Tamil Nadu - Chennai   

The `Karadi' approach to English

By Our Staff Reporter

Film actor Nasser (right) handing over the first copy of the `Karadi path', a creative learning kit to the Secretary, Higher Education, Tamil Nadu Government, K. Gnanadesikan, in Chennai.

CHENNAI, NOV. 16. When publisher Shobha Vishwanath asked 70 teachers from Government Tamil medium schools how many of them were confident of speaking in English, only three hands went up.

And yet, these class IV and V teachers also taught English doubled as English language teachers for around 7,000 schoolchildren in St. Thomas Mount, Villivakkam and Sriperumbudur.

Last week, the Karadi Alliance Trust, headed by Ms. Vishwanath, helped the teachers get started on a creative learning aid for children to learn, enjoy and use English. The learning kit, funded by the Ford Foundation, is essentially a storybook and an audiotape for the children. Schools that didn't have tape-recorders would be provided with one.

During the orientation programme, the teachers heard the tale of the foolish crow who lost his roti to the wily fox in Tamil. The voices of actor Nasser, the narrator, and playback singer Anooradha Sriram filled the auditorium, as the teachers smiled at the crow's song and turned the pages of the brightly illustrated bi-lingual storybook.

"In the first few classes, the story is played in Tamil. Once the children are familiar with the story, the teacher plays the English version narrated by Saeed Jaffrey," said Ms. Vishwanath.

The Karadi programme had been successfully used in schools in Goa and at the Olcott Memorial School here, she said.

Nasser handed over the first copy of the kit to the Secretary of Higher Education to the Tamil Nadu Government, K. Gnanadesikan.

Mr. Gnanadesikan he said, "In our schools, we now have teachers who are qualified BA literature graduates in literature to teach English for classes VI and upwards.

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