Marking a Garhwali-Speaking Child's Hindi Paragraph
You teach Hindi in a composite government school in Chamoli district. Your Class 7 has 35 students, almost all Garhwali speakers. This week's 10-mark writing task is an anuched (paragraph) on 'Mera Gaon'. One script reads: 'hamare gaon mein pahad ki choti par ek chhota mandir hai. log dyar mein pani late hain aur kur mein anaj rakhte hain. main ne kitab padha aur school gaya.' The student uses the local words dyar and kur, writes 'main ne kitab padha' in a context where the intended object is a book (kitab, feminine), and makes eight spelling errors. The head teacher wants all marks entered in the register tomorrow, and a parent has complained that local words are 'wrong Hindi'. You have the script, a red pen and one Hindi textbook.
1. How will you mark this script - what will you penalise, what will you leave alone, and why? Give a mark breakdown for a 10-mark task.
Read the worked answer
Mark against the purpose of the task, not against a single imagined 'pure' Hindi. A workable split is content and organisation 4, language accuracy 4, and expression or voice 2. Under content, the child has a clear place, a temple, water storage and grain storage, so award 3–4. Under accuracy, count only standard-Hindi errors that interfere with meaning or are taught at this level: the eight spelling errors, and the agreement error in 'main ne kitab padha'. Under expression, reward the concrete local detail; do not deduct for dyar and kur as if they were spelling mistakes. Instead, write a margin note asking for a standard Hindi word or a short gloss in brackets, and count that as a vocabulary-learning point, not a penalty. This keeps the mark scheme transparent: the child loses marks for correctable standard-Hindi errors, not for knowing Garhwali.
2. Explain the grammatical issue in 'main ne kitab padha' and design a 15-minute oral remediation for the whole class.
Read the worked answer
With a transitive verb in the perfective, Hindi marks the subject with ne and the verb agrees with the object, not the subject: kitab is feminine, so the form is 'main ne kitab padhi'. The child has used the masculine default padha. This is a common overgeneralisation, not carelessness. A 15-minute oral cycle: first, put three familiar feminine objects on the desk (kitab, kopi, gadi) and three masculine ones (kalam, kamra, pustak is masculine in many usages, so choose unambiguous examples such as kela, ped), and have students say 'main ne kitab padhi', 'main ne kela khaya'. Second, do a quick substitution drill where you change only the object and students change the verb ending. Third, move to the child's own sentence and ask the class to repair it aloud. Fourth, set five written sentences for homework. The point is to make object gender salient through speech before correcting the script in red.
3. A parent says local words are 'wrong Hindi'. How do you respond, and what does this mean for the 10-mark rubric?
Read the worked answer
Respond without dismissing the parent's concern. Explain that Garhwali is a language with its own vocabulary, not broken Hindi, and that the school teaches standard Hindi for formal writing while respecting the home language. Say what the rubric actually rewards: clear content, organised paragraphs, standard spelling and grammar in the formal register, and the ability to choose words for the reader. A local word used once with a gloss can be accepted; a paragraph written entirely in a dialect that the intended reader cannot follow would need revision, and that is a register issue, not a moral one. For this script, the rubric should not list 'use of local words' as an error category. Instead, add a small vocabulary row: 'uses standard Hindi equivalents or explains local terms'. This protects the child's confidence, gives the parent a clear standard, and keeps assessment defensible.