DIMAPUR:
Twelve Nagaland heritage-based short films were released at the Capital Convention Centre in Kohima on September 21. These short films are based on the customs, practices, values and different aspects of Naga culture, which are drawn from the school subject Nagaland Heritage Studies.
KT Sukhalu, Nagaland’s adviser to school education and State Council of Educational Research and Training (SCERT), released the films.
“Many aspects of our heritage, culture, and traditions are not being fully documented,” Sukhalu noted while releasing the films. He asked the SCERT department to document those for the students.
He said the students are often not fully aware of their culture and tradition. “Therefore, screening of these short films to the students should be done to infuse the feeling of pride in one’s identity,” he stated.
Sukhalu also stressed the need for counselors to mainstream the students into the right line of thinking and overall development.
Commissioner and secretary, school education and SCERT, Kevileno Angami, said culture is our identity and a person who does not know one’s culture is ignorant.
“It is important that we teach our children the knowledge of our state, cultural practices and history,” Angami said.
She said the SCERT has come up with the Nagaland Heritage textbook which helps children learn the dialect and language, cultural practices and poems of different tribes. With the release of the Nagaland heritage-based films, it would supplement what is in the textbook, she added.
SCERT director, N Chumchanbeni Kikon, said the Nagas’ rich cultural heritage can be successfully preserved if only they value, document and transmit it to the next generation. She added that the SCERT Nagaland has documented a total of 15 Naga heritage-based short films, out of which three were released in 2020. She also said the SCERT Nagaland is the first SCERT in the country to introduce the course for Diploma in School Counselling on April 2, 2018.
Altogether 38 trainees from the 3rd batch of Diploma in School Counselling were conferred diploma on the occasion.
Meanwhile, 31 new candidates were inducted into the course as the 4th batch during the programme.