On Wednesday 03 Nov 2010 3:43:35 am Yamandu Ploskonka wrote: > hmm, sure..., sorry What does it mean? 90% of the children get 100%? > Is there a sliding scale / bell curve? what is "fluency", anyway? > fluency in what? I can share my experience in helping out Sikshana (www.sikshana.org). Sikshana sends out people (mentors) to assist public school teachers to do a dip stick check at 4th and 7th in four areas: * expression - does he/she speak freely? do he/she open out to teachers and peers for help in getting supplies, seek clarifications etc? If so, check * writing - can he/she write down thoughts and needs? Spelling and grammar errors are ok as long as the meaning comes through clearly. * reading - can he/she read (unseen) sentences, paragraphs, written requests, understand and be ready to act upon it? * numeracy - can he/she perform division (arithmetic) of three or larger digits and verify the result?
These checks take only a few minutes per student and serve to indicate if he/she has started learning and build a foundation for life. We do this for the primary language in 4th and check bilingual/trilingual skills in 7th. A list of students who fall short is drawn up. We don't spend time on analyzing why the gap occurred but ensure that each student is "adopted" by an adult - a teacher who has stepped forward to take up this challenge or a local volunteer or a teacher assisted by a local volunteer. In a typical cluster of 15 schools (~1500-2000 students) around 25-30% fall short even with tech infusion. But with personal attention, the numbers drop below 10% in a matter of months. The bar is then raised slowly so that no student is left behind. The exact method used to attain fluency is left to the teacher. Subbu _______________________________________________ IAEP -- It's An Education Project (not a laptop project!) IAEP@lists.sugarlabs.org http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/iaep
