The term 'summer camps' conjures up visions of bonfires, picnic lunches- fun and games. True to tradition, the summer camps organised by the N.G.O. Pratham are about fun and games but absent are bonfires and picnic lunches. Instead you have 15992 children in 104 schools attempting a transversal from the 'can't read' class to the 'can read' category.

First started in Delhi in 2002, the summer camps use the school infrastructure available during the summer vacation to organise remedial / bridge course sessions for in-school/ out - of school children. There are essentially three kinds of classes:

• Balwadi (pre-primary education) classes for children in the age in the 3-5 age group

• 'Learning to Read' (L2R) classes for school going as well as 'out -of school' children in the 6 to 14 age bracket

• 'Reading to Learn' program (R2L) for 'out-of school' children in the 6 to 14 age group

• Classes that prepare 'out-of-school' children for the National Open School Exams for standard 3 and 5

The summer camps have now become an annual feature in Pratham units across north India. In Delhi this year, they were held in all the eight zones that Pratham Delhi operates in - South Shahdara 1, South Shahdara 2, Central Shahdara 1, Central Shahdara 2, North Shahdara, North-East Shahdara, City Sadar (Sadar, Karol Bagh, Daryaganj region) and West Delhi (Najafgarh Zone). The camps were held from mid-May to mid-July.

These classes and the results from them are discussed below in greater detail:

Learning to Read (L2R):
Pratham Delhi organised 707 L2R classes this year. Though the focus of the L2R program is on language, classes were held for arithmetic also. Further, libraries were run in the given schools. Apart from encouraging reading by lending books the library sessions tried to sustain the child's interest in schooling by organising activities pertaining to arts and crafts, story telling, story writing, role-plays, word games et cetera.

The total number of common children (children who took the Week 1 assessment test as well as the Week 6 assessment test) in this category was 13812. The 'Learning to Read' result for Delhi (overall) is given in Table 1.

Table 1: L2R Results Delhi (overall)
The number of children in the 'can read category' has seen a quantum jump 15.5 per cent of the total number in the first week to 52.4 per cent of the total in the sixth week. The number of children in the 'nothing' category has fallen from 4201 to 314 in the duration of four weeks. It may be mentioned that the children left in the word category at the end of the four weeks will now, with minimal effort move on to the 'can read' category. Moreover, as the zonal report below shows, in some zones the number of children shifting from the 'can't read' category to the ' can read' category' was as high as 67.7 per cent of the total.

Fig 1: Zone wise assessment results in the second week of the Delhi summer camp

Fig 2: Zone wise assessment results of the Delhi summer camp (week 6)

Of the 6887 children in Pratham Delhi Bridge courses 3397 did not participate in the summer camp. In a third of the cases this was due to the child being out-of-town during the time (visit to native village). The 'summer camp school' being very far away, a shift in the place of residence of the child and the child being involved in work are some of the other cited reasons.

Reading to Learn (R2L):
Pratham Delhi organised 255 ' Reading to Learn' classes. The R2L classes are primarily for the 'out-of school' children. It is more advanced than the L2R program and measures the child on her writing and reading comprehension skills. Pratham conducted a baseline test for the 2180 children in the second week of the program. The test comprised seven questions each gauging the child's performance on a specific skill. (For example, question one is a word dictation, question 2 a test of reading comprehension, question 3 on creative writing. The results for the same are given below:

	Q. 1	Q. 2a	Q. 2b	Q. 2c	Q. 2d	Q. 3a	Q. 3b	Q. 4a	Q. 4b	Q. 5a	Q. 5b	Q. 6a	Q. 6b	Q. 7a	Q. 7b
Child -ren Got Full Marks	19.5	65.9	63	54.8	38.4	26.1	26.1	80.8	66.2	41.5	21 .9	28 .6	27 .6	9.1	10 .9

Table 2: Baseline Test (in terms of percentage of children who got full marks in a given question) for R2L in Delhi summer camp (overall)

Other Programs:
In addition to the flagship L2R program and the R2L program Pratham Delhi organised Balwadi and NOS preparation classes. 11 such NOS preparation classes were held during this period.

As one sits down and watches the children making attempts to take that crucial yet elusive leap, from the ' can't read' to the ' can read' section of the population, the term 'camping for a cause' comes to the mind. We understand that the process initiated by thesummer camps has to be continued. We need efforts in the future to prevent the reversion of children to the ' can't read' category. Moreover, the number of children covered by the program is negligible when compared to the number of non-readers in the capital. With new efforts that take account of these and the other problems facing elementary education, Pratham Delhi should play an important role in turning the Delhi of the 'morrow into a literate capital.

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