Introduction
With the invention of the first electronic television in 1927 by the 21 year old inventor named Philo Taylor Farnsworth[1], some people were under the wrong impression that radios had become redundant and had taken the back seat in the field of mass communication and education. Nothing can be further from the truth.
The basic assumptions of this article are that policy makers, education planners, group leaders, curriculum constructors, researchers and donors are aware that: (a) Teaching and learning need not be confined only to classrooms, colleges and schools, (b) It is important to incorporate
Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) into the formulation and execution of the Radio Study Programmes.
This is a complex task which involves not merely learning a “new language” but learning how to “teach in new language”. It is a challenge to the existing pedagogical infrastructure.
What is Asynchronous Learning?
Asynchronous learning[2] is a student-centered teaching method. It is a general term that is used to describe forms of education, instruction, and learning that do not occur in the same place or at the same time. The term is most commonly applied to various forms of digital (for example, Radio or TV) and online learning in which students learn from instruction that may come in the form of prerecorded audio/video lessons or game-based learning tasks that students complete on their own. Asynchronous learning may also include a wide variety of instructional interactions like email exchanges between teachers, online discussion boards, instructional materials and correspondence etc.
Interactive Radio Instruction (IRI)
Today there has been some amount of reservation about large scale investments in Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) within the educational system. To address this problem a low-cost educational technology, with a long history, has been employed in many developing countries. It is known as the Interactive Radio Instruction (IRI).
Throughout Africa and South America, radio has been used as an important tool for learning and dissemination. The term Interactive Radio Instruction (IRI) is encompassed under the more general term Interactive Audio Instruction (IAI). As technology has been evolving, many different forms of delivering audio programmes have come into use. These include CD players and MP3 players. IRI only requires an audio device like radio and an adult facilitator to reach out to learners who are isolated by distance and poor communication infrastructure. The Interactive Radio Instruction can be used in any almost setting, from formal classrooms to community learning centers in rural India.
According to a World Bank toolkit published on the topic in 2005,
Interactive radio instruction (IRI) is a distance education system that combines radio broadcasts with active learning to improve educational quality and teaching practices. IRI has been in use for more than 25 years and has demonstrated that it can be effective on a large scale at low cost. IRI programs require teachers and students to react verbally and physically to questions and exercises posed by radio characters and to participate in group work, experiments, and other activities suggested by the radio program.[3]
According to Vikaspedia,[4]
IRI consists of broadcasting lessons to classrooms on a daily basis. The radio lessons, on particular topics and aimed at specific levels, at particular levels, provide regular, structured assistance to teachers and serve to improve the quality of teaching and enhance learning. IRI also serves to expand access to education, by bringing ready-made lessons to remote schools and learning centers which have few resources and teachers.
Studies suggest that IRI projects have had a positive impact on both access to and quality of formal and non-formal education. It is also a cost-effective means of delivering educational content to a large number of people.
History of the Radio
The history of radio can be traced back to the 19th century when the Italian inventor Guglielmo Marconi built the first commercially successful wireless telegraphy system that is based on airborne Hertzian waves (radio transmission).[5]
The early history of radio is the history of technologies that grappled with the production and use of radio instruments that used radio waves. The development of radio actually began as “wireless telegraphy”. As time went by, radio was considered as a powerful tool in matters pertaining to broadcasting. The idea of wireless communication goes further back than the discovery of “radio”. There were experiments that were conducted in “wireless telegraphy” via inductive and capacitive induction and transmission through the ground, water, and even train tracks. These experiments were carried out in the 1830s.
James Clerk Maxwell showed in 1854 that electromagnetic waves could propagate through free space. David Edward Hughes was the next one to perform an experiment around 1880, on the transmission of a signal by means of electromagnetic waves. This was considered induction at the time. It was in 1888 that Heinrich Rudolf Hertz reiterated the veracity of Maxwell’s theory of electromagnetism. Some 20 years later, after the discovery of the “Hertzian waves” the term “radio” was universally adopted for this type of electromagnetic radiation. As mentioned earlier, the first Electronic Television was invented in 1927 by Philo Taylor Farnsworth.
Types of Radio Broadcasts[6]
The term “broadcasting” refers to the transmission of audio or video content using radio-frequency waves. With the advance of digital technology, radio broadcasting has many different types of content distribution. Listeners have the choice to tune into several types of radio stations than ever before. Here’s a brief description of them.
Analog Radio
Analog radio consists of two major types: AM (amplitude modulation) and FM (frequency modulation). This station frequently feeds only one transmitter that is referred to as an AM station or an FM station in the U.S. AM radio uses the long-wave band in some countries. The long-wave band comes with frequencies that are fairly lower than the FM band. It also has slightly different transmission features. It is useful and works better for broadcasting over long distances. Both AM as well as FM is used to broadcast audio signals to homes, cars and moveable receivers.
Digital Radio
There are four standards for digital radio systems that exist worldwide: IBOC (In-Band On-Channel), DAB (Digital Audio Broadcasting), ISDB-TSB (Integrated Services Digital Broadcasting-Terrestrial Sound Broadcasting), and DRM (Digital Radio Mondiale). They are different from each other in several aspects.
IBOC
A company named iBiquity Digital Corporation, with a trademarked name of HD Radio, developed IBOC. It still continues to manage it. It was introduced for regular use in 2003 and is in frequent use in the U.S. There are more than 2,000 U.S. AM and FM stations that are using the IBOC digital radio services today. Today the IBOC stations broadcast two versions of its primary content: analog and digital.
DAB
This is also known as Eureka 147 in the U.S. and as Digital Radio in the U.K. DAB has several advantages like IBOC but is fundamentally different in design. Unlike IBOC, DAB cannot share a channel with an analog transmit. So it needs a new, dedicated band. Every DAB broadcast in addition needs much more band since it consists of multi-program services (typically 6 to 10, depending on quality and the amount of data it carries). This feature makes it unusable by a typical local radio station.
ISDB-TSB
This was specifically developed for Japan in 2003. It is the digital radio system used for multi-program services. This type currently uses transmission frequencies in the VHF band.
DRM
This is a system that was developed primarily as a substitute for AM international broadcasting in the short-wave band. DRM uses the similar channel plan as the analog services with some limitations and changes to the analog service.
Sirius XM
Sirius XM is the combination of two similar but competing satellite radio services. They are XM Satellite Radio and Sirius Satellite Radio. XM and Sirius are subscription services. They broadcast more than 150 digital audio channels that are suitable for reception by car, portable, and fixed receivers. They cover the complete area of United States, much of Canada, and parts of Mexico.
Community Radio Service
Community radio (CR) is a radio service that offers a third model of radio broadcasting in addition to commercial and public broadcasting[7]. Community stations cater to geographic communities and communities of interest. They broadcast content that is popular and relevant to a specific audience group. Community radio stations are operated, owned, and influenced by the communities they serve and are generally nonprofit organizations. The programmes include stories and sharing of experiences by the community members. These Community Radio Services have proved to be very useful in certain locations and circumstances. Take for example, the case of Nepal with just a small fraction of India’s population, has 260 community radio stations with no restrictions. The April 2015 Nepal earthquake killed nearly 9,000 people and injured nearly 22,000 proved to be one of the incidents where the Community Radio Service was of great use. The Community Radios swung into action to relay critical information to the centers of activity in the cities and informed about the relief and rehabilitation efforts.
On the other hand some experts have also criticized the idea of Community Service Radio in India. For example, Shubhranshu Choudhary, the founder of CGNet Swara (an organization involved with setting up community radio and call centers to relay citizen news in Chhattisgarh) argues, “Community radio in India is a well-cultivated myth. Out of the existing radios, most are run by educational institutions and others are by non-governmental organizations, so there’s no role of a community.”
Internet Radio
Several radio stations today use online streaming audio services to provide a simulated broadcast of their over-the-air signals to web listeners. The advantages of this type are that it offers additional online audio streams that are repurposed, time-shifted, or completely different from their on-air services. Broadcasters may offer several services as they like since there is no scarcity of bandwidth or obligation of licensing of online services. In addition, web distribution is delivered to end-users by the third-party telecommunication providers on a nationwide or worldwide basis. This is not the case with over-the-air broadcasting.
Statistics[8]
Since the target group live in rural India, we need to understand the facts and figures pertaining to the rural populace. Rural areas are also known as ‘countryside’ or ‘village’ in India. These have a low population density. Agriculture along with fishing, cottage industries, pottery etc. is the main source of livelihood for the people. Rural India is viewed and defined by different people and agencies in different ways. The National Sample Survey Organization (NSSO) defines ‘rural’ as: “An area with a population density of up to 400 per square kilometer, Villages with clear surveyed boundaries but no municipal board, and a minimum of 75% of male working population involved in agriculture and allied activities.”[9]
The Reserve Bank of India defines rural areas as those areas with a population of less than 49,000 (tier -3 to tier-6 cities).[10]
It is generally said that the rural areas house up to 70% of India’s population. The rural population currently accounts for one-third of the total Indian FMCG[11] sales.[12] The importance and statistics pertaining to radio broadcasting is summarized by Mayank Jain when he states, “In the summer of 1923, the Bombay Presidency Radio Club started broadcasting in India over a small radius of less than 500 meters. In 1927, two privately-owned transmitters were set up by Broadcasting Services at Bombay and Calcutta, which got taken over by the government in 1930 and became the Indian Broadcasting Service. It became All India Radio in 1936… Almost a hundred years later, India has 245 commercial radio stations spread across 50-odd cities out of a total of 1,600 cities and towns in the country… More than 70% of Indian population lives in villages and a vast majority of them have little to no connectivity to Internet, electricity or telephone lines making radio the only feasible medium for mass communication.”[13]
The Role of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) in Education
UNESCO defines ICT as “The term, information and communication technologies (ICT), refers to forms of technology that are used to transmit, store, create, display, share or exchange information by electronic means. This loose definition of ICT includes technologies like radio, television, video, DVD, telephone (landline and mobile phones), satellite systems, computer and network. It also includes other associated technologies such as video conferencing, e-mail and blogs etc. In the ‘information age’ that we live in today, educational objectives require integrating these modern forms of ICT into education.”[14]
Experiments have proved that integrating ICT into education systems can enhance the quality of education delivery. The use of ICT has also has shown that it can lead to greater access to information and services by marginalized groups and communities.
ICT has been used in 3 main forms:
1. Direct class teaching, including interactive radio instruction (IRI) and televised lessons.
2. School broadcasting, where broadcast programming provides complementary teaching and learning resources not otherwise available.
3. General educational programming which provide general and informal educational opportunities.
Today educators have teaching resources like instructional materials, audio and visual digital products, software and content-ware, modes of connectivity, media, educational websites etc. A glimpse into the future would excite the educationalists not only of what resources are currently available but new trends and innovations.
Case Study: Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU)
Abstract: Indira Gandhi National Open University has been allotted 40 FM radio stations from which to broadcast educational programmes for the benefit of students and general public in India. These FM radio stations, delivered through the Gyan Vani network, cater to learners seeking to gain knowledge in the areas of basic, primary, higher, and extension education. Radio programming covers various subject areas. It is anticipated that the opening of India’s airwaves will prove beneficial to the nation’s general population, thus fostering the democratizing principals of empowerment, advocacy, and community participation… The survey focused on audience’s perceived need for a radio channel dedicated exclusively to educational programming; it also provided an opportunity for respondents to suggest possible programme content and formats. Respondents, in general, indicated that they looked towards the network Gyan Vani to fulfill personal and educational goals by offering certified vocational courses, coaching for entrance exams, updated information on careers, courses, etc.[15]
Established in 1985, IGNOU was an important milestone in India’s educational history. An important feature IGNOU’s teaching methodology is the use of electronic media and computer networks like radio, television, cable TV, audio/video cassettes, CD-ROMs, Internet, interactive systems (one-way-video/ two-way-audio teleconferencing) and interactive radio counseling. Among these, radio is considered an important medium that reaches out to students studying at a distance. Even with the emergence of new technologies like television, radio continues to remain a viable medium for educational purposes in terms of pedagogical importance and geographical reach.
Radio as a Tool in Education
Radio has been used as a tool in education for more than 80 years. Radio like other available instruments and channels of communication could be used to assist to put across essential knowledge to enlighten and educate people. In addition radio can also be mobilized to comprehend the potential towards meeting basic education for all. Radio is an effectual system for delivery of education to larger numbers of people. It facilitates information exchange at the community level, acting as a “community telephone”. Radio plays a vital educational role as the sole medium for formal and non-formal education.[16] Radio has been used in several ways like school broadcasting, informal general education, social action programming and adult basic education and literacy etc. Universities that offer distance teaching courses employ radio for advertising, enrolling as well as for teaching. For example, the Open University in Britain uses this system uses this system for discussion of course materials, alternate viewpoints that are not contained in the printed materials, source material analysis etc.
Radio also has been used extensively as an educational medium in the developing countries. Here are some examples: Thailand, to teach mathematics to school children and for teacher training, India, for rural development, Swaziland, for public health, Mali, for literacy training, Mexico, for literacy training and other programs, Nigeria, for management courses for the agriculture sector, Nicaragua, for health education, The Philippines, for nutrition education, Guatemala, to promote changes in farming practices and to improve production, Sri Lanka, for family planning and health, Trinidad and Tobago, to promote knowledge of breastfeeding, South Korea, in support of family planning, Botswana, for civics education, The Dominion Republic, in support of primary education, Paraguay, to offer primary school instruction etc.
Back in 1956, the “Maharashtra Radio Forum” project was carried out in India. The purpose was to determine if radio forums would work in India with rural audiences who were largely illiterate, rarely exposed to radio, and unused to organized group discussion. The objectives of the project were to stimulate discussion, increase participants’ knowledge and, if possible, have the activities result in decisions and actions to improve village life”[17]
In a study sponsored by UNESCO, Paul Neurath (1959, 1960) studied the effects of a Farm Radio Forum project at Poona, India. He compared 145 forum villages with non-forum villages.
According to Neurath (1959):
“Radio farm forum as an agent for transmission of knowledge has proved to be a success beyond expectation. Increase in knowledge in the forum villages between pre- and post-broadcasts was spectacular, whereas in the non-forum villages it was negligible. What little gain there was, occurred mostly in the non-forum villages with radio.”[18]
In Australia, radio has been used for direct teaching, whereby radio schools are used to connect children in secluded farmsteads in the outback together with a teacher sited many hundred miles away. There are two examples of radio direct teaching 1. In the farmsteads having short wave receive and transmit radio, enabling the learners to partake directly in the lesson. 2. Parent offer the back up support, in this way a teacher operates in the same way to a classroom and the teacher except that the learners are at a distance (Bates, 2005).[19]
The Advantages of using Radio in Educational Programmes
- Radio is capable of delivering high quality educational programmes to highly diversified audiences located across broad geographical expanses at very low cost per course production.
- When radio is used as a supplementary learning tool, it benefits the weaker group of students.
- The Agency for International Development[20] has demonstrated that the radio educational programme brings out greater learning effects than textbooks and conventional class room teaching.
- Radio teaching can also have the additional benefit of teaching subjects that classroom teachers lack due to lack of training or lack of knowledge in certain fields.
- Perhaps another important advantage of radio teaching is that the radio can provide instruction for one group of students while the teacher is engaged with another.
- Radio programmes can also introduce new resources that may not be available with the teacher or in the school library.
- Another advantage of the Radio Home Study/Learning Programme is that learning can take place in one’s home along with other group members.
Few Disadvantages of Radio Teaching Programmes
While the radio teaching has many advantages as given above, there are a few disadvantages as well. To mention a few: inherently lacks interaction, clarifications to doubts and questions are not available, instruction cannot be interrupted, and time for reflection is minimal. In order to overcome these problems, supporting material and follow-up exercises have to be provided.
Conclusion
The rural people in India do not have educational infrastructure that the urban populace have like teachers, libraries, class rooms, slide and movie projectors etc. Educating this section of rural Indian folk is a complex task which involves not merely learning a “new language” but learning how to “teach in new language”. It is a challenge to the existing pedagogical infrastructure. Radio has been used as a tool in education for more than 80 years. Throughout Africa and South America; radio has been used as an important tool for learning and dissemination. Radio is an effectual system for delivery of education to larger numbers of people. It facilitates information exchange at the community level, acting as a “community telephone”. Radio has been used in several ways like school broadcasting, informal general education, social action programming and adult basic education and literacy etc. Universities that offer distance teaching courses employ radio for advertising, enrolling as well as for teaching. The asynchronous model of teaching that makes use of the Interactive Radio Instruction (IRI) has a history of success in several countries and also has proved to be cost effective means of delivering educational content to a large number of people.
References
Academy for Educational Development. (1979). Paraguay using radio for formal education in rural areas. Academy News, 2 (2), 4. Washington, D.C.: Clearinghouse on Development Communication.
Agency for International Development. (1990). Interactive Radio Instruction: Confronting crisis in basic education. (A.I.D. Science and Technology in Development Series). Washington, DC: Author. ERIC Document No. ED 322 894.
All India Radio: growth and development. Retrieved March 31, 2003 from: http://www.air.org.in
Bansal, K., and Choudhary, S. S. (1999) Interactive Radio for Supporting Distance Education: An evaluative study. Indian Journal of Open Learning, 8(1), 61 – 71.
Byram, M. and Kidd, R. (1983). A hands-on-approach to popularizing radio learning group campaigns. Convergence, 16(4), 14 – 22.
Cooke, T., and Romweber, G. (1977). Radio Nutrition Education – Using the advertising techniques to reach rural families: Philippines and Nicaragua. Washington, D.C.: Manoff International.
Dikshit, H. P. (2002). Preface to study: Radio Vision (Multimedia through Digital Radio). In Sreedher, Radio Vision: Multimedia through Digital Radio. UNESCO and IGNOU.
ERT (Educational, Research and Training Unit) (2001). An Overview: Gyan Darshan, Gyan Vani, Interactive Radio Counseling, Electronic Media Production Centre: IGNOU.
Faulder, D. (1984). Learning on Air. Media in Education and Development, 7(1), 36 – 39.
IGNOU (2001). Gyan Vani: The educational FM radio network of India. Publicity material developed by IGNOU, New Delhi.
Jaminson, D., and McAnany, E. (1973). Radio for Education and Development. Beverley Hills CA: Sage
Nwaerondu, N. G., and Thompson, G. (1987). The Use of Educational Radio in Developing Countries: Lessons from the Past. Journal of Distance Education 2(2), 43 – 54.
Sharma, R. C. (2002b). Gyan Vani: The Educational FM Radio Network of India. International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning, 2(2). Field Notes Vol. 2, No. 2, News from Asia. Retrieved March 31, 2003: http://www.irrodl.org/content/v2.2/field.html
Sukumar, B. (2001). IGNOU Interactive Radio Counseling: A study. Indian Journal of Open Learning, 10(1), 80 – 92.
Tripp, S., and Roby, W. (1996). Auditory presentations in language laboratories. In D. H. Jonassen (Ed.) Handbook of research for educational communications and technology (p. 821- 850). New York: Simon & Schuster Macmillan.
[1]Philo Farnsworth (1906 – 1971) was an American inventor and television pioneer. He made many contributions that were crucial to the early development of all-electronic televisions. He is perhaps best known for his 1927 invention of the first fully functional all-electronic image pickup device (video camera tube), the “image dissector”, as well as the first fully functional and complete all-electronic television system
[2]Asynchronous learning is based on constructivist theory. Constructivism is a learning theory that is found in psychology which explains how people might acquire knowledge and learn. It therefore has direct application to education. The theory suggests that humans construct knowledge and meaning from their experiences.
[3]http://www.worldbank.org/en/region/afr
[4]http://vikaspedia.in/education/teachers-corner/technologies-2013-for-improvement-in-teaching-and-learning-process
[5]https://www.google.co.in/webhp?ei=XDukVbOKB5WPuAS-0b-ICA&ved=0CAUQqS4oAw#q=the+history+of+radio
[7]Commercial broadcasting (also called private broadcasting) is the broadcasting of television programs and radio programming by privately owned corporate media, as opposed to state sponsorship. It was the United States′ first model of radio (and later television) during the 1920s, in contrast with the public television model in Europe during the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s which prevailed worldwide (except in the United States) until the 1980s.
Public broadcasting includes radio, television and other electronic media outlets whose primary mission is public service. In much of the world, funding comes from the government, especially via annual fees charged on receivers.
[8]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rural_area#India
[9]http://www.dhanbank.com/pdf/reports/InFocus-December%201,%202010.pdf
[10]http://www.dhanbank.com/pdf/reports/InFocus-December%201,%202010.pdf
[11]Fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) or consumer packaged goods (CPG) are products that are sold quickly and at relatively low cost. Examples include non-durable goods such as soft drinks, toiletries, over-the-counter drugs, processed foods and many other consumables.
[12]http://www.dhanbank.com/pdf/reports/InFocus-December%201,%202010.pdf
[13]Mayank Jain, “Why India has only 179 community radio stations instead of the promised 4,000”, May 11, 2015.
[14]http://www.unescobkk.org/education/ict
[15]“Bridges to Effective Learning through Radio”, April – 2003, http://www.irrodl.org/index.php/irrodl/article/view/118/198
[16]http://www.col.org/events/0006commradio.htm
[17]Bordenave, 1977; Mathur & Neurath, 1959; Sitaram, 1969.
[18]p 105, http://web.worldbank.org/archive/website00236B/WEB/RAD_01.HTM
[19]“Educational Technology Innovation and Impact/Edutainment/Radio Education: Radio Education” https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Educational_Technology_Innovation_and_Impact/Edutainment/Radio_Education
[20]Tripp and Roby, 1996.
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