New Education Policy -2020 is an important education policy which aims to provide provisions for fulfilling the aspirational goals of 21^st century under the lenses of SGD-4 including ensuring inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning for all by 2030. The policy has given a significant space for early childhood care and education and unveiled with 5 years of foundational course as Pre-Primary education for children age 3-8 years. The policy has designed with lot of reforms in current examination system and mandated to address the challenges includes: (i) access, (ii) equity, (iii) quality, (iv) affordability, and (v) accountability faced by the current education system.  It is enlisted various provisions at all levels of education from school to higher education.  NEP 2020 has given the highest priority to build a strong foundation early in a child’s life and It is envisaged for better learning with a strong foundation as predatory mechanism for addressing low and slow learning challenges at primary education.  It aims at the holistic development of a child's social, emotional, cognitive and physical needs in order to build a solid and broad foundation for lifelong learning and wellbeing.  Besides to this, NEP has been emphasized on STEM approach (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) to create a window of opportunity on critical thinking as important part of children growth and it gives a better exposure on technology that power the world.   For this, it is proposed to   have a special regulatory authority including National Education Commission, public investment on Education to support vocational and adult education to transform the society.

The most important area of investment on early learning is really matters for ensuring all boys and girls have access to quality pre-school education and learning ready when they enter in class- 1.  Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) is a critical foundation for the learning and development, and have acute impact on success at the primary stage of education as per the Nneuroscience research that 90% of the child’s brain growth occurs by the time a child is 5 years of age.

In fact, in India the Integrated Child Development Services Scheme (ICDS) has mandated the Early Childhood care and education along with other services including supplementary nutrition, growth monitoring, primary healthcare, immunization and referral to secondary health care through Anganwadi Centres, but the focus and exposure on pre-school education is limited with little play and minimum learning space for the young children.  Anganwadi centres have operated as nutrition of day care centres staffed with no formal training on Child Development as per the India Consensus report.  But, Women & Child Development Departments have proactively taken lot of measures and re-worked on very vibrant early learning strategies for ensuring a pre-school education in Anganwadi centres by designing appropriate curriculum frameworks with adequate reading and learning materials.  For example, department of Women and Child development departments of Karnataka, Odisha and New Delhi  has been facilitated various consultations for making Anganwadi Centres as learning hubs where Bal Raksha Bharat is also known as Save the Children also contributed with its Ready to Learn Concept for strengthening quality pre-school education in Anganwadi Centres. They have demonstrated lot of innovations during pandemic to reach the children through on-line platform.

These initiatives have really will help in giving a smooth way out for integrating ECCE with Primary Education with 5 years of foundational course as per the NEP 2020.  However, the Government of India with State departments have to work on a strong way forward agenda for rolling out pre-primary education in all the States and to start with Anganwadi centres as a first step which are co-located to school premises way back with an objective to integrate pre-school domain with primary schools.  Only challenge is, not seen any collective action from Department of Women and Child Development and Department of School Education in sharing the roles in strengthening the domain in co-located Anganwadi Centres. Besides to this, no news on initiating ECCE (Pre-School) courses in DIETs as pre-requisite for moving ahead with pre-primary education as part of NEP.  In fact, Telangana Government has been made its efforts and succeeded in initiating a course in a single DIET at Medak. Because, NEP is already indicated to have minimum 6 months of training on ECCE for undertaking pre-primary education from 3-8 year and it required to take up a special ECCE training to primary school teachers to handle pre-school domain.  Even SGT (Secondary Grade Teacher) teacher who carried a normal Diploma in Education (Dl. Ed) is not eligible to handle pre-primary education without having a Technical training and exposure for ensuing (a)Physical and Motor development (b) Cognitive development (c)socio-emotional and ethical development (d) cultural and artistic development (d) development of communication, language, early literacy and numeracy.  Besides to this, NEP has been mandated it is qualifications for Anganwadi Workers or Teachers must have 10+2 years of education with 6 months ECCE diploma course. If any lower qualified candidates will be required to have 1 year ECCE course is mandated.  Other hand, revision of National Curriculum framework for guiding State frameworks will be a long way to go to authenticate the curriculum and its standards.  Overall, it is realised that, Teacher training will play an important role in realising the core area of pre-primary education along with appropriate infrastructure, investment and a strong & collective action from both DWCD and Education departments along with Tribal Welfare department, Health & Family department and Human Resource Development as a nodal authority to oversee the programme. 

NCERT has been initiated certain actions towards pre-primary education and released Guidelines for three month play based school preparedness module for Grade 1 with title of Vidya Pravesh with daily schedule for guiding the teachers who manages the pre-primary education at Grade- -1.  The Ministry of Education has launched an another programme- NIPUN (National Initiative for Proficiency in Reading with Understanding and Numeracy) Programme to cover the learning needs of children from 3-9 years of age under NEP to create an enabling environment to ensure universal acquisition of Foundational Literacy and Numeracy.  This initiative will ensure every child to achieve desired learning competencies in reading, writing and numeracy by grade 3 by 2026-27.  The NISHTA (National Initiative for School Heads and Teachers Holistic advancement) programme by NCERT initiated as a special package for building teacher capacities on foundational literacy and numeracy (FLN).

There are many challenges in undertaking pre-school education in the country especially in age-appropriate admission is not taking place in schools and Anganwadi Centres/pre-schools as per the India Early Childhood Education Impact study under taken by CECED, Unicef and ASER during 2018.  Example: pre-school age children age at 4 years are in primary schools including 0.3% in Assam. 12.3% in Rajasthan and 7.9% in Telangana states. Primary school age children in pre-schools at age 6 years are in pre-schools including age at 6 years: 54.7% in Assam, 26.3% Rajasthan & 29.1% in Telangana and children at age 7 are in pre-schools including 17.3% in Assam, 10.3% in Rajasthan & 8.6% in Telangana State.  Age appropriate admission one of the important measure to move forward with a strong learning ladder with foundational ECCE programme.

Access to early childhood education (ECE) in India is limited.  In 2017-2018, only about 20% of children aged 3-5 were enrolled in pre-primary education.  The share of children attending pre-primary education varies by states, with more than half of children in Goa, Punjab, Sikkim and Tripura attending, and less than 10% in Odisha and Bihar.

The NEP 2020 places a high priority on ECE, advocating for the inclusion of ECE from age 3.  The NEP recommends four models for implementing ECE, including Anganwadi centres, pre-primary sections in schools and standalone pre-schools. 

Considering these steps and plans, there are few other important measures to be taken for introducing or strengthening pre-primary Education in India such as: creating awareness on the importance of pre-primary education among parents with a focus on first generation learner families, infrastructure development, ensuring quality standards such as hygiene, safety, nutrition and well-being of children. It should not be confined to school ready must be on Learning ready with an objective to establish an experience and stimulus to develop skills and intelligence for young children to create a life. The Education and Women and Child Development departments to work together for ensuring an appropriate curriculum, teacher training and setting -up milestones for early learning along with child centric measures for children wellbeing. It is mandated to strengthen parent committees, ensuring parent participation in the learning process.  Overall, we need to identify the importance of pre-primary education as need of the hour to create strong foundation for young children to minimise the challenges low and slow learning at primary schools and build the learning ladder among young children.

Conclusion

ECCE is pivotal for shaping a child’s future and addressing the challenges of low and slow learning in primary education. By creating a solid learning foundation, NEP 2020 can usher in a transformative era for India’s education system. A unified effort from stakeholders, including government departments and civil society organizations, is essential to make this vision a reality.

The views expressed in this article are based on desk reviews and the author’s experience. The organization is not responsible for the opinions presented.

By Sree Nagesh Malladi
Education Analyst