Textbook Blunders: Editors’ panel in the dark about changes

Published by the National Curriculum and Textbook Board (NCTB), the books mention that five others, mostly NCTB officials, fine-tuned and modified the contents.

The textbooks were written on the basis of the new curriculum developed in 2012 in line with the National Education Policy 2010 for the students of 2013 academic session, Dr Mahbubul Haque, convener of the panel, told The Daily Star yesterday.

Following the distribution of the books among students in 2013, opinions were sought from class teachers, guardians and other stakeholders, and some corrections were made in those later, said Mahbubul, a former teacher at Chittagong University.

“Now the books contain the names of people who modified the contents. But I knew nothing about the changes. As far as I know, none of us was informed about this.

“We [panel members] had worked hard to prepare the textbooks,” said Mahbubul.

The other panel members are Dr Syed Azizul Haque, Shafiul Alam and Nurjahan Begum. All of them have long been involved with the NCTB for developing textbooks.

Azizul Haque, professor of Bangla department at Dhaka University, said the people who modified the contents made some mistakes instead of making those better.

“The books contain our names as writers, but they [the authorities concerned] didn't seek our opinion before making the changes in the books.”

He said the famous rhyme “Adarsha Chhele” in the Bangla textbook for class-III is a glaring example of the mistakes.

In the textbook, the rhyme written by Kusumkumari Das has lost its original order.

It begins inaccurately. The first line reads “amader deshe sei chhele kobe hobe” instead of “amader deshe hobe sei chhele kobe” (when our country will have such a boy).

On the mention of orna (scarf) in the alphabet chapter of the class-I Bangla textbook, Mahbubul said they found this word most common in identifying the Bangla letter ও (O), as many children see this piece of cloth in their houses.

“We used only a picture of a scarf in the textbook. But now the book contains a picture of a girl wearing a scarf,” he said.

There has been a volley of criticism on the social media and other forums over some embarrassing blunders in school textbooks.

The education ministry has already made NCTB Chief Editor Pritish Kumar Sarkar and its Senior Expert Lana Humayra Khan officers on special duty (OSD) over the blunders in textbooks.

Two committees have also been formed to find out the mistakes in the books and also those responsible.

The Daily Star yesterday called three of the five government officials who modified the textbook contents, but none of them responded.

NCTB Chairman Prof Narayan Chandra Saha also didn't pick up his mobile phone.

However, NCTB Member (primary curriculum) Dr Mohammad Abdul Mannan said the textbook editors and writers are not usually informed when small corrections are made in those.

“But whenever we make major changes, we inform them.”

He said a procedure is followed for making corrections and changes in textbooks.

The NCTB seeks opinions from teachers and students through a try-out at the school level, and then holds workshops with the experts on this.

The final decision is made at the meeting of the National Curriculum Co-ordination Committee, he added.