Education Anjan Ghosh In the context of the present din over Total Literacy, a small effort, discussed here, at putting into practice a critical pedagogy shows our pedagogues how to stop canting and start acting, MUCH discussion and debate has focused on alternative pedagogy in non-formal education across the world. The quest for alternative pedagogy has spanned Paulo Friere's Brazilian experiment with the 'pedagogy of the oppressed', Sylvia Ashton Warner's 'organic teaching' among the Maoris in New Zealand, to the Italian school at Barbiana. Yet how far has this rubbed off on the practice of non-formal education in India? A slim but attractively produced two- part primer in Bengali, Major Para Lekhar Khela by Sandip Bandopadhyaya, sponsored and published by Unnayan, a social action group from Calcutta, affords us an opportunity to reflect on the practice of pedagogy in non-formal education here Written specifically fur the 6-14 year old children of Unnayan's non-formal education centres located in the fringes of the city, the primer evolved through a participatory research process whereby the author initially tried out his lessons with the children in the above centres before including them in the primer. Children's suggestions and responses were kept in mind before the lessons were given final form, Often their responses were included verbatim in the text.
