the national education policy nep 2020 has been pushing for those involved in early childhood education to reexamine the way the minds of children are moulded while reiterating the need for early childhood care and education ecce the policy has attempted to shift gears towards a more experiential learning model stressing that the entire ecosystem should move away from the typical rote learning practice while cambridge international took the cue to introduce early childhood curriculum in the schools in india in line with nep 2020 its implementation in schools under national and state boards needs a rethink since numeracy and literacy skills of indian children are much lower than world standards nep 2020 has recommended early childhood learning interventions to make learning more holistic however there is a structural problem in the indian education system the anganwadis for children up to 5 years are handled mostly by the woman and child development wcd department and partly by the health departments of the state governments class ixii on the other hand is handled by the state education departments for learning to be seamless all these three departments have to work in tandem for the successful implementation of nep 2020 says bijaya kumar sahoo advisor to the odisha adarsha vidyalaya sangathan government of odisha and founder mentor at sai international education group implementation strategiesaccording to him the state council of educational research and training scert must develop qualitative curriculum pedagogy and train teachers for capacity building within states in line with nep 2020 the states should also create the state school standards authority sssa as an independent entity to improve overall quality of k12 education and ensure accountability says sahoo citing odisha as a front runner in early childhood learning sahoo adds that it has set up a task force to develop implementation strategies post consultation with all stakeholders to recommend policies talking about the need for adequate infrastructural resources sahoo stresses that state governments are already working to integrate it as a key facilitator for imparting quality education but digital resources cannot replace books and teachers though it can be an enabler to upgrade the quality of school education he adds as for language of instruction as per nep 2020 guidelines sahoo explains that childrens learning is best conducted in the mother tongue but english must be introduced as a subject to ensure their smooth transition to formal schooling way forwardemphasising on nep 2020 highlighting the need for ecce to be multifaceted and flexible radhika bhushan founder director skb little folks preschool says a threeyearolds overall physical cognitive language socialemotional development can be handled very well if done right this is an ongoing process with ageappropriate activities planned as per their developmental levels it is currently not even on the agenda of the boards and there is still a long way to go highlighting the need for a separate space for preschoolers as their requirements are very different to k12 methods of teaching she adds that early childhood learning requires oneonone