UPHESC Assistant Professor Education 2025 PYQs

Concept: NEP 2020 (para 4.2): the foundational stage (ages 3–8) will consist of flexible, multilevel, play-based, activity-based and inquiry/discovery-based (interactive) learning.

1. Lecture method is teacher-centred and unsuitable for 3–8 year-olds.
2. So play, activity and interactive methods – i, iii, iv.

Short trick: Foundational stage = Play + Activity + Inquiry; no lectures.

Concept: The Acharya Ramamurti Committee (1990) reviewed NPE 1986; its report (Dec 1990) was titled ‘Towards an Enlightened and Humane Society’.

1. Janardhana Reddy Committee (CABE, 1992) reviewed NPE again → Programme of Action 1992.
2. Hartog Committee (1929) – wastage and stagnation; B. G. Kher Committee (1948) – financing of primary education.

Short trick: Ramamurti 1990 = ‘Enlightened and Humane Society’.

Concept: NEP 2020 (para 23.3) proposes an autonomous National Educational Technology Forum (NETF) to provide a platform for free exchange of ideas on using technology for learning, assessment, planning and administration.

1. NPE 1986 gave Operation Blackboard and Navodaya; Sachar Committee (2006) – socio-economic status of Muslims.

Short trick: NETF – new body of NEP 2020 (like PARAKH, NRF, HECI).

Concept: Operation Blackboard (launched 1987–88) was recommended by NPE 1986 to provide minimum essential facilities in every primary school – two all-weather rooms, two teachers (one woman) and essential teaching-learning material.

1. Sargent Plan (1944) – post-war educational development.
2. Yashpal Committee (1993) – ‘Learning without Burden’.

Short trick: NPE 1986 → Operation Blackboard + Navodaya + DIET.

Concept: NEP 2020’s 5+3+3+4 structure: Foundational (5 yrs: 3 yrs pre-school/Anganwadi + Classes 1–2, ages 3–8), Preparatory (Classes 3–5), Middle (6–8), Secondary (9–12).

1. Pre-primary is only the first 3 years of the foundational stage.
2. Basic Education was Gandhi’s Wardha scheme (1937).

Short trick: 5-3-3-4 = Foundational–Preparatory–Middle–Secondary.

Concept: The Secondary Education Commission (Mudaliar, 1952–53) laid down aims of secondary education: development of democratic citizenship, improvement of vocational efficiency, development of personality, and education for leadership.

1. Hunter (1882) – primary education; Sadler (1917–19) – Calcutta University; Radhakrishnan (1948–49) – university education.

Short trick: Mudaliar’s 4 aims: Democratic citizenship, Vocational efficiency, Personality, Leadership.

Concept: In the standard textbook view this description of the inclusive school is attributed to Judy Lupart (Canada), who argued that inclusion needs a fundamental restructuring of regular schools – reconstructed educational thinking and practice – for the benefit of all students.

1. Roger Slee writes mainly on the politics of inclusion and 'the irregular school'.
2. Specht and the other names are not the usual attribution for this line, so the textbook answer is Lupart.

Short trick: Lupart → 'Reconstruct the regular school'.

Concept: RCI was set up in 1986 as a registered society; it became a statutory body under the Rehabilitation Council of India Act, 1992 (amended 2000).

1. PWD Act – 1995; RTE Act – 2009; RPWD Act – 2016; National Trust Act – 1999.
2. RCI regulates training of special educators and rehabilitation professionals.

Short trick: RCI: society 1986 → Act 1992 → PWD 1995 → RPWD 2016.

Concept: Jean-Marc Gaspard Itard (French physician) is regarded as the father of special and inclusive education for his systematic individualised training of Victor, ‘the wild boy of Aveyron’ (1800s).

1. Louis Braille – Braille script for the blind.
2. Samuel Gridley Howe – Perkins School for the Blind.
3. Anne Sullivan – teacher of Helen Keller.

Short trick: Itard → Victor of Aveyron → father of special/inclusive education.

Concept: RPWD Act 2016 Schedule: blindness = (i) total absence of sight; or (ii) visual acuity less than 3/60 or less than 10/200 (Snellen) in the better eye with best correction; or (iii) field of vision subtending an angle of less than 10 degrees.

1. Partial absence of vision – low vision, not blindness.
2. 30° field limit – not the criterion (it is < 10°).
3. Option D reproduces the Act’s criterion (10/200 Snellen in the better eye).

Short trick: Blindness: 3/60 or 10/200, field < 10°; Low vision: 6/18–3/60, field < 40°.

Concept: National Institute for the Visually Handicapped (now NIEPVD – National Institute for Empowerment of Persons with Visual Disabilities) is at Dehradun, Uttarakhand.

1. Hearing – Ali Yavar Jung NI, Mumbai.
2. Intellectual disabilities – NIEPID, Secunderabad.
3. Locomotor – Kolkata; Multiple disabilities – Chennai.

Short trick: Eyes → Dehradun; Ears → Mumbai; Mind → Secunderabad.

Concept: Daniel L. Stufflebeam (1971) developed the CIPP model – Context, Input, Process, Product evaluation – for decision-oriented programme/curriculum evaluation.

1. Context → planning decisions; Input → structuring; Process → implementing; Product → recycling decisions.
2. Bloom – taxonomy of objectives, mastery learning.

Short trick: CIPP = Context–Input–Process–Product = Stufflebeam.

Concept: In the standard textbook view this line is attributed to K. G. Saiyidain, who saw the curriculum sociologically: the school curriculum reflects the traditions, environment and ideals of the society it serves.

1. Kerr: curriculum is ‘all the learning which is planned and guided by the school’.
2. Dewey: curriculum as the child’s experiences/activities linked to social life.

Short trick: Society’s mirror (traditions, ideals) → Saiyidain; ‘planned and guided learning’ → Kerr.

Concept: The National Curriculum Framework for Teacher Education (NCFTE) 2009 – ‘Towards Preparing Professional and Humane Teacher’ – was brought out by NCTE.

1. NCERT published NCF 2005 (school curriculum).
2. NIRF – ranking framework (2015); NAAC – accreditation (1994).

Short trick: Teacher-education framework → Teacher-education council (NCTE).

Concept: Criteria such as comprehensiveness, variety, suitability (to learners’ maturity), validity and continuity are applied while selecting and organising learning experiences (Tyler/Taba).

1. Taba’s steps: diagnosis of needs → objectives → selection of content → organisation of content → selection of learning experiences → organisation of learning experiences → evaluation.
2. The criteria named all concern ‘experiences’.

Short trick: Keyword ‘experiences’ → selection and organisation of learning experiences.

Concept: Curriculum designs can be craft-centred (Gandhi’s Basic Education), learning-outcome based (OBE) or competency based.

1. NAAC guidelines are criteria for assessing and accrediting institutions’ quality – not a basis for designing a curriculum.
2. Hence curriculum cannot be designed on NAAC guidelines.

Short trick: NAAC = accreditation, not curriculum design.

Concept: Hilda Taba (1962) gave the grassroots (inductive, bottom-up) model – teachers who teach the curriculum should design it, starting from teaching-learning units.

1. Tyler (1949) – rational/objectives model (top-down).
2. Oliver – curriculum improvement model; Saylor, Alexander & Lewis – administrative/system model.

Short trick: Taba = Teachers at the grass roots (bottom-up).

Concept: NCF 2005’s five guiding principles: connecting knowledge to life outside school; shifting learning away from rote methods; enriching the curriculum beyond textbooks; making examinations flexible and integrated with classroom life; nurturing an identity informed by national concerns.

1. Learning ‘totally based on content knowledge’ (rote) is exactly what NCF 2005 wants to move away from.

Short trick: NCF 2005: Life-link, No rote, Beyond textbook, Exam reform, National identity.

Concept: Robert Stake’s Countenance Model (1967) collects data on antecedents (pre-requisites), transactions (the operational curriculum) and outcomes, each as intended (potential) vs observed (actual), judged for congruence and contingency.

1. Pre-requisites = antecedents → related.
2. Potential (intended) and operational (actual) curriculum = intents vs observed transactions → related.
3. Potential vs actual results = intended vs observed outcomes → related.
4. ‘Identifying educational experiences’ is a step of Tyler’s objectives model, not Stake’s.

Short trick: Stake = Antecedents–Transactions–Outcomes × Intended vs Observed.

Concept: The discipline-based design rests on Jerome Bruner’s ‘The Process of Education’ (1960): each discipline has a structure (key concepts and methods of inquiry) that can be taught in an intellectually honest form at any stage (spiral curriculum).

1. Spencer’s essay ‘What knowledge is of most worth?’ underlies the subject/utility (activities of life) design.
2. Dewey – experience/activity-centred design; Froebel – play-way, kindergarten.

Short trick: Structure of the discipline + spiral curriculum = Bruner.