Education ministry publishes study on foundational literacy, numeracy of Class 3 students

NEW DELHI: The education ministry, on Wednesday, published the findings of the survey on foundational literacy and numeracy of over 86,000 Class 3 students across India. The study covered students from 10,000 schools and involved more than 18,000 teachers, the ministry said.

Foundational literacy and numeracy tests the students’ ability to read, write and do basic mathematics. The study was based on a survey conducted in 20 languages and the results will be used for planning interventions at the school level.

A detailed report on the study, called the National Foundational Literacy and Numeracy Study, is yet to be made public.

“The study assessed learning competencies at the foundational stage in the children and the findings will be used to plan systematic interventions. The study is quite unique as it is first time in the entire world that oral reading fluency with comprehension and numeracy benchmarks based on Global Proficiency Framework are set for 20 languages with the largest sample ever for one-on-one basis assessment,” the ministry of education said in a statement.

The Global Proficiency Framework, created by United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization’s (UNESCO) International Bureau of Education, is a method to assess proficiency levels of reading and mathematics for different levels. Students are assessed on four levels —below partially meets, partially meets, meets, and exceeds global minimum proficiency—on a common scale from low to high achievement.

The ministry said that achieving foundational literacy and numeracy is one of the most important goals of the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020.

“National Education Policy (2020) gives paramount importance to the ability to read and write, and perform basic operations with numbers at foundational level as it is an indispensable prerequisite for all future schooling and lifelong learning. Attaining foundational literacy and numeracy for all children has thus become a national mission, under the NIPUN (National Initiative for Proficiency in Reading with Understanding and Numeracy) Bharat,” the ministry said.

Under NEP 2020, the Foundational Literacy and Numeracy Mission aims to ensure that all the children, by the end of Class 3, achieve foundational learning standards by the year 2026-27.