Puppetry: a powerful mode of science communication

5 day workshop on Science Communication through Puppetry at Science City
Kapurthala, July 24, 2018: Puppetry has been a source of entertainment from Ancient time in India. It plays an important role in folk media for disseminating knowledge in rural population. The workshop is being jointly organized with NCSTC, Department of Science & Technology Govt. of India and Pushpa Gujral Science City. Around 50 teachers of Govt. schools from various districts of Punjab are participating in this work shop. Dr. Rajesh Grover, Director Science City while speaking on the occasion of five day workshop on “Science Communication through puppetry” expressed his concern over the poor performance of class X students of the state in the Nation wide assessment survey carried out by NCERT to evaluate their learning competencies. He emphasized the need of designing initiatives to improve learning outcomes especially the use of low cost teaching aids as powerful communication medium to make learning interesting for the students. He said that Puppetry being a low cost medium, can be used as an effective tool as it involves active dialogue with the audience. Being a traditional means of entertainment, it is mainly confined to semi-urban areas and villages. He added that incorporation of puppetry in class rooms will not only bring edutainment but also preserve the folk art. Further, participants of the workshop shall be trained on preparation of puppets from low cost materials which are easy to use in classroom type situation and also familiarized with the scientific issues and facts to establish the efficacy of the puppetry.
Mr. Rajpal Panchal, General Secretary, Indian Resource and Development Association (IRADA ) along with Rajvir Raju and Krishan Kumar (Folk Artist) conducted various attractive sessions during this workshop to encourage teachers to adopt such medium for making better classroom interaction with the students and make their learning interesting.