various aspects.
(This report has been compiled by Maqbool Ahmed Siraj. He can be reached at maqbool_siraj@ rediffmail.com)
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