English rhymes to get Kannada twist in ‘local’ learning push

English rhymes such as ‘Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star’ and ‘Baa Baa Black Sheep’ that have captivated the imagination of kids in classrooms will soon be replaced with local content under the new Karnataka Curriculum Framework (KCF).

The KCF will provide pedagogy for early childhood education, which includes kindergarten and anganwadis. At present, there is no prescribed government curriculum for children before class 1.

The KCF for early childhood education, which will prescribe pedagogy up to class 2, will concentrate mainly on local subjects and mother tongue. Even rhymes will be based on local subjects. Kannada rhymes will be translated into English so that students’ learning is localised.

School Education & Literacy Minister B C Nagesh said the KCF was being prepared considering the importance of early childhood education and recommendations of the NEP.

“We will release the KCF by December 10. Preparing the syllabus won’t take much time as early education is mostly activity-based,” Nagesh told DH, adding that the content will be based on local subjects.

Union Minister for Education Dharmendra Pradhan, at a meeting held in New Delhi with education ministers on Wednesday, has instructed them to prepare local-based syllabus, and that the curriculum should be released immediately. Nagesh attended the meeting.

“Along with the importance of mother tongue in early education, the Union minister has instructed that the syllabus should be localised. As the syllabus is very limited, it won’t be difficult for us to bring in local flavour,” Nagesh said.

For example, kids in the coastal or Malnad region will learn local geography, history, persons, places, food, climate, crops and so on.

“What is the need to teach a child sitting in North Karnataka about Cubbon Park or Lalbagh located in Bengaluru? They should know first about their region and neighbourhood,” Nagesh said.

Textbooks for early childhood education will be confined to teaching numeracy and alphabets. Everything else will be activity-based. “Even numeracy and alphabet books will have more pictures and colours. This is mainly to avoid pressure on kids up to grade 6,” he added.