Transforming Early Education in Punjab: Insights from Programme Aarambh
Rocket Learning, making a significant impact on early childhood education in the state through its global partner, Programme Aarambh, began in March 2024. It has developed incredible parent engagement and increased play-based learning. It was introduced in 8 districts. In the progressive program, rocket learning teaches upwards of 132,000 students and 70,000 parents.
Adding to Rocket Learning’s Growth in Punjab
A successful follow-up of Programme Aarambh in Punjab is the considerable concentration on ensuring parents’ involvement. Mr. Digvijay Singh, Senior Project Manager for Punjab, referred in an interview as follows: “At that time, I quit the company and came to be one of the early members of Rocket Learning during April 2024 in Punjab, as a potential participant regarded from Foundation Literacy and Numeracy (FLN). I had seen during that time that quite entirely underestimating parents is absolutely not possible when learning outcomes in children were to be achieved,”he said.
Even though pre-primary made it to the government schools in Punjab as early as the year 2018, the challenges were always there for implementation. Recognizing the gap, Rocket Learning jumped into action. A survey pointed out that the state of Punjab had more than 95% households with smartphones, thereby enabling scalability and accessibility of the programme.
The team dealt in a top-down hierarchy approach to involve stakeholders from suitable state management officials, extending to the block and district levels. The Punjab Development Commission and SCERT operative partnership ensured complete mingling with educational framework.
AarambhNiti’s Objectives and Practices
To streamline education information between school and home through the concept of technology; that means parents can easily interact with their children during their play activities at home using the common materials that enhance the way in which simple play related to children-learning activities is assured an environment when the child and parent will not feel loaded.
Parents prefer using WhatsApp to share notes and receive feedback. It’s a live connection that aids instant correspondence between the parent in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and the programme team. Also, the program managers customize field visits to both parents and educators to ensure impartial feedback from all sources in order to further improve or refine these activities.
The Punjab programme would be divided into four zones: Malwa, Doaba, Majha, and Puadh. This way programmers can tailor-make activities so that they can be relevant and engaging.
Hardships on Getting Started
The project had faced a number of hardships at its beginning. One of the greatest would be adapting the plane curriculum into Punjab’s local dialect and cultural setting due to mostly dealing in Hindi and Marathi speaking states. But because of the fact that they supported the government leaders in their efforts, the team tried to develop tools deemed efficient according to the local standpoint.
Also, they faced issues where few parents could master technology itself. Such is the attention lavished on bringing-in YouTube sessions and local meetings. Until that, such facilitation would be proposed for every parent to understand the programme.
Thus Far Impact on the Programme
Programme Aarambh is progressing at a brisk pace from its official launching date in November 2024. It was precisely implemented in eight districts— Mohali, Patiala, Sangrur, Ludhiana, Shri Muktsar Sahib, Tarn Taran, Amritsar, Rupnagar—reaching about 1.32 lakh students already. By the next academic year, the programme is designed to progress to all 23 districts.
Punjab houses 12,800 pre-primary government schools catering to 3.6 lakh children, rising to 4000 in the current phase of 5000, with registration in Program Aarambh by 4400 by phase. this boasted huge participation by the parents, with 25,000 in number able to actively participate by submitting videos of learning activities of their children. In other words, 40% of the total numbers are involved.
Parents’ Most Memorable Feedback
My most popular feedback was one from a single mother in Ludhiana. She had thought that early learning starts only when children start school. But after applying Programme Aarambh, she understood how important it is to learn early also at home. She started doing activities with her child, using simple, everyday materials. With time, a big difference was evident because her child was a lot confident and very involved with activities in boththe school and home.
This feedback is exactly vouching for parents in early childhood development. When armed with the right tools and knowledge, parents can create an environment that will enable optimum growth and development for the child.
Anticipating Future
The objective of Programme Aarambh in terms of improving Punjab’s outcomes of early education only grows strong in its quest fro desired mileage in other cities of the state. By concentrating on parental engagement, play-based learning, and conforming with the cultural context, Programme Aarambh is transforming learning experiences for children, as well as for parents. With the involvement of local stakeholders, getting involved in the programme again and again, the brighter future towards Punjab’s early childhood education is being paved.