Childhood

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Preschool and Playway in India

LARRY PROCHNER
Childhood 2002 9: 435
DOI: 10.1177/0907568202009004005
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PRESCHOOL AND PLAYWAY IN INDIA

LARRY PROCHNER
Concordia University, Montreal
Key words:
early childhood education,
international, play
Mailing address:
Larry Prochner
Education Department,
Concordia University, 1455 de Maisonneuve Blvd West, Montreal, Quebec
H3G 1M8, Canada.
[email: Lprochner@videotron.ca]
Childhood Copyright 2002
SAGE Publications. London, Thousand Oaks
and New Delhi, Vol. 9(4): 435453.
[0907-5682(200211)9:4; 435453; 028538]

There is a global trend towards formal approaches

to preschool education. This article explores the
tension between formal and non-formal approaches
in the context of India, through a discussion of the
preschool programme of the Government of Indias
Integrated Child Development Services that targets
disadvantaged children, and private nursery schools
that operate on a commercial basis. Although a
non-formal approach is endorsed by experts as best
for children in both settings, it has little support in
actual practice. In the competitive context of Indian
schools, many parents opt to provide their children
with an early headstart on formal instruction.

Introduction
This article explores the idea of playway in preschool programmes in India
and the concurrent trend towards more formal instruction.1 Information was
drawn from government and academic reports, interviews with experts and
field observations conducted over a 3-month period in 1999, while I was in
India as a Shastri Indo-Canadian Fellow.2 One of the issues I explored was
the relation of western play theory to the Indian version of play-based education called playway.3 Although the two sounded the same in written accounts
and as described by experts, they looked different when observed in practice.
Moreover, although playway is often associated with Indian preschools,
play-based education is not widespread. This article shares my reflections on
this situation. The article begins by briefly describing the westernized
approach to play-based preschool education in relation to the global trend
towards formal early education, before turning to playway in India.4
Three presuppositions frame the analysis. The first is that childhood is
a social construction. By this I mean that childhood is a category of human
development based on culturally and historically situated ideas (Cunningham, 1996; James and Prout, 1990; James et al., 1998). The second is that
the services a society provides for children and families, for example
preschool education and out of home childcare, are governed in part by these
particular representations of childhood (Cannella, 1997; Silin, 1995). The
third is that the globalization of ideas concerning childhood and early childhood education competes with locally conceived ideas and services.
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CHILDHOOD 9(4)

Whereas research in developmental psychology has shown that there are few
universal principles of development (Burman, 1994; Fox and Prilleltensky,
1997; Ogbu, 1981), globalization emphasizes the common experience of
childhood and flattens differences. Some experiences are taken to have a
meaning that transcends culture, for example play. Understandings of childrens play are constructed on a tableau of ideas on childhood and childrearing (Roopnarine et al., 1994). In light of the diversity of the experience of
childhood, a pedagogical approach that hinges on a single definition of play
is not tenable.
Local ideas about play in early childhood settings are created out of
the tension between culturally and historically situated beliefs and international ideas. In the field of preschool education these international ideas
have been dominated by western theory, which has historically assigned play
a privileged role. These theories are identified with 19th- and 20th-century
educators such as Froebel, Montessori and Dewey, and psychologists such as
Freud, Vygotsky and Piaget. Bennett et al. (1997: 1) referred to this ideological, philosophical and educational tradition as the nursery inheritance.
While play does not mean the same thing in each case (Saracho and Spodek,
1998), play-based approaches share fundamental concerns for the importance of choice, activity and interaction. Play is a multidimensional and multipurpose part of early childhood education. A play-based approach is at the
opposite end of the continuum from formal instruction. While the latter is
mechanical, decontextualized and adult-centred (developmentally inappropriate), play-based education is natural, responsive to context and child-centred (developmentally appropriate). Western play-based approaches were
exported around the world during the 19th and 20th centuries (Wollons,
2000). Where the programmes were established in colonized nations, they
mainly existed for children of the local elite and colonial administrators. In
the postcolonial era, play-based approaches were favoured by early childhood education experts, and recommended for all children regardless of
social class.
Since the Head Start studies in the USA in the 1960s and 1970s, adultcentred approaches to early education have often been associated with the
scripted instruction of the behaviourist model (Bereiter and Engelmann,
1966), an experience that can leave children with serious negative emotional residue (Schweinhart and Weikart, 1998: 58). Formal early education
was called miseducation by Elkind (1988). He charged that parents who
enrolled their children in such programmes engage in practices that are
more reflective of parental ego than of parental need (Elkind, 1988: xiv).
My position, however, is that the debate over the value of play vs other
forms of learning in early childhood programmes is value laden. Western
preschools emphasize autonomy and self-direction (Cannella, 1997; Jipson,
1991; Tobin et al., 1989). They aim to meet the democratic ideal and are
production oriented (Woodhead, 1996: 91). A play-based approach centring
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PROCHNER: PRESCHOOL AND PLAYWAY IN INDIA

on childrens activity is seen as a way to meet these goals. Conversely, formal instruction in preschool is demonized as a threat to socialization for citizenship in a democracy (Greenberg, 1990, 1992). Concern over the rising
tide of academic instruction in preschools was a factor in the creation of
principles of developmentally appropriate practice (DAP) by the National
Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC) (Bredekamp and
Copple, 1996). Bredekamp (1998: 186) wrote that the document [Developmentally Appropriate Practice in Early Childhood Programs] is a political
statement about what NAEYC and its members think constitutes the good
life for children. Nonetheless, there have been attempts to export a single
version of the good life to children elsewhere in the world. An example is
the Step by Step programme funded by financier George Soros through the
Open Society Institute, and recently reported on in popular publications for
early childhood educators in the US (Ford and Coughlin, 1999; Seefeldt and
Galper, 1998).5
Yet the practice of preschool is often at odds with expert advice. Every
day, hundreds of thousands of children set off for preschool to learn the
basics of literacy and numeracy using rote learning strategies such as memorization and group drill, in countries as diverse as India, Kenya, Nigeria, Taiwan and Thailand (Olmsted and Weikart, 1989; Sestini, 1985; Woodill et al.,
1992). Said (1997) wrote about the gap between expert advice and preschool
practice in Kenya.
Instead of encouraging children to ask and answer questions, or attempting to
interact with the children as much as possible, teachers spend a lot of time keeping children quiet and ridiculing them. This behavior on the part of the teacher
instills fear in the children and destroys their confidence. Most preschools in
Kenya are run by teachers with firm ideas on discipline and behavior. They
have large enrollments, often with one class of up to 40 children to a single
teacher, and little or no equipment or learning materials. Children have no
opportunities to discover and explore or even move around the room.

It might be concluded from this state of affairs that Kenyan preschools are
dismal institutions that prepare children for the worst aspects of a test-driven, competitive education system. However, such a critique would depend
on a particular construction of childhood, and of the appropriate relationship
between children and adults in an educational setting. I do not mean to make
a judgement that Kenyan preschools of the type just described are appropriate. Rather, that an assessment should consider multiple factors. Examples
include cultural values regarding such issues as crowding (Liddell and
Kruger, 1987, 1989) and the amount and type of play materials (Liddell,
1995; Woodhead, 1996), ideas concerning discipline and childadult interaction, and the relation between preschools and social class (Gakura, 1992).

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CHILDHOOD 9(4)

The case of India

The nations of the world have been categorized according to their level of
industrialization and quality of life variables (industrialized, developing and
least developed). India is both an industrial giant and technological leader,
and a developing nation. In his speech on the occasion of Indias 50th
Republic Day (Schmetzer, 2000), K.R. Narayanan, the President of India,
spoke of two Indias. We have one of the worlds largest reservoirs of technical personnel but also the worlds largest number of illiterates; the worlds
largest middle class, but also the largest number below the poverty line and
the largest number of children suffering from malnutrition (Schmetzer,
2000: B6). In 2000, India had an infant mortality rate of 70 per 1000 live
births, 2.4 million deaths of children under the age of 5, and an adult literacy
rate of 71 percent for males and 44 percent for females (UNICEF, 2001a).
India was ranked 128th of 174 countries on the United Nations Human
Development Index, just below Iraq and Lesotho (UNDP, 2000). However,
historical statistics point to significant social gains in India. In 1983, the
infant mortality rate was 104.9 per 1000 live births (National Institute of
Public Cooperation and Child Development, 1997a). The infant mortality
rate in the year 2000 represented a decrease of 66 percent over the previous
decade. A lowered infant mortality rate is not limited to India. Vaccination,
feeding and health programmes for pregnant women and young children
have changed the focus of agencies such as UNICEF from child survival to
child development (UNICEF, 1996). As Myers (1992: xviii) wrote: 12 of
every 13 children born in 1991 will live to see their first birthday. The question posed by Myers was What will happen to the twelve who survive?6
India is a particularly compelling case in which to consider this question.
Myers conceded that he was not concerned with problems of the middle or upper classes, whether they be found in India or Sweden, even though
some of these children may be at risk of a distorted and unhealthy development resulting from over-indulgence or from other conditions increasingly
present among favored social groups (Myers 1992: xxi). However, the
problems created by a pressurized preschool experience are of great concern
in India for the general public (Viruru, 1999) as well as experts (Verma, cited
in Bhavnagri, 1995). Private preschools are oversubscribed, and the competition for spaces in the lead schools is intense, with as many as 300 children
competing for a single opening. This phenomenon is not limited to the elite.
A bourgeois revolution in India has resulted in the growth of the consumer
class and more parents who are able to purchase their children a preschool
experience (Stern, 1993). A study in Tamil Nadu state found that even parents from low-income communities in urban areas sought out private
preschools for their children once they reached age 4 (M.S. Swaminathan
Research Foundation, 2000).
An important context for preschool in India is primary school. Primary
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school enrolment increased over the past decade to reach over 109 million in
1995 (UNESCO, 1996). However, the dropout rate continued to be very
high. In the state of Gujarat, one-quarter of children do not enrol in school at
all. Of those that enrol, 60 percent leave after the first grade, and 40 percent
of the remaining students leave school before the end of grade 4. The reasons for not enrolling or leaving school include poverty and economic conditions, including the need for childrens labour, which in the case of girls, is
often related to looking after younger siblings. Other reasons are the poor
quality of the school experience, and the lack of relevance of school learning
to childrens lives. Overcrowding and a shortage of textbooks are part of the
normal school experience for most children. The average pupil to teacher
ratio in India is 64:1 (UNESCO,1996)). The high ratio is supported by adultcentred teaching methods that leave little room for learning through play. As
one commentator observed:
. . . given the state of school infrastructure and the poor quality of instruction,
rather than asking the question of why children do not come to school, we
should perhaps ask the question why they come to school in spite of the poor
infrastructure and unattractive ways of teaching. (Sinha, 1998: 4)

A number of global factors have drawn attention to improving the quality

and increasing the quantity of preschool and primary education. The right to
education is part of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (Article 26)
as well as the Convention on the Rights of the Child (Article 28). Preschool
education was one of the main pillars of the Education for All movement
(Early Childhood Programmes, 1997: 41) supported by the UNDP,
UNESCO, UNICEF and the World Bank. Over time, the emphasis of the
Education for All movement has shifted from the number of children attending school to what they are learning and the quality of their experience.
Improvements in preschools were viewed as a starting point for more general reforms in curriculum and teaching in primary schools. A main area of
reform is in the introduction of playway in the early years. However, informal approaches in preschools have generally been overwhelmed by the competitive school context in both the public and private sectors. Moreover,
because school is the ideological context for preschools, there is a focus on
teaching rather than child development (Swaminathan, 1993).

The roots of playway

European-style preschool programmes were introduced into India in small
numbers in the early years of the 19th century as philanthropic and missionary efforts. Over time, western programmes were adapted according to
Indian ideas on pre-primary education and on education in general, thus laying the foundation for the Indian approach to play-based education. The educational ideas of Mohandas K. Gandhi and Rabindranath Tagore are the two
most frequently cited influences on preschool education in modern India.
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CHILDHOOD 9(4)

Both were advocates of universal education, basic education and education

with a practical basis that focused on the development of the whole child
(Cenkner, 1994). Tagore promoted a view of the natural child and the corrupting influence of formal schooling (Mani, 1961). He believed that nature
was the best teacher, and under the age of 7, children were to learn through
natural objects. Children were viewed as having a natural gift to learn, but
schools alienated them from this gift by enforcing conformity. Unlike adults,
children had minds that were free and creative. The ideal school recognized
this and provided activities that focused on music, art and poetry, and childrens happiness. This latter emphasis is continued in the spirit of current
educational reforms at the pre-primary and primary levels in India, that aim
to make learning joyful (the joyful learning or Tarang approach).
One historian described Gandhi as a child-centred idealist, who
believed that the body and the spirit should be educated as one (Mani, 1961).
For Gandhi, education was meant to be free and compulsory, conducted
through the learning of a craft, and self-supporting through the sale of crafts
made by students. Industrial training, in which both boys and girls were
taught a handicraft, was linked to spiritual training. Literacy and book learning was not emphasized. Education was to be conducted in the vernacular,
and stress the ideal of citizenship in a free India. The four stages of Gandhis
plan were: first, education through parents and the community (from conception to 2 years 6 months); second, pre-basic education conducted by
school teachers, at home and by the community; third, basic education from
age 7 to 15; and fourth, post-basic education, or education for self sufficiency, in late adolescence. Pre-basic education was broken down into two
substages: from 2 years 6 months to 4, education was through play and
group activities; from 4 to 7 years children engaged in more purposeful
activities. Thus, pre-basic education is interpreted as support for pre-primary
or preschool education. In pre-basic education teachers had the nurturing
role of a mother to educate the spirit and not only the mind and body.
The importance of a childs mother as the first and most important
teacher, and of educating the whole child, was part of the European philosophy of early education expressed in the writings of Johann Amos Comenius,
Johann Pestalozzi and Friedrich Froebel. Nineteenth-century naturalistic theories of education emphasized hands-on experience and took a dim view of
formal instruction. The Finnish educator Uno Cygnaeus extended Froebels
idea of handwork in the kindergarten to include real-world manual training
in such crafts as carpentry and basket weaving. The importance of activity
and sensory-based learning found expression in the handicraft education
movement in Europe, and later, as part of the doctrine of the New Education
movement. However, most sources indicate that while Indian educational
reformers such as Gandhi and Tagore were aware of these ideas in the West,
the ideas merely reinforced what had been arrived at independently in an
Indian context.
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Two schools established along Froebelian and Montessori lines in the

early decades of the 20th century, show the meeting of Indian and western
ideas. The Childrens Garden School was founded by Ellen Sharma and her
husband, Dr V.N. Sharma, in 1936. Ellen Sharma was a European with masters degrees in the humanities and education. Her approach incorporated
aspects of Froebel and Montessori in an Indian social and cultural context.
According to a long-time teacher at her school, this meant a greater focus on
group education than on individuals, and the use of local materials for
teaching aids (Rajalakshmi, n.d.: 20). Materials included Montessori-influenced items, such as cylinders, colour cards and geometrical insets, along
with indigenous materials such as seeds for tracing the outlines of designs
and letters (rangoli). In all aspects of the curriculum there was a focus on
practical work, learning by doing, learning through repetition and self-effort
(Rajalakshmi, 1998).
The pre-primary school (Bal Mandir) in Bhavnagar was also influenced by Maria Montessori, who is the foreign educator most often associated with Indian preschools. Much of the early interest in Montessori was
centred in the state of Gujarat (then part of Maharashtra). In 1915, a Montessori school was established near Vadodara (Muralidharan and Kaul, 1993),
and in 1920, Gijubhai Badheka, among others, opened the Bal Mandir at
Bhavnagar. Badheka adapted Montessori materials and methods to suit
Indian conditions (Muralidharan and Kaul, 1993: 26). The Bal Mandir
incorporated western and Indian educational ideas in a Hindu nationalist
context. Thus, there was considerable emphasis on religion (Hinduism), language (Gujarati) and culture (traditional music, art, dance), along with
Montessori materials and activities. Today, the Bal Mandir is part of a larger
educational institution called Shri Dakshinamurti Vidyarthi Bhavan, that
includes a primary and secondary school, as well as a pre-primary teachers
training college (Shri Dakshinamurti Vidyarthi Bhavan, n.d.). Altogether, the
institution has about 2600 students, with 600 enrolled in the Bal Mandir.
I visited both the Childrens Garden and the Bal Mandir, and despite
their having some fundamental differences, the two preschools have some
aspects in common. Both offered children a structured learning environment
in which free play in both the western sense and as imagined by Tagore (play
that children initiate and control) had a minimal role. Groups in both
preschools were large and led by a single teacher and a helper or intern, a
situation that was only partly due to the number of children that needed to be
served, or to economic considerations. At the Childrens Garden, the director
linked the move to larger group sizes in recent times to the continued
process of indigenization of preschool education as well as finances. I heard
similar explanations from directors of other preschools.
There tends to be a high proportion of teacher-directed activities in
Indian preschools, including whole-group games in which children follow a

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CHILDHOOD 9(4)

leader, as observed by Roopnarine et al. (1994). Individual and small group

activities may involve flash cards, lotto games and work sheets offering
practice on number and reading problems. As explained to me by teachers
and experts, Indian values of conformity and interdependence are reflected
in preschools. As against the independent pluralistic society of the West,
India is an interdependent society. Feelings of mutual care and interdependence are culturally reinforced and individuality and competition is discouraged (Bhogle, 1999: 281). A supervisor of student teachers at a university
laboratory nursery school, accustomed to the reaction of western visitors to
the degree of teacher direction in preschools, wrote that,
. . . teacher interaction and mediation may seem like teacher domination,
especially compared to some Western schools or visitors from a different culture. But a balance of giving children a chance to explore by themselves, interact with other children and material, and teachers providing assistance in
achieving a task, giving information, questioning and talking does seem to help
the children. (Shastri, 1997: 12)

The approach to play in settings associated with academic child study, such
as the laboratory nursery school, is more similar to western programmes
than the Childrens Garden and Bal Mandir. The Chetan Balwadi is the laboratory preschool at the Department of Human Development and Family
Studies at the Maharaja Sarajirao University of Baroda in Gujarat state. It
was established in the American home economics tradition of child study in
1949 (Faculty of Home Science, 1999; Saraswathi et al., 1988). The
founders of the laboratory preschool set out to create an alternative to the
Montessori-dominated preschools of the time that were considered overly
rigid. The play method, based on child development research and the nursery school movement, was virtually unknown (Verma, cited in Bhavnagri,
1995: 157). Hallmarks of this new approach were low ratios of teachers to
children, more small group activities and more free play and child initiated
activities. The role of childrens activity and interaction in learning was
stressed. This more westernized approach to playway was promoted by the
Indian Association of Preschool Education, and the two main national-level
research and training institutions concerned with preschool education (the
National Institute for Public Cooperation and Child Development, and the
National Council for Education Research and Training). As a theoretical
approach, child-centred playway has been sustained through the efforts of
experts at universities and research institutions, and officials in government
agencies responsible for preschool education. However, it is not widely practised, and playway in preschools, in whatever form, is the exception rather
than the rule. This fact is noted in almost all commentaries on preschool
education in India (see, for example, Kaul, 1992).

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PROCHNER: PRESCHOOL AND PLAYWAY IN INDIA

Playway in public sector preschools

Preschool services are provided by a wide range of government and voluntary agencies in India. The Government of Indias Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) includes more than 350,000 preschool centres
(anganwadis), serving approximately 10 million children in the age group
36.7 Started in 1975, the ICDS is the largest early childhood care and education programme in the world. The objectives of the ICDS are comprehensive, and they include promotion of child and maternal health
(immunization, health check-ups, referral services, treatment of minor illnesses), nutrition (supplementary feeding, growth monitoring and promotion, nutrition and health education), and preschool education for children
aged 36 (Department of Women and Child Development, 1995). The programme has been very successful in health promotion, particularly through
its immunization and feeding programmes. However, an ongoing concern
has been the quality of preschool education in the anganwadis.
In the early years of the ICDS, preschool education played a secondary role to the feeding and vaccination programmes, in a pattern consistent with child survival programmes of the time. In the late 1990s, the ICDS
underwent a transition to incorporate childcare and more attention to
preschool education. According to a Department of Women and Child
Development publication, the early childhood care and preschool education
component of the ICDS may well be considered the backbone of the ICDS
programme, since all its services essentially converge on the anganwadi.
This is also the most joyful playway daily activity, visibly sustained for
three hours a day (Department of Women and Child Development, 1995: 9).
However, the delivery of playway was limited by the resources of the
anganwadis, the skills and training of the anganwadi workers and a difference in viewpoint between those in charge of curriculum and training who
promoted playway, and parents and community members who sometimes
favoured the opposite, namely, a formal school-like approach to literacy and
numeracy education in the early years. The outright neglect of playway in
the first decade of the ICDS was highlighted in the first of the two major
reviews of the service by the National Institute of Public Cooperation and
Child Development. Adarsh Sharma, who directed both studies, described a
typical anganwadi in the 1987 report:
All the anganwadis by and large looked alike in their setup. Faded charts of
birds, animals, fruits, alphabets and numbers adorned the walls. In most cases,
these were stuck far above the eye level of children. . . . Their daily routine
included teaching of numbers through rote method. The anganwadi was turned
into a primary school, the concept of non-formal preschool education was obviously not followed or implemented as envisaged in this scheme. . . . The investigators reported that only approximately 2630 percent anganwadis children
looked happy, involved and absorbed in the ongoing activities. An equally
small proportion of the anganwadi workers permitted children freedom of
movement to explore surroundings. The children were found seated in rows,

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CHILDHOOD 9(4)

one behind the other, unable to look at each other. The anganwadi workers were
usually seated on a chair with a table in front of them, far away and far too high
for establishing eye contact with the children. Discipline was enforced strictly,
making children epitomes of conformist behavior. (Sharma, 1987: 579)

The 1987 study did not measure the effect of preschool education on childrens learning. A 1992 study compared children who had attended an
anganwadi and a control group of children with no preschool experience
(National Institute of Public Cooperation and Child Development, 1997b).
Both groups were tested in three areas to determine their readiness for
school. The investigators observed [the] performance of the children and
assessed their abilities to count, identify colors and exhibit manipulation
skills. All three competencies are required for formal learning. [Non-formal
education] imparted at anganwadis is expected to develop in the children
these abilities (National Institute of Public Cooperation and Child Development, 1997b: 118). Anganwadi workers were also asked to report on the
preschool education aspect of their programme. A majority of workers
[reported that they] were devoting only 12 hours a day on preschool education activities. There was no way to judge the quality of this programme conducted during these hours (National Institute of Public Cooperation and
Child Development, 1997b: 116; emphasis in original). Nevertheless, the
study concluded that preschool education, not unlike the type described by
Sharma in 1987, had the effect of getting children to primary school and
keeping them there for longer than those children who had not attended an
anganwadi. The study did not speculate on how the children acquired their
abilities, for example counting to 50, which is beyond the expectations for
Standard 1 class (grade 1) as set by the Government of Indias Ministry of
Education. Nor was the study longitudinal. Parents were asked to report on
the preschool experience of older siblings of ICDS children who were
already enrolled in primary school.
Despite these limitations the study has been used as evidence that the
ICDS programme has achieved all of its main objectives (health, nutrition
and education). Yet, in describing its success, experts decry its methods. In
1998, Sharma wrote:
. . . the preschool scenario in ICDS has been quite disappointing and devoid of
the real emphasis on child-centered playway activities, nurturing the joy and
creativity of the young child. Nevertheless, despite its poor quality, empirical
evidence has indicated its positive impact on young children. (Sharma, 1998:
292)

Community surveys have noted that preschool education is the most popular
service of ICDS anganwadis (National Institute of Public Cooperation
and Child Development, 19978: 58), and that parents prefer formal instruction for their children. Early on, formal preschool education was tacitly
accepted by the National Institute of Public Cooperation and Child Development, the main organization responsible for training workers. The Manual
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PROCHNER: PRESCHOOL AND PLAYWAY IN INDIA

on Integrating Child Development Services noted that children invariably

bring slates or takties (wooden slates for writing that are a feature of primary
school) [to the anganwadis] with them. Any attempt to discontinue the element of formal learning might create problems and a credibility gap,
between the child and the community (National Institute of Public Cooperation and Child Development, 1984: 55). A booklet published by UNICEF
(n.d.: 24) on the ICDS used a similar argument. Preschool education in a
non-formal setting forms the backbone of the ICDS program as all services
converge on the pre-school center. . . . The main function of the preschool
education component is to stimulate and satisfy the curiosity of the child
rather than following any rigid learning curriculum. Children are taught
songs and games. However, since there is no formally structured curriculum, and flexibility is encouraged, the anganwadi often responds to parental
demands to teach the alphabet and elementary numeracy. Thus, a situation
evolved in which the non-formal and flexible aspect of preschool education
left the way open for the introduction of academic instruction.
According to Joshi (1995), who operates preschools as part of a nongovernmental organization (NGO) in the Indian Himalayas, one reason why
parents prefer formal instruction in preschools is a lack of confidence in
playway to prepare children for teacher-directed test-oriented primary
schools. The villagers viewed the playway method as just song and dance
(Joshi, 1995: 28), thus deriding the very aspect of the approach noted as the
strength of anganwadis in which children are taught songs and games
(UNICEF, n.d.: 24). Joshi recommended that NGOs overcome this bias by
avoiding the balwadi (kindergarten) nomenclature entirely. Call them
hamari bal pathshala (little schools), so there is less resistance to the idea.
All villagers preferred the term schools (Joshi, 1995: 28). At the same
time, Joshi, who was trained in the Montessori approach, warned against
replacing playway with formal instruction.
There is an attitude among NGOs and others that is dismissive of the use of play
materials and child-centered methods as an urban elite import, and as an indulgence that they can ill-afford in the circumstances in which they work. This attitude needs to be explored and discussed with the agencies involved. Perhaps the
hidden curriculum of authoritarian teaching methods is to demand submission to
authority and it is no coincidence that we find such methods popular and prevalent in rural and working class areas. Is the privilege of learning to question
authority and think independently only to be limited to our elite schools as a
matter of policy? (Joshi, 1995: 45)

Playway in private sector preschools

Formal teaching in preschools, however, cuts across class lines. Just as there
is no single version of playway, various methods are employed in preparatory preschools those institutions directed solely at preparing children for
formal schooling. What the schools have in common, is that they do not
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subscribe to learning through play. This does not mean that children do not
play, but that the worlds of work and play are distinct in these school settings
(Viruru, 1999). In the context of preparatory preschools, childrens play is
not childrens work, as it has been portrayed in western play theory.
Private-sector preschools in India are numbered at anywhere between
50,000 and 100,000 (Swaminathan, 1993). While many are operated by
entrepreneurs as separate enterprises, others are attached to private primary
schools. Most preschool experts in India oppose the growth of an unregulated preschool education sector. Swaminathan (1998) wrote that in private
preschools,
. . . untrained teachers in ill-equipped classrooms, [cram] the three Rs forcibly
down the throats of unwilling children, while ignorant managements enforce
inappropriate curriculum and methods of teaching, at the cost of parents who,
ironically, often pay a fee they can ill afford for this dubious service resembling torture. (Swaminathan, 1998: 22)

Some of the schools have a reputation as teaching shops that do not respect
the developmental needs of their young students. Children are enrolled from
the age of 2 years 6 months or 3, and the programme is completely oriented
towards their future school success. The preschools are criticized for their
role in socializing children into the authoritarian reality of the Indian education system (Mohite, 1998). Talking among children is forbidden, and there
is an almost total focus on reading and writing (Department of Human
Development and Family Studies, 1997). The former head of the Department of Preschool and Elementary Education at the Government of Indias
National Council for Educational Research and Training wrote that almost
95 percent of preschools in the private sector are functioning as a downward
extension of the primary school (Kaul, 1998: 57). The curriculum can
include content that is beyond the official curriculum for the early primary
grades. The language of instruction is most often English, which many parents consider to be necessary for success in school and career (Di Bona,
1998).
In short, preschool in India is serious business. The extent to which
this is true is evident in the growth of a sub-preschool level. Pre-nursery
schools prepare children for nursery school admission tests. The overheated
competition for places in the most sought after schools feeds the need for
pre-primary classes, that in turn creates a demand for pre-nursery school
classes. Because of the special role of pre-primary classes in the schooling
hierarchy (it is often the only point of entry into the most popular schools),
the preschool or pre-nursery school can have a higher fee than the primary
levels. Parents correctly see preschool as a gateway to later schooling. This
is true in other majority and minority world countries with a highly competitive secondary and higher education system. In turn, the competitive process
helps to make the best private schools appear more successful. Commenting
on the situation in Kenya, Sestini wrote that,
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. . . children who attend good preschools are selected by the head teachers of
good primary schools and have increased chances of entry into good secondary schools. This practice is not merely the product of parental pressure to
facilitate the achievement of their children, it is also a reflection of the need for
principals of schools to produce successful students. (Sestini, 1985: 29)

In fact, when compared with public schools, private schools do produce

more successful students because they provide them with the skills necessary to continue in school (test taking skills) rather than necessarily teaching
the official curriculum (Bashir, 1997: 155). In contrast, in public schools
. . . the best pupils will succeed, but the majority will not acquire even rudimentary skills of literacy and numeracy (Bashir, 1997: 155). In this climate,
convincing parents of the value of child-centred playway is a formidable
task.
Conclusion
In their discussion of culture and play, Roopnarine et al. wrote that unfortunately, in some developing countries, the play intervention strategies
imported from the post-industrialized world are adopted in a wholesale manner because of their perceived superior quality. That is, they must be good
because they come from the developed world (Roopnarine et al., 1998:
210). More than a half-century earlier, Gandhi (1945) offered a similar warning concerning Montessoris approach: scientific education with Western
trappings might prove poisonous to the city dwellers because here education
begins the moment the child is conceived and ends no one knows when
(Gandhi, 1945; 3701).
Play-based preschool education in India is the result of many influences. The idea that children learn best through play has Indian as well as
western sources. The range of preschool programmes offered by the public
and private sectors in India is vast, and a full description is beyond the scope
of this article. These include many excellent and innovative programmes,
largely unknown outside their community or region. As Di Bona (1998: 274)
observed, the Italian Reggio Emelia preschools are an inspiring story, but
no more so than countless examples around India that have not yet been
told. Some of these stories were described in a recent book edited by
Swaminathan (1998). However, as stressed throughout this article, programmes based on playway are rare.
The preparatory focus of pre-primary education in Indian mirrors a
worldwide trend towards more structured curricula and a focus on outcomesbased education in the early years (Goffin, 1994; Wood and Bennett, 1999;
Woodrow and Brennan, 1999). There is, however, opposition to this movement. In India, there are efforts to dampen the competitive nature of
preschools in the private sector through regulatory and voluntary measures.
Leaders at the highest level of the early education hierarchy in universities,
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government and NGOs are tireless in their drive for play-based education.
Efforts have also been made on the legal front. In 1997, the Delhi High
Court banned interviews for admissions to pre-primary classes, although the
measure had limited success (Teething Trouble, 1997). In the state of
Maharashtra (of which Mumbai is the capital), pre-primary schools must be
registered under the Preschool Centres Act of 1996, an attempt to establish
standards of operation and admission (Poll Playtime, 1998). In the private
sector in most states, reforms are mainly voluntary measures such as those
promoted by PRAYAS (endeavour) member schools in Vadodara, Gujarat.
These include the use of a lottery system for admission, the selection of children from the local community and support for informal approaches to
teaching and learning. However, the likelihood of a widespread increase in
the practice of playway may be greatest in the public sector. Eighty-five percent of Indian children do not have any preschool experience prior to starting school (UNESCO, 2000a), placing the focus on playway and curriculum
reform in the early primary grades. The National Policy on Education (Ministry of Human Resource Development, 1986) emphasizes the need for a
child-centred and activity-based approach in the early primary grades as well
as in pre-primary. Consistent with this policy, in public schools in the state
of Gujarat, the curriculum in the first 3 months of the first grade must follow
the principles of Tarang or joyful learning (Mohite et al., 1996). Tarang is a
form of indigenous non-formal education, and it is meant to guard against
too rapid an introduction of academic structure in kindergarten (balwadi)
and first grade. It is too early to judge the effect of this intervention, but
there is considerable hope that it will have a general impact on the quality of
primary schooling.

Notes
1.
In the terminology of UNESCO (2000b), and as generally used in the literature on
development and education, formal education is considered to be of an academic nature and
within the context of a structured, age-graded school system. Informal or non-formal education is an organized educational activity outside the school. In a preschool, non-formal education refers to a play-based, child-centred approach. Formal education within a preschool
refers to a teacher-centred approach with a focus on academics.
2.
The Shastri Indo-Canadian Institute was founded in 1968 to promote understanding
between India and Canada.
3.
The term playway is commonly used in countries influenced by British traditions in
early education to refer to play-based education. May and Carr (2000) traced the origin of the
term to a book by Henry Caldwell Cook (1917) titled, The Play Way; An Essay on Educational
Method.
4.
For a general picture of preschool education in India see Gill (1993a, 1993b), Kaul
(1992), Khalakdina (1998), Pattnaik (1996) and Swaminathan (1993).
5.
The Step by Step programme was formed to introduce child-centred methods in
preschools in Eastern European and former Soviet bloc countries. The aim was to reform
preschool practices that were developed in the past to support the Soviet state.

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6.
The ratio was used by Myers to express in whole numbers the percentage of children
worldwide who lived beyond their first birthday at the beginning of the 1990s.
7.
The ICDS is administrated by the Department of Women and Child Development,
Ministry of Human Resource Development.

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