primary school teachers the twists and turns of everyday practice

Version 20 Oct 08, edited final
I
Why a study on teachers?
Most debates and discussions on India’s growth story or poverty levels or increasing
social strife invariably veer around to education: the lack of it, its relevance in
today’s world, its quality and content and the state of our schools. As the debate
gathers momentum a blame game begins. Some blame the government machinery;
others point a finger at the corruption of institutions or the politicisation of content
(curriculum). All analyses, however, agree on one factor—the importance of
teachers. We bemoan the quality and dedication of the teaching community and in
the same breath admit that the teacher in India is but a cog in a hierarchical
administration, a powerless pawn in an intricate game of electoral politics. This
ambivalence is not new, but what is new is the hopelessness that permeates the
discourse across the country. At one level we pin our hopes on education;
simultaneously, we grudgingly admit that nothing short of a systemic overhaul will
do.
A great deal has been written about teachers in India and close to 20 commission and
committee reports have been brought out by the government in the last 30 years (see
reference annexure for a listing). Every few years yet another high level committee is
set up to review different aspects of education—it gives detailed recommendations
and there is even some debate on it. The process then runs cold. The reports talk of
yet another effort made by the government, adding to the long list of documents that
are quoted.
Some changes can indeed be observed on the ground. Teachers’ salaries have
increased sharply in recent years, making regular teaching positions highly sought
after; and in-service teacher-training has become a regular and important activity in
every state. Yet, the available evidence from every part of the country clearly
demonstrates that students are not learning. In particular from 2006, when the first
Annual Survey of Education Report (ASER) was released, there has been increasing
public debate on the abysmally low learning levels in primary schools, as
exemplified by children’s inability to read a short paragraph or solve a simple
division problem.
One set of arguments places the responsibility for this situation squarely on the
teachers themselves. If inputs received by teachers such as pay scales and training
programmes, have improved and yet educational outcomes remain abysmally poor,
the reasoning goes, then teachers themselves are clearly to blame. The media often
portrays teachers, especially in government primary schools, as a cadre of
government employees who get good salaries but do little work. In recent years
there has been a great deal of public anger against teachers; many view the
mushrooming tuition centres run by teachers during and after school hours as the
privatisation of a public service. Recent research has generated alarming statistics on
teacher absence in Indian primary schools and has also highlighted inadequate
content knowledge and pedagogical skills among teachers. In this view, what is
required is increased accountability from teachers, who need to be held responsible
for the outcomes of their work.
A second set of arguments, often utilised by teachers themselves and also
documented by a range of research reports and analyses, blames the larger political
and bureaucratic environment within which teachers operate. Teachers across the
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