Yavatmal ZP school bridges language gap

Yavatmal: A Yavatmal zilla parishad primary school, bordering Telangana state, is using innovative methods to help their students learn Marathi even though it’s not their mother tongue.

At Belampalli village, everybody speaks ‘Kolami’ dialect which much closer to Telgu than Marathi. This proved a challenge for teachers posted at the village’s only primary school because the curriculum is in Marathi.

Rajesh Munjekar, seniormost among the only two teachers at the school, said it was almost like teaching the children a foreign language. “The school was started in 2006 and the previous teachers faced this language problem a lot. All our books are in Marathi and that’s also the medium of teaching in all ZP schools,” said Munjekar.

Neccesity forced the teachers to innovate. Munjekar said, “We then started teaching them in their language and started making them familiar with basics of the Marathi language. While teaching them simple spoken sentences we also focussed on Marathi alphabets and writing. We were starting from scratch and therein lay the challenge,” said Munjekar.

Pravin Sidam, the only other teacher in the school having hardly two dozen students, said suprisingly the kids were very willing to learn. “Teachers who had been posted here before us worked hard and we have all continued the same pattern. Children here are very keen to learn because their parents know that education is the only way these little ones can progress in life,” said Sidam. Teachers made it mandatory for students to talk in Marathi while on campus. Sidam said, “The more they speak the better they get. We have got a lot of success in teaching Marathi this way and now students can confidently read basic sentences as well.”