Non-Formal Education

Not all education comes out of a textbook.    Formal education is usually conducted in a classroom, with a teacher and a text and is certificate or degree oriented.  There are proscribed lessons and even a test at the end of the course.  The content is usually on the high end with rules, dates, facts, memorization, etc.  There is nothing wrong with formal education.  It often works.

There are many instances when formal education is a barrier to learning.  In villages where language skills are being upgraded, the demands of formal education can easily disuade many individuals from continuing to learn, especially if they have had little or no formal education in the past.

Instead, an education process known as non-formal education is the best process for learning. read this description of education carried out by WFN in some villages:

Our participants in the classes are of ages ranging from 15 to 50 or 60. There is no maximum age limit. The main objective of these programs is not to get the participants admitted to a formal school, but to teach language through practical discussions. Essentially, the programs are designed to teach functional literacy skills applicable to daily village life. WF believes that a theoretical discussion of language would not be nearly as effective, and would frustrate participants enough to leave the program.  The literacy program includes information about violence against women and human rights.  The opportunity to raise awareness about women's issues is made all the more important as many of the classes have male students.

Instead of memorization and hard and fast grammar rules, participants learn to read and write as they learn to coordinate and work in a group. Some groups choose to design their curriculum to be similar to our skills training programs. We encourage this active participation in deciding how the group will learn language skills. We also fully support the exchange of information and skills among participants so that people can learn in an open atmosphere, sharing ideas.

Non-formal education is generally identified with four educational characteristics: (M.K.Smith, '96)

• Relevance to the needs of disadvantaged groups.
• Concern with specific categories of person.
• A focus on clearly defined purposes.
• Flexibility in organization and methods.

Non-formal education is more community based, not text based, deals with situation specific content, is short term and easily altered to meet the situation "on the ground," and is more concerned with meeting needs than getting degrees and certificates.  For a more detailed discussion of the differences between formal and non-formal education as well as the political and educational history of the language defining these types of education go to an article by M. K. Smith.