Blackboard Warriors Of India
Kamlesh Zapadiya
There are passionate teachers with the zeal of making learning, a fun activity for children than turning them into bookworms. Despite the obstacles faced in their personal life, they strive towards making other lives brighter and worth it. One such special teacher is Kamlesh Zapadiya.
“A good teacher is a doctor who heals ignorance and an artist who inspires creativity”. Good teachers are doctors and artists are those who inspire creativity out-running the boredom of learning from books”.
Kamlesh Zapadiya hails from a remote village in Rajkot. He lives in a little hut amidst a farm and electricity is the biggest challenge faced throughout the day. Being a primary school teacher, his passion for teaching took him to a great level altogether.
Kamlesh, a 35 years old teacher wanted to make learning a fun-filled activity by inducing enthusiasm in children that over-powered the boredom of studying from books word to word. Kamlesh along with 5 other fellow teachers decided to work towards a revolution that could make learning fun for children.
Travelling 20 kilometers daily to Jasdan was no trouble for Kamlesh as it was the closest accessible cyber café. His determination and passion kept him fueled throughout the journey. The idea of making study materials in the form of a quiz was his goal. After endless study and research on educational aids, tools, and tutorials, Edusafar.com was born.
Edusafar.com is the website created in the very same Cyber Café as Kamlesh wanted to share all the outcomes of research and studies to make it available to the public. Their achievement was converting the entire syllabus of 1st grade to 10th grade into a Quiz format.
The best part of this website is that the quizzes can be downloaded free of cost. “Most of the schools have computers and this quiz can be reachable at ease to every student” he says. He is working towards creating an app that supports students who do not understand English, but Gujarati.
The app contains questions related general knowledge and current affairs, thus making the students socially aware. Kamlesh’s focus is to make subjects interesting and enjoyable than forcing students into mugging words from the textbooks.
The quiz format on Edusafar.com has been recognized by the Indian Institute of Management-Ahmedabad. Zapadiya is recognized among the hundred teachers who have been felicitated by Gujarat Innovative Education Council and Gujarat Council of Educational Research and Training in Gandhinagar.
The District Institute of Education and Training have conducted a special workshop on this project. They have taken Kamlesh’s idea forward by implementing the same in 1,020 schools across the district.
Kamlesh Zapadiya is definitely one among those few passionate teachers who wants to make lives of students memorable and productive to the extent of keeping aside personal obstacles! Every nation needs such special teachers who devote their hearts and minds to the welfare of the younger generation who are built to sustain future of our nation.
