Story in numbers: A learning crisis for children in the early grades

Even those who are not education experts or researchers can tell you that after five years of schooling, only half the children in India can read at Standard II level. And that the results for basic arithmetic are even more worrying.

But what led to this learning crisis? There are many contributing factors. Poorly educated parents and lack of learning support at home are certainly a contributor. Inadequate school readiness, learning by rote, the paucity of appropriately trained teachers, and no system of identifying or helping children who are not making adequate progress in the early grades — all can be listed as problems.

The World Development Report 2018 argues that when issues of learning are taken seriously, and learning becomes priority, progress can be made towards solving the learning crisis.

There seems to be a slow trend reversal: It is very slow but it is encouraging. 

The percentage of unschooled parents is progressively coming down. This means that at least one of the influencing factors concerning children’s education — the premium parents put on education — will rise over time and hopefully, more parents will realise that sending children to school and leveraging the Right to Education are crucial to their future wellbeing.