ToR - Digitization Partner for Developing Online Course Library Management Course

Terms of Reference 

Digitization Partner for Developing Online Course 

Library Management Course

Literacy Program

Room to Read

About the Organization

Room to Read envisions a world in which all children can pursue a quality education, reach their full potential and contribute to their community and the world. To achieve this goal, we focus on two areas where we believe we can have the greatest impact: literacy and gender equality in education.  We work in collaboration with communities and local governments across Asia and Africa to develop literacy skills and a habit of reading among primary school children, and support girls to complete secondary school with the life skills they’ll need to succeed in school and beyond. Over 20 million children have benefitted from Room to Read’s programs over the past 20 years.

India is Room to Read’s fourth country of operation and has impacted millions of children with its key programs. Since our inception in 2003 in India, we have been touching the lives of several young minds across states like: Andhra Pradesh, Gujarat, Chhattisgarh, Delhi, Rajasthan, Uttarakhand, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Telangana and Karnataka. We aim to capacitate internal and external stakeholders in the education sector to understand early literacy as an important aspect of foundational learning through scientifically developed curriculum and close and continuous engagement at all levels. 

Background of the Literacy Program

Room to Read’s literacy program is based on scientific and yet contextually relevant principles of literacy that are time tested. This set of comprehensive principles of early literacy ensures that the magic and science of reading are well established in the lives of the benefitting children. Yet at the school/teacher level, the program design detailed out a simple, structured lesson plan, enabling the teacher to engage with the children around activities.

Through extensive field experience and scientific research, Room to Read has designed an innovative Comprehensive Literacy Approach that looks at ‘learning to read’ as a comprehensive experience immersed in which the child learns all the skills that are required to become independent and fluent readers. Hence, it aimed aims to combine the ‘Science’ of learning to read with the ‘Magic’ of loving to read in an enabling reading environment.

Comprehensive Literacy experience in Room to Read involves explicitly designed reading and writing instruction in Hindi in grades 1 and 2 and school library interventions for students in grades 1 to 5, in the same schools. This comprehensive approach to reading develops both reading skills and a habit of reading among the children, supported by provision of material, training of teachers, regular monitoring and feedback along with community engagement.

Its expected outcome for the program is – “Children reading with fluency and comprehension by end of grade 2 and developing a habit of reading by grade 5.”

The Three Pillars of our Literacy Program   

Room to Read’s Comprehensive Literacy Approach is aimed at helping children become independent readers for life, to have an enhanced world view and be capable of making informed choices. This is done on a strong foundation of three pillars of literacy, orality, orthographic expertise and exposure to a variety of texts. These skills are neither incremental, nor causal in nature. These skills are spirally intertwined and if early readers experience them simultaneously, it helps them to become motivated independent readers.

About the course 

Course Objective: To develop a nuanced self-learning online course for teachers on building a ‘child-friendly’ library and its effective usage as a thriving space for language-learning and over-all development of the child.  

Course Progression: The course would start with a simple pre-assessment and would progress to four modules ranging from 30 to 40 minutes each. At the end, there would be a post-assessment to check the online learner’s (OL’s) progress from ‘pre’ to ‘post’. 

Keeping in mind a learner centric approach the course will be self-paced and the medium of instruction will be in Hindi. 

Audience

The online course will be designed for educators in government schools. The course will be uploaded on Diksha. 

 

Course Duration

The course will be made up of 4 modules approximately 30 to 40 minutes each inclusive of course content and assessment. Keeping in mind a learner centric approach the course will be self-paced and the medium of instruction will be in Hindi. 

 

Methodology

The methodology of the course will be a blend of inputs ranging from audio and video aids, animated content, interactive slides with clickable hotspots, one or two game-based assessments, individual exercises, supplementary material, etc. 

The experience of the participants will be central to the aim of each session. This course is going to be written by library experts. The main objective of the course is to give a practical solution around how to build a thriving ‘child-friendly’ using whatever resources she/he has available. Following are some guiding principles of the course:

1. Application-based approach: From library infrastructure to curating an ideal book collection to management and reading activities everything would be covered keeping the online learner as a ‘doer’ at the epicentre. The idea is to deliver a compressive and lucid training that equips the online learner on all steps of running successful library.  
2. Real sources and real-life examples to explain concepts: To facilitate a complete training on ‘why, what and how’ of library establishment we plan to use lot of real-life examples from RTR books, demonstration videos, lots of real library images, real testimonials, etc. 
3. ‘Print and use’ resource material to aid easy application: We plan to develop printable resource materials such as charts, posters, checklists, presentations, formats (e.g., timetable, check-in check-out formats, reading activities schedule, reading activity formats, etc.). We want to ensure that the online learner has all the help ready for them once they decide to build a library.
4. Reflective approach: Each module would be based on ‘see and reflect’, ‘read and reflect’ and ‘do and reflect’ model. There would be reflective questions at the end each component of a module.  
5. Self-assessment at every step: Self-assessment would be built in at the end of each module so the online learner can assess themselves in their understanding of the learning objectives of the course at every step. 
6. Comprehensive approach: We’d be building a comprehensive course that is clear, crisp and action oriented. We’d work towards thorough content edits to ensure we achieve this. 
7. Interactive course content: the digital course content would be designed to ensure active engagement of the online learner. All the course content would adhere to best digital learning practices. The idea is to build a course that is fun, and enjoyable while delivering a meaningful learning experience.  

1.  Scope for Work and Expectations

Room to Read proposes to hire a digital developer who will work closely with the Literacy Program Team and experts to create these online courses on RtR’s library management processes and principles aligned to the principles of self-learning and best practices for building a learner-friendly online course. These courses are meant will be used by teachers and librarians in government schools. 

1.  Developing digital transcripts of course modules and sessions  

• Room to read will provide course content to the digitization partner. The structure, learning objectives map and course content, along with the duration for each module/course shall be shared with the vendor. The digitization partner will be responsible for digitizing the course content and uploading the finalized course on Diksha. 
• Prior to the digitisation of the course content the consultant will be required to share, for feedback and discussion, a detailed scene by scene storyboard depicting course content and flow, how the course will look, what interactivity will be incorporated, and any functionalities that will be part of the learning experience

1.  Requirements for Digitisation 

Requirements can include but are not limited to the following 

1. 2d animations and engaging/animated slides to depict course content 
2. Interactive elements – examples (including but limited to) 

•  Clickable hotspots 
•  Divergent paths 
•  Drag and drops 
• Matching exercises 
• Clickable popups 
• Swipe cards, 

1. Assessments

• Content is envisaged to be highly interactive and engaging through pre, mid, and end of module assessments involving MCQs, fill in the blanks and click, drag/drop, etc. 
• Atleast one engaging game-based assessment/exercise will also need to be developed.

1. Work closely with the Course anchor/writer and support him/her/them to envision digital storyboards for all modules.

1. Compatibility: 

• The designed courses should be compatible with basic LMS features (preferably Diksha Platform) capturing the learning progress of the users and being responsive to assessments and learning analytics module-wise, course-wise, etc. The final courses need to be in HTML 5 format to be a compatible with Diksha. 
• Sharable Content Object Reference Model (SCORM) standards- The content is to be SCORM packaged with the latest/acceptable version to enable integration, hosting, and functioning of courses on the Learning Management System (LMS)
• Multi-device and Platform Compatibility- The e-content should have cross-platform compatibility (i.e. Android, Windows, Blackberry, iOS, etc.) and compatibility with major browsers (i.e. Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome, etc.). It should also be accessible on an open User Interface (UI)

B. Deliverables:

• A high-quality, interactive, self-paced digital course for educators on Library Management for Room to Read’s Literacy Program compatible for the Diksha Platform. 
• Course to be compatible for and uploaded on the Diksha Platform
• Illustrations used should be according to the Indian context. 
• Soft copies of the curriculum flow, process documents created during the development process, and detailed storyboards for online uploading should be submitted. 

C. Timeline: June – September 2022

 (Final Completion by 15th of September).

 

The consultant will need to provide services and complete tasks based on the timelines as outlined in this ToR and as will be mutually agreed to during the contract finalization.  

 

D. Experience and Qualifications 

• The consultant must have demonstrated experience in the area of developing/ delivering online or blended or e-learning content for adolescents, trainers, educators, etc 
• The consultant must have a demonstrated passion and expertise in the area and should be highly adaptable to a dynamic work environment 
• The consultant should have a strong lens of gender equality cemented in his/her/ work. 
• The consultant must have demonstratable experience in developing content teachers, educators, and students. 
• The consultant must be open to critical and constructive feedback.
• The consultant should be proficient in English and Hindi.
• The consultant should have experience with creating interactive content or digital courses for Diksha. 

E. Payment Terms

• No advance payment 
• Payment will be done in a staggered manner. 20 % payment will be done after submission of module 1, 20% payment after delivery of Module 2 and 3, and rest of the payment after submission and upload of the final e-course. 
• Final payment will be done based on the approval of the successful completion of the assignment. 

F. Please Note

• The TDS will apply to the consultancy fee. 

Note: For all the above-mentioned scope of work there will be a minimum of 3 to 4 rounds of feedback and suggestions that will come from Room to Read on each session and the consultant should be open to that.

To apply

• Interested individuals/agencies may apply with their CV/ organization profile 
• Please send in your CV with details experience of working on similar projects
• The vendors are requested to share work samples of interactive eLearning courses that show elements mentioned in the Scope of Work above. Samples of any interactive content uploaded on Diksha, since the course will eventually be uploaded on the Diksha Platform.  
• Please send in the various stages of the assignment that you identify along with the timeframe in the technical proposal.

 How to apply 

• Agencies/ Individuals Need to Submit TECHNICAL & FINANCIAL PROPOSALS IN SEPARATE EMAILS  
• Proposals to be submitted over Procurement.India@roomtoread.org, without copying anyone in RTR 
• Last Date for the submission is 4^th July 2022.
• Subject for submission of Technical Proposal is – TECHNICAL PROPOSAL – Developing digital transcripts of course modules and sessions.
• Subject for submission of Financial Proposal is – FINANCIAL PROPOSAL – Developing digital transcripts of course modules and sessions. 

For Any Clarification / support , please contact Anuj Sharma @Anuj.sharma@roomtoread.org

Tags Education and Education Technology (edtech)