Multilingual Education and India

World Book Day gives us a nice excuse to promote the production of books in the local languages. Particularly since this year there was a special emphasis on indigenous languages! In line with the theme of the International Decade of Indigenous Languages (2022-32), f or this year, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) has chosen the theme  “Indigenous Languages”! According to their official statement , “Indigenous and local languages feature as part of the World Book Capital Network Charter, and the Charter recognizes a less rigid concept of ‘the book'; it also acknowledges all  forms of literature (including oral traditions).” The statement also mentions that, “ Of the almost 7,000 existing languages – many of which are fast disappearing – the majority are spoken by indigenous peoples who represent the greater part of the world's cultural diversity.” Therefore, they are stressing the importance of safeguarding these languages, the mot...

At the recent International Mother Tongue Language Day, the use of technology was emphasised. Bloom Library and Storyweaver are two pieces of simple software which come to the rescue of educators, parents, and students who want to create books in their own language. It is good to note that, rather than competing with each other, they complement each other and host each other's books and resources on their websites. As many of you are already aware, there are two very useful online book-creation tools that are making enjoyable reading material available for children in many different languages. They are Storyweaver  from Pratham Books and Bloom Library   by SIL International. Both of these online libraries not only offer books in many languages but also allow one to create one’s own books and download them for future use. They also have a variety of  image libraries which can be used by someone creating a resource.