Maths and Science Resource Center

Adivasi children come to the school with a bag full of rich experiences of interacting with nature, but are lost at school, that fails to connect the knowledge in the books with their experiences. Over a period of time, this leads to significant discontent, indifference and drop-outs.

The VBVT Resource Center is a collaborative space for developing and sharing contextually relevant learning materials, rooted in the lived experiences of Adivasi communities. It supports teachers, students, and community educators with low-cost, locally meaningful tools across subjects—Math, Science, Social Studies, Language, and more. Beyond teaching aids, the center also curates resources like the Kaathadi learning channel, bilingual children’s magazines, and documentation of indigenous knowledge.

This center reflects VBVT’s commitment to culturally grounded pedagogy and continuous teacher development. It is a growing hub that supports our goal of building a community-owned model of education, aligned with the aspirations of Adivasi children and youth.

 Vision

Resource center’s vision is to bring about a change in Maths and Science teaching such that it bridges the gap between the real world and the textbook, builds a sense of inquiry and scientific temper in the child and hence, enables the child to learn concepts in a meaningful manner.

 Objectives

The objectives of the Maths & Science Resource centre are the following:

• To facilitate learning by discovery and inquiry, through hands-on activities
• To deepen the understanding of concepts, clear misconceptions and develop problem-solving and critical thinking skills
• To bridge the gap between the textbooks and daily life
• To empower Teachers, particularly in government schools, to deliver Maths and Science content effectively

Current Focus:

We are currently revitalising the Resource Center with a renewed focus on:

• Low-cost teaching-learning materials in Math, Science, and Social Studies
• Contextual curriculum content rooted in Adivasi life and knowledge
• Bilingual children’s magazine that bridges community wisdom and student creativity
• Expansion of the Kaathadi learning channel with videos across subjects and languages
• Ongoing teacher training in subject-specific pedagogy and classroom practice
• Piloting a financial literacy module for both youth and community members

These initiatives are co-created with teachers, students, and community members. We see the Resource Center not just as a storehouse of materials, but as a living lab for building a culturally relevant and community-owned education system

 Kaathadi YouTube Channel

Kaathadi YouTube channel aims to share best practices with larger audience and encourages children and teachers to carry out these activities towards deeper understanding. Kaathadi YouTube channel contains videos of innovative hands-on Maths and Science learning activities and experiments.

Link to the channel: Kaathadi Channel

Sample video:

Why does the Tiger have stripes? | An interesting activity | Primary School Science

 முழுக்களின் வகுத்தல் | ஒரு எளிய செயல்பாடு