The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Chennai News : Plans to set up Board to look into school syllabus revision

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, Sep 27, 2007
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Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu - Chennai

Plans to set up Board to look into school syllabus revision

Staff Reporter

Website hosting textbooks used by students of Standards I to XII launched

— PHOTO: V.GANESAN

ONLINE LESSONS: (From left) School Education Minister Thangam Thennarasu launches online textbooks in Chennai on Wednesday. Chairman and managing director of the Textbook Corporation Hemant Kumar Sinha, Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan’s State Project Director M.P. Vijayakumar and School Education Department Secretary M.Kutralingam are in the picture.

CHENNAI: The School Education Department is considering setting up a Curriculum Development Board, which would look into syllabus revision and upgradation, School Education Minister Thangam Thennarasu said here on Wednesday.

Launching www.textbooksonline.tn.nic.in , a website hosting 322 titles of textbooks used by students from Standards I to XII, he said 180 titles remained to be uploaded. The pending titles were pertaining to the vocational stream. “Since the department was in the process of revising the syllabus for the stream, the textbooks would be made available once the process of revision is complete,” he said.

A committee headed by Tamil Nadu State Planning Commission member Girija Vaidyanathan, reviewing the existing curriculum, would recommend and initiate the necessary changes, Mr. Thennarasu added. “We want the curriculum to reflect current trends. We are looking at introducing new chapters.”

The Tamil Nadu Textbook Corporation has compiled the content and designed the website with the help of the National Informatics Centre (NIC), Tamil Nadu chapter. Commending them, the Minister said, “It is a very important day in the history of the School Education Department. Students can access their lessons anytime now, and minor delays in despatch of textbooks will not disrupt classroom learning anymore.”

With the Government having provided computers to 1,180 higher secondary schools, more students were in a position to access content online, he said. “We have been giving each school a server, a laptop and 10 computers. We are in the process of distributing computers to high schools.”

Secretary to the School Education Department M. Kutralingam said the department had also made available question papers of the last three years’ examinations on the government examinations website for the benefit of students.

Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan’s State Project Director M.P. Vijayakumar said that since the website enabled users to offer suggestions it would help the department revise syllabus effectively. “This will make syllabus revision regular and more transparent,” he said.

Chairman and managing director of the Textbook Corporation Hemant Kumar Sinha said that this was the first time that a State Board had made available textbooks online. Besides the regular subjects, textbooks in languages such as Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam and Urdu were also made available. NIC’s (Tamil Nadu State Centre) deputy director general A. Mohan was present on the occasion.

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