We have books!

Although school began on June 1st, the education department didn't issue its books until yesterday. That would be two and a half months into the first term. In the meanwhile, they instructed us not to teach anything. I am sorely tempted to wax Orwellian and to toss around terms such as "ministry of un-education" and the like.

The first problem was that the Tamil Nadu government didn't print the books on time. So the day before school was about to begin, they issued an order that schools should remain closed for another two weeks. We didn't comply as we're a residential school. What are the children supposed to do all day? Then June 15th rolled around the books still weren't off the press.

Problem number two. The state had mandated that all children would now study from the same books, whether at a public or private institution. This would level the playing field and grant children from all socioeconomic backgrounds the same chances. Except that public schools would have their books and instruction in Tamil, while private schools would have it in English.

Private schools have objected to being coerced to use the same books as the public schools, because the latter tend to be rather simple. They fear that it will drastically lower the level of the private schools. And so, for the past month, this issue was being fought out in court.

Every week they announced that a decision would be announced the following Friday. And then every Friday for several weeks, it was announced that the decision was being postponed.

In the meantime, we were told to wait. But we defied it all and taught from photocopies made from American books (which aren't riddled with grammatical mistakes! and don't have first-graders identifying adverbs! or second-graders reading Keats! and make sense!).

Last Friday the verdict came in earnest. Private schools lost: we have to use the government books. But nothing's stopping me from heavily supplementing with materials of better quality.

I'm glad the new books have arrived because we need them for Tamil class and for the tenth grade to study for their all-important board exam at the end of the year. But I'm not thrilled with the English mistakes and the odd punctuation.

At least I haven't, so far, come across any stories that happen to mention a teacher caning a student. From the book used last year, published in 1910 2010:

Here's another favorite. The green sheets held up by Archana, our sweet first-grader, are sticker papers. We are supposed to cut out strips and then use them to cover up any quotations in the books from the previous state minister. The current state minister apparently does not want the children of Tamil Nadu growing up reciting statements from his predecessor.

This is the spineless quality of these brand new books.

Mariamal helped me sort the books. That wraps up another week at the funny far in India!