Special programme to focus on primary edn

The Karnataka government on Wednesday announced the launch of Karnataka Learning Partnership (KLP), an innovative primary education initiative in association with Akshara Foundation to enhance the learning levels of students.

Karnataka's primary and secondary education minister Basavaraja Horatti told reporters that the first phase of KLP will cover 75,000 students facing learning problems in 1,411 government schools in nine educational blocks of Bangalore.

"The objective is to make students better readers through an accelerated reading programme over three months. This programme will be extended to other districts in phases," he added.

The accelerated reading programme is being implemented by over 4,000 government school teachers who have been trained by Akshara Foundation and government resource personnel.

Akshara Foundation chairperson Rohini Nilekani said the accelerated reading programme is a unique model that emphasises enhancing the learning and reading skills of students through story cards and other study materials.

"We will distribute as many as 3.5 million story cards and 1.5 million pieces of supplementary material. The final assessment of the students will be carried out by September end," she added.

Both Akshara Foundation and the government had conducted a survey to ascertain the learning skills of students in Bangalore.

"It was found that nearly 40 per cent of the students in 1,411 schools had problems relating to learning and reading. This programme is aimed at helping the students in overcoming these problems," Nilekani pointed out.