In a bid to inculcate a scientific temper among children from economically disadvantaged backgrounds and stimulate inquiry-based teaching in the country’s rural hinterland, a Pune-based educationist has come up with a series of animated science videos. The series aims at demolishing language barriers to make everyday science comprehensible and accessible to such children.
The 36 videos — each with a different science theme — for children between the ages of eight and 13, are the brainchild Lewitt Somarajan, the founder of Life-Lab, an educational initiative of the Women’s Organisation for Socio-Cultural Awareness. The NGO is supported by Book A Smile, the charity partner of BookMyShow.
The videos, featuring the characters ‘Gappu’ and ‘Bobo’ from a previously successful comic book series by Life-Lab, are three to four minutes long each.
Sans words and dialogues and set to a euphonic background score, the videos expound scientific concepts like crystallisation, electromagnetism and osmosis by weaving simple stories in surroundings familiar to children of all social and economic classes.
“The intent behind the graphic books and the videos is to try and provide ownership of learning to the student without being overtly didactic. The videos blend science into an extremely simple storytelling format aimed at arousing the interest of any child, given the power and recall of the visual media,” says Mr. Somarajan, who initiated Life-Lab in 2012 while still a Fellow at Teach for India.
“The inspiration behind the Gappu and Bobo series was my own stressful, and sometimes downright unhappy learning experience,” says the ever-smiling Mr. Somarajan, who has had a peripatetic education in no less than six States.
But his friendly mien belies a steely determination to brush away the cobwebs of rote learning and take experiential education to India’s backwater and children from the social margins in urban areas.
“When the majority of the population is scientifically illiterate, it not only aggravates inequity, but also excludes this majority from making decisions and create a meaningful impact on its environment. Thus, science literacy is imperative for the full realisation of the human being,” he says, stating that the ‘Gappu and Bobo’ comic book series was launched keeping in mind the holistic development of children.
So far, 20,000 children have read the books. Buoyed by the popularity of the books, Mr. Somarajan thought of expanding them to animated videos, especially following extensive visits to the hinterland a few years ago.
“It was when I started going to the tribal-dominated areas in Chattisgarh and the rural hinterland of Maharashtra that I became acutely conscious of the daunting language barrier which made it hard for children in these remote areas to grasp the simplest of scientific concepts. The other cause for grave concern was the proficiency of the so-called rural teachers in schools where the children’s attendance often depended on the caprice of their parents,” he said.
Now, with these videos, every science teacher can be a storyteller too, he observes. Mr. Somarajan said the ‘Gappu and Bobo’ videos seamlessly blend “socio-emotional learning” with “activity-based science learning” in an innovative format. “As they are silent educative films, teachers, parents, educators and children across the length and breadth of the country can use them without facing any language obstacle,” he said.
