Chennai, Sept 21 (BPNS)
A recent study conducted by the National Council For Educational Research and Training (NCERT) has revealed that the students of Class 3 of Tamil Nadu schools are abysmally poor in the numerical ability tests. The students fared poorly in the language proficiency tests as well, shockingly in the Tamil language also.
The Foundational learning study ,2022, was conducted by the NCERT for the Bharat Nipun scheme under the Ministry of Education, Government of India.
The study found that 29% of Tamil Nadu’s Class 3 students could not complete the basic numerical abilities including number identification, multiplication, division, identifying patterns comprising numbers and shapes and , identifying dates and months in calendars. This makes the state most backward as far as the numerical ability of the students of Class 3 are concerned. Tamil Nadu is followed by Jammu and Kashmir (28%), Assam (18%), Gujarat (18%) and Chattisgarh (18%). It may be noted in this context that the national average of the number of students who could not comprehend numerically was only 11%.
Interestingly the Gross Enrolment Ration at the national level is only 27.1 while that of Tamil Nadu is 51.4. This data clearly shows that Tamil Nadu is totally lacking behind with other states in this.
The state fared poorly in the language category as well with 48 percent of students not knowing basic knowledge and skills in Tamil while 43% do not know the basics of English.
The test was conducted with the child being made to read out loud and asked questions from the texts that were not from school syllabus.
It is to be noted that the study was conducted among 2937 class 3 students of 336 schools. This includes class 3 students of 336 schools of Tamil Nadu. The study was conducted among government school students, private school students and aided school students.
The NCERT in its report said that only 46% of students were able to read 80-100 letters correctly and fluently in Tamil. Interestingly only 47% of the students could read 80% of the words in English correctly and fluently.
The Nipun Bharath Scheme is for all Class 3 students to have basic literary and numerical abilities.
