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as technology, teaching methodology, content, teacher training,project coordination and monitoring and assessment of thestudents. It also discusses project implementation, challengesfaced during implementation and impact of the project so far.

II.

PROJECT BACKGROUND

This project was a collaborative effort among fiveorganizations with an aim to reach the unreached and provide

them quality education using technology. It was designed byUnited Way of Hyderabad, BodhaGuru and Learning Spaceand funded by a corporate social responsibility (CSR) team ofa major organization in the field of information technology (IT)for the benefit of children in homes run by a non-governmentalorganization in the cities of Hyderabad and Secunderabad inTelangana state. The project was designed to improve Mathand Science skills of 700+ children of 12 different homesstudying in classes 1 7 in the near-by government schoolswith the help of 24 in-house teachers and 2 coordinators.

A. Objective

The objective of this project was to help children of thesehomes to become proficient in Math and Science skills at theirlevel and become equally competent with other children goingto private schools in academic year 2014-15.

B.

Context

One of the key stakeholders of the project BodhaGuruempowered many affordable private schools with technologyand got good results. To reach the children who cannot affordto have technology for their learning, they, along with UnitedWay of Hyderabad came up with an idea of working with thechildren of these homes. The children here were street childrenand other under-privileged children who are given residentialenvironment and education through near-by governmentschools and in-house teachers of the homes.

Before joining these homes, many of these children never

went to school before or had gaps in their schooling, werevictims of abuse and child labour etc. After joining the homes,they underwent a short course named Bridge Course beforetheir admission to compensate for the loss of academic yearsand get admission in the schools in the class according to theirage.

C.Research Methodology

The data for the study was collected from secondarysources, survey, questionnaire on the concepts taught anddirect observation. Data on learning level of Math fromPratham Annual Study of Education Report (ASER) study [8]was taken as the baseline. The results of the assessmentsconducted to the students of the homes were compared against

this baseline data.As the project was aimed at improving primary and upper-

primary students at an NGO in the city of Hyderabad, India,700+ children of 12 different homes run by this NGO, werestudied. The project was conducted for the academic year 2014 1015. Out of these 12 homes, 6 homes were for boys and 6homes were for girls. Children were given assessments everytwo weeks. These assessments had subjective and multiple

choice questions from Math and Science and supportedstudents studying in both Telugu and English mediums.

D.

Challenges

We faced many challenges as educating these children washarder when compared to teaching a normal child who attendedschool from the age of three. Below are the main challenges wefaced:

Learning levels were different from their grades: Thechildren were in the age group of four to fourteen years.The bridge course they attended before they gotadmission to the grades appropriate to their age wasabout five to six months and it is very difficult tocompensate for the academic study they missed in theprevious years in such short duration. So, their learninglevels were low compared to the grade they wereattending in the school.

Varied learning levels:As children were from differentbackgrounds, they had varied levels of experienceswhich had immense impact on their lives and in thiscontext, on their learning new things. So, it was a

challenging task to standardize a particular learningmethodology.

Limited infrastructure: These homes were run bypassionate non-governmental organizations and due tolack of funds, the infrastructure was minimal in thesehomes - from food, clothing to classrooms, television,blackboard, electricity etc.

Resident teachers busy with admin work:As there werelimited human resources in the homes, a large numberof teachers did other work such as taking sick child tohospital, cook for the children in case the cook wasabsent, administrative work, raising funds etc.

Resident teachers not technology-savvy and wereuntrained:These teachers were very passionate people.However, their technology skills were limited and manyof them were not trained in formal teaching/learningmethodologies.

Limited time for study hours:Most crucial thing for theproject was time. As the children went to school duringthe day and most of the times they got home work, therewas limited time available for the extra study hours.

III.

PROJECT DESIGN

Keeping the above challenges in mind, we designed theproject so that children from all grades improve their Math andScience skills. Various components are discussed below.

A. Technology

Each home was equipped with a TV and an Android set-

top box (NjoyLearning device), loaded with following self-

learning content designed by BodhaGuru in local language

(Telugu, Hindi, Indian English):

Short animated story video

Detailed concept video

Thought provoking interactive quiz

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Based on observation during visits to the homes, out of 24teachers working on this program:

16 teachers were strictly following our methodologyand guidelines 100%

5 of them were following the same for about 70% -80%

3 of them were following the same for less than 50%

B. Student attendance & involvement

Based on observation and interaction with students duringvisits, it was observed that among students those are present ineach home, about 90 - 100% of students were attending studyhours. In some homes, about 10% of students were not regularattending the study hours due to behavioural issues.

It was also observed that students were interested inwatching story-videos and enthusiastically participated indiscussions and activities. It was noted that out of twelvehomes, student involvement in class discussions and activitieswas 90 - 100 % in 10 homes and less than 50% in 2 homes.

C.

Curriculum completion

Twenty weeks curriculum was completed and sixteen testswere conducted in all the twelve homes.

D.

Student learning based on the assessments conducted by

BodhaGuru team

Below is the summary of the assessments conducted forthese children till Jan 2015 to understand the learningoutcome improvement for Science and Math of childrenstudying after school hours in these homes, as part of theproject.

1) Background scores at national level

Before looking into the results of the students in these

homes, it is important to summarize the learning levelresults of Math from Pratham Annual Study of Education

Report (ASER) study which is done in 577 districts and

16497 villages of India covering all of the Indian states.

Note: On the learning level assessment, Pratham surveycovers measuring basic reading levels and basic Math skillsfor children in age 3-16 years by randomly selecting 20households in a given village. The child in that householdgoes through a simple test. A sample Math test in thePratham survey includes identification of single and twodigit numbers, two digit subtraction and three digit dividedby a single digit division problems.

As seen from the following table 1, out of children studying

in class 5, only 24.5% children were able to do two digitsubtraction and 26.1% children were able to do division.

Table1. Pratham Math Study Results

2)

Scores of the children in the homes

Below are the results of the children of these homes forcore (aka fundamental) concepts based on December, 2014tests. We have aggregated multiple topics into a concept foreasier readability.

a) Question Paper

Fig. 3 shows sample answer sheet for a test we

conducted in January, 2015:

Fig. 3. Sample question paper and answer sheet

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b) Quantitative Analysis

Fig. 4 summarizes the results of each of the homes for

subtraction topic each bar represents the percentage

of children who scored greater than 60% on the

subtraction concept with results taken from multiple

tests. As we can see from dark black bar, more than

65% of children in class 4 and 5 were able to do three

and four digit subtraction with and without borrowing.

Note: Few homes did not have Class1-3 and Class 6-

7 hence you will see fewer numbers of bars in them.

Fig. 5 summarizes the results of each of the these homes

for division topic each bar represents the percentage

of children who scored greater than 60% on the division

concept with results taken from multiple tests.

Fig. 4. Subtraction concept results in the homes for different classes

Fig. 5. Division concept results in the homes for different classes

c)

Qualitative Analysis

Below is the analysis of these results at qualitativelevel:

Overall (across tests and classes), we saw very goodresults for Math as well as Science. These results aremuch higher than ASER 2014 study.

Note: We evaluated concept level understanding ofchildren by looking at their answers to multiplequestions across tests.

We saw results improving in each home from firstbaseline test conducted in July 2014.

The revision weeks and associated activities (grouplevel activity sheet, teaching children directly, practiceworksheets etc.) made a lot of difference. In all thetopics such as subtraction and division where childrenwere struggling, we saw tremendous improvement inthe subsequent tests.

The children enjoyed hands-on activities in bothScience and Math.

Each home had 10-15% children who were veryintelligent based on their test scores as well aspersonal interactions with them. They could not onlysolve the problems, but they could also createquestions and solve them, which is much harder skillto acquire. Additionally there were children in class 4to 7 in every home who could teach/explain conceptsto others.

One fundamental problem continued to be lack ofreading and writing skills i.e. language skills both

English and Telugu which was impacting theirsubject skills. The good news was: though childrenhave language problems, but still they were able toanswer science questions which they could co-relate toreal life like in germination of seeds or human food.

VI.

LIMITATIONS DURING PROJECT IMPLEMENTATION

Below were some limitations observed during projectimplementation:

Conceptual skills of teachers: Based on theobservation and interaction during visits, it was notedthat out of 24 teachers, 67% of the teachers wereconceptually good, 25% of them were average and 8%

were below average. Some new teachers who wererecruited in the middle of the project were belowaverage.

Implementation of study hours:There were unexpectedevents affecting regularity in conducting study hours.Teachers were unavailable sometimes attending sickchildren, internal meetings and inspections etc. Studyhours could not be conducted during donor visits aschildren were engaged by the donors.

Teacher attendance:A couple of homes were runningon single teacher as the second teacher was on leavefor longer duration due to personal reasons. Somehomes had a backup teacher, some do not.

Student attendance:There was a lot of variation in thenumber of students attending study hours as studentswent to their native places during holidays and some ofthem did not come back as soon as the holidays wereover. In some homes, a couple of students did notattend the classes though they were present in thehome due to disciplinary issues. Even teachers werenot able to control them.

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Teaching methodology: Initially, it was observed thatthough training was given on the suggestedmethodology of using NjoyLearning device, someteachers were not following it due to their personalpreferences, getting used to traditional methodologyetc. By the end of the academic session, it wasobserved that most of the teachers were using thedevice as per the suggested methodology.

English language skills of teachers:As some teacherslacked basic English language skills, they were facingdifficulty in understanding some Math and Sciencevideos which are in English.

Change of teachers: In some homes, new teacherstaught the children as the teachers who were initiallytrained could not take classes due to various reasonssuch as role change, promotion etc. Though the newteachers were trained later, this caused somedisturbance in terms of completing the curriculum ontime.

VII.

CONCLUSION

Technology can be very helpful in making learninginteresting and easily replicating it to large number of schools.However, when designing technology solutions for under-privileged children, special care must be given in terms ofcontent design, software UX and the hardware form-factor.The content must be multimedia based with ways to generateinterest (e.g. stories, practical examples), in local language anddesigned for self-learning (smaller videos, one video based onother). The practice apps should be easy to use with a self-guided flow, should point out the exact mistakes and ways tosolve it like animated step-by-step walk-through of eachquestion. The overall software UX should be simple andconsumptive driven for any teacher or child to use it withoutany IT skills. The hardware should be portable, robust and

loaded with offline content that can work in any environment.

In teaching the children from varied backgrounds as in ourproject, no doubt technology plays a vital role, but teachersability to use the technology in the best possible ways isequally important. Any implementation of technology ineducation relies heavily on the teachers i.e. getting anyeducational innovation into existing practices heavily dependson the personal and individual meanings that teachers give toit.

ACKNOWLEDGMENT

These improvements of learning level are outcome of ateam effort. Team BodhaGuru and Learning Space team wouldlike to sincerely thank the management of these homes for thesupport and all the associated teachers of these homes whowere passionate to make difference, eager to learn, whoconducted after school hours sessions meticulously every dayand conducted the curriculum on time. We would also like tothank United Way of Hyderabad Team for conceiving thisprogram, getting all the stakeholders together & providing usthe desired autonomy to execute this project and our CSRsponsors for sponsoring the project.

REFERENCES

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Lemke, J. L. (1990, p.133). Talking Science: Language, learning andvalues. Ablex Publishing Corporation, Norwood, New Jersey

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Pratham ASER Study: http://www.asercentre.org/