Most people can’t read or write. Many of the signs use pictures not words so everyone can understand them. Because they can’t read or write it means they can’t get jobs. The government in India is trying hard to teach everyone to read and write.
They have made schools in India free for children but lots of them have to help their parents on their farms.
Indian children start school when they are 6 and they go for 6 days a week. Some schools start very early in the morning and go home just after lunch. Children are supposed to stay at school until they are 14. They have a primary, middle and then a high school. If they want to go to University they have to be able to read, write and speak English. Everyone has a holiday over the summer for 2 months, even longer than us!
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A tiffin box when it is open and closed. |
Children take their lunch to school in a tiffin box. This is a pile of little tins that stack on top of each other and clip together. They put rice and other things in it. |
Schools in the country
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These photos show schools that are very poor in the villages. They are built like their houses out of wood and bamboo. The children feel lucky if they can come to this school. It means they might be able to get a better job when they are older. |
There are not enough schools in the countryside for all the children to go to a school near to where they live so the nearest school could be a long way away. Children travel from villages all around and usually walk. This can be a long way and the children have to get up very early to get there. Younger children go on bikes if the family has one.
The schools in the villages are poor and don’t tend to have electricity so they don’t have computers and whiteboards like us. The classrooms are bare but may have some of the children’s paintings on the walls to make them look nice.
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This school is closer to a city. Look at the buildings in the background. The children are wearing uniforms which means their parents must have a bit of money but they are certainly not rich. This is playtime but the children are under cover. This building could also be a classroom. Look at the chalk board in the middle.
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Indian schools have large classes, sometimes with 35 children in one class. The teachers are usually women. |
If the weather is nice the children sit outside for their lessons in the shade of a tree. They sit cross legged on the floor in neat rows, girls on one side and boys on the other. Some, but not many, classrooms have desks. |
They learn their own local language, Hindi, Indian history, maths and geography. |
The government has given lots of village schools slates and chalk. Books can’t be used over and over but these can.
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Schools in the city
Some rich people in Indian cities pay to send their children to the best schools. The private schools can afford to pay the best teachers and have things like computers and proper classrooms with desks so these children can learn much better than the poor children. These schools are much more like our schools.
Children who live in the cities have a much better chance of getting a good education as the schools have better equipment.
Normal schools in Indian cities that are run by the government are free but they cannot afford the best teachers like the private schools. Poor families don’t have much choice though, if they don’t go to these schools the children can’t learn. |
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