India - Teaching in classrooms to get digitalised

Macmillan Publishers India Ltd, in collaboration with Edurite Technologies, plans to launch a high-quality visual learning aid, DigitALLy, for schools in India and bring about 15 lakh students under its corpus within a couple of years.

While announcing the tieup here on Tuesday, Edurite COO Srikanth Iyer said, "Our common vision is commitment to education. The content of DigitALLy is based on a cognitive learning process that helps in the retention and retrieval of long-time memory."

Using this technology, teachers can impart education via audio-visual medium through a combination of texts, animations, videos and images projected on the screen.

Edurite, an eight-year old Bangalore-based company, is already providing the technology to over 300 schools, covering more than six state syllabi, including CBSE, ICSE and West Bengal board syllabus. So far, the company has approached 20 schools in Bengal and the response has been encouraging.

The authorities do not have to shell out a huge amount to introduce DigitALLy in their respective schools. It is a boot model and comes at a nominal cost of Rs 100 per student a month. "It is a long-term process and we profit over a long period of time," said Iyer.

Elaborating more on the technology, Iyer said it would be helpful for students from primary as well as high schools. "It can survive changes in syllabus and also allows the addition of content for its use as database."

The product also provides a full-time resource coordinator, to be paid by the companies, to help the teachers in implementing the technology and thereby focusing on the learning aspect of the teachers as well, Iyer said.

"DigitALLy will help to enhance the periphery of books," said Alok Lahoti, senior vice president (sales and marketing) of Macmillan Publishers India Ltd.