ASER 2018: 47.2% Class 1 students in UP village schools can’t recognise alphabets

As many as 47.2% children in Class 1 of Uttar Pradesh rural schools cannot even read letters of the alphabet, says the 13th Annual Status of Education Report (Rural)-2018.

As many as 47.2% children in Class 1 of Uttar Pradesh rural schools cannot even read letters of the alphabet, says the 13th Annual Status of Education Report (Rural)-2018.

As many as 47.2% children in Class 1 of Uttar Pradesh rural schools cannot even read letters of the alphabet, says the 13th Annual Status of Education Report (Rural)-2018. (Yogendra Kumar/HT file)

The report also says 32.3% of class 1 children in the state’s rural schools can recognise alphabets only, while only 9.4% of them can read words.

In UP, the report covered 70 districts, surveying 82,470 children, 2,100 villages and 41,984 households.

Likewise, 15.1% class 3 students cannot even read letters, 27.2% can read letters but not words and 15.7% can read words, but not class 1 level text or higher, the report adds.

Only 14% class 3 students can read class 1 level text but not class 2 level text, and 28.1% can read class 2 level text, the report says.

The report also indicates that 9.5% class 3 students cannot even recognise numbers 1-9, 33.2% can recognise numbers up to 9 but cannot recognise numbers up to 99 or higher, 30.7% can recognise numbers up to 99 but cannot do subtraction, 15.2% can do subtraction but not division, and 11.4% can do division.

Only 32.4% children between the age of 8-10 years, 60.1% children between the age of 11-13 years and 74.8% children in the 14-16 group can read class 2 level books.

The report says the performance of students in private schools was found better vis-à-vis government-run schools. Only 36.2% government school students of class 5 could read class 2 books against 68.8% private school students. Likewise, 62% government school students of class 8 could read class 2 books properly against 85% students who go to private schools.

Only 11.2% class 3 students of government schools can do at least subtraction against 43.7% private school kids, the report says. In the same way, only 17% of the government school kids of standard 5 can do division while 42.9% private school kids can do so, the report adds.