NEP 2020: Students should be taught in mother tongue till class 5, says PM Modi

New Delhi, Sep 11: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday said that language is just a mode of study and not a study in itself. Addressing the conclave, PM Modi said, "We need to see that most of the energy of students should not be spent on learning the language rather than the subject. A child should understand what they are taught."

The Prime Minister further went on to say that in a lot of countries, elementary education is imparted in their mother tongue. "It is a known fact that students learn better in the language they speak at home."

In rural areas, parents are not associated with a child's learning because of the mode of teaching at school. At least till class 5, students should be taught in the mother tongue.

"Along with the mother tongue, students will be taught international languages including English but Indian languages will also be promoted," said PM.

PM Modi also said that one of the major reasons behind the drop-out ratio is that students, who do not have the freedom of choosing their own subject. "Now, students will not have to be limited to the watertight boundaries of commerce, science, and humanities and will chose any subjects they want to choose," PM Modi said.

It can be seen that NEP brings several changes to the school education including universalisation of Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) for children up to the age 8, 10+2 structure of school curricular is to be replaced by a 5+3+3+4 curricular structure, integrating curriculum to 21st-century skills, mathematical thinking and scientific temper, development of new comprehensive National Curricular Framework for School Education and vocational integration from class six onwards.