To lessen the burden on the students and help them grow through fun-filled activities, which will build character and make them responsible citizens of the country, the Bihar Education department has made Saturday a ‘bagless day’ in all government schools. On this day, students are told to leave their books at home and come to school to just engage in a host of extra curricular activities.
The idea is to introduce an environment of fun and joy in the schools so that the students, who are already heavily burdened with study load, loosen up and enjoy their time in school. This will in the long run help them form attachment to their school and make them perform better in their studies, and also help them choose enjoyable activities that they would like to pursue in later life, either as a hobby or a passion.
Indian Masterminds spoke with the Additional Chief Secretary of Bihar’s Education Department, Dipak Kumar Singh, IAS, to get a better insight of the initiative, ‘Bagless Saturday’, and how will it bring a change in the learning process of children in the state.
BAGLESS SATURDAY
Launched by the Chief Minister of Bihar, Nitish Kumar, on the occasion of National Education Day, celebrated every year on 11 November, the concept of Bagless Saturday is to promote education through activities and innovation. Facing a crunch of teachers in government schools, the initiative has been launched to have a better perspective towards studies, which cannot be done through books only, but also though various other activities.
While speaking to Indian Masterminds, Mr. Dipak Kumar Singh said, “We have assigned a particular day in the week wherein studies will not take place with the help of text books, but through various extra-curricular activities. This was launched on National Education Day, which is also the birth anniversary of Maulana Abdul Azad, who was the first Education Minister of India.”
The day was first commemorated by Bihar in 2007 after which the Government of India also adopted it a year later. Mr. Singh said that after a week-long studies, they wanted children to have a fun weekend, and, hence, adopted the concept where Saturdays are dedicated for children to know about their surroundings and pursue their hobbies and interests. The department is encouraging curiosity, creativity, innovation, logic-thinking, art and beauty, sports, and cultural activities for the children and have designed a monthly theme for the same.
LEARNING THROUGH INNOVATION
The programme of ‘Bagless Saturday’ has been made compulsory for children studying from classes 1 to 8. However, for students in classes 9 to 12, participation is voluntarily.
The 120 activities to be conducted under Bagless Saturdays are divided under 12 domains. One domain has been allotted for each month. If the teacher wants to choose any other activity out of the list to make it creative and interesting, then they are free to do so, but the allotted domain must not be violated.
Themes like ‘I am the Creator’, ‘I am an Artist’, ‘I am a Cleanliness Lover’, ‘I am a Patriot’ etc., have been kept and activities have been allotted accordingly.
In all the activities, the class teacher will be compulsorily involved as a facilitator and will observe and evaluate the children’s work. Mr. Kumar said, “Earlier, we used to have Parent Teacher Meeting (PTM) only twice a year. However, after this initiative, in every fourth Saturday of the month, a PTM is conducted, wherein evaluation of each child is done. As the number of children in each school is large, this helps in monitoring the progression of children better.”
If in a month, a fifth Saturday falls, a cultural programme will be organized on that day and the works made by the children on the previous Saturdays will be displayed and reviewed by the teachers.
