TN: Quality pathetic, books USE-less, says panel

CHENNAI: The syllabus and textbooks of the Uniform School Education System (USE) are substanda­rd, with no sco­pe for children to be activ­ely involved in the learning process, an expert committee constituted by the State government to examine the scheme said in its report submitted to the First Bench of the Madras High Court on Tuesday.“The textbooks cannot be used for the academic year 2011-12 as they require a lot of alterations, modifications and changes to provide good quality education to all the children in the State of Tamil Nadu,” the nine-member committee, headed by Chief Secretary Debendranath Sarangi, said in its report running to about 500 pages.The panel was constituted on the directions of the Supreme Court on June 14, based on a batch of appeals.The HC Bench comprising Chief Justice M Y Eqbal and Justice T S Sivagnanam granted two-days’ time to the parties to file their objections/replies and adjourned the matter till July 7.The textbooks seemed to have been prepared in haste; they had been translated from Tamil to English—which in general was poor and at times atrocious, the report said, adding that literal translations had made the science and social science textbooks of all classes worthless.The textbooks did not provide for constructive learning and, hence, did not give students an opportunity to discuss, interact and expr­ess their spontaneous views. The books would not ignite in children a passion for understanding, the report said.There were also no activiti­es in the books and, therefore, no opportunity for children to come up with their own obser­vatio­ns. With an overload of information, the emphasis was more on memorising. “He­n­ce, the textbook is more a source of stress and would in no way foster creativity and joyful learning.”