ADULT LITERACY PROGRAM AT ALLAMA IQBAL OPEN UNIVERSITY

Sidra Rizwan
Dr., Allama Iqbal Open University, PAKISTAN, sidra.rizwan@aiou.edu.pk

Abstract

This article focuses on education as the basic right of every human being with this realization Allama Iqbal Open University in Pakistan initiated an Adult Learning program for its grade one to four employees who didn't have the opportunity in life to attend school till certification level. The Allama Iqbal Open University in one of its kind institution in the country with a mission to provide education to the masses at the doorstep, but the need for educating its own uneducated employees was never realized till very recently. An Adult Literacy Centre was launched by the department of Distance and Non- formal Education which initially offered literacy level 1 program to 30 university employees who enrolled as students. The salient feature of this program which made it different from any other adult literacy program was that the team for teaching three core subjects English, Urdu and Mathematics comprised of four Ph.D teachers and three Ph.D scholars from the faculty of Education who taught these subjects for 45 minutes each daily, five days a week with an aim to enable the students to read and write alphabets,  read with the help of phonics, read and write simple sentences and use daily life vocabulary words in both languages, basic daily use numeracy and concepts of addition, subtraction and multiplication with tables. The entry level of students was determined through a pre test (verbal and written), majority of the students scored very low on the pre test in all the three subjects. The teaching period was three months starting from 15th August 2017 to 15th November 2017 during which the teachers taught languages through phonics along with enabling the students to write their names, write three letter words, simple sentences, vocabulary building, picture recognition and reading beginners' reader. In Mathematics counting was taught and addition was done with single digit taking it to three digits by the end of the level, in the similar way subtraction and multiplication was done. Post test (verbal and written) of the three subjects was conducted at the end of three months and a marked difference was found between the scores of  pre and post tests of the final 16 students who remained till the end of the program as the rest dropped out. The findings showed that the students who were regular in the class performed better as compared to those who were often absent. High level of intrinsic motivation of the students helped them to score better than those whose motivation level was relatively low. Reinforcement also played a positive role in securing good grades. At the end of level 1 program a graduation ceremony for the students was organized, certificates were given to all the students who qualified for the next level along with medals to the position holders. Overall the teaching in the Adult literacy program at Allama Iqbal Open University was successful as it achieved its pre defined objectives.

Keywords: Adult literacy, Allama Iqbal Open University, teaching core subjects