New initiatives of NCERT

Why is in news?

The NCERT marked its 65^th Foundation Day at its headquarters in New Delhi, the Union Education Minister has taken part in it.

• NCERT - The National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT) is an autonomous organisation set up in 1961 by the Government of India.
• Aim - To assist and advise the Central and State Governments on policies and programmes for qualitative improvement in school education
• It acts as a nodal agency for achieving the goals of Universalisation of Elementary Education.
• New initiatives – It has launched including Bal Vatika DTH TV channel, DIKSHA 2.0, etc in line with the vision of the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020.
• Bal Vatika - PM eVidya DTH Channel – It is a DTH Channel Available on No. 35.
• It will provide engaging audio-visual content for teachers, Anganwadi workers, parents, and children aged 3-6 years to boost foundational literacy and numeracy skills.

PM e-VIDYA is a comprehensive initiative which unifies all efforts related to digital/online/on-air education to enable multi-mode access to education.

• DIKSHA 2.0 platform – It is an upgraded version of DIKSHA featuring structured lessons, adaptive assessments, performance feedback.
• It Also uses AI-enabled tools such as Read Aloud, Closed Captioning and automatic translation of text files into 12 languages.

DIKSHA (Digital Infrastructure for Knowledge Sharing) is a national platform for school education, an initiative of NCERT, launched in 2017 under the aegis of the Ministry of Education (MoE), GoI.

• PRASHAST 2.0 - It is an enhanced pre-assessment screening tool for the early identification of children with disabilities, integrated with UDISE+, APAAR, Swavlamban Card portals and Kitab Ek Padhe Anek.

Swavlamban Card is Unique Disability ID (UDID) card, an identification card for Persons with Disabilities (PwD) in India.

• APAAR - Automated Permanent Academic Account Registry, is a specialized identification system designed for all students in India and part of the 'One Nation, One Student ID' program.
•  Kitab Ek Padhe Anek - A universal design for learning-based initiative to create accessible textbooks for inclusive classrooms.

References

1. Economic Times | NCERT - 65th Foundation Day

2. NCERT | PRASHAST 2.0