increasing literacy in rural areas through mobile phones

The percentage of illiterate rural is close to 40% and urban being about 20%. While more people each year in both rural and urban areas are getting literate, this is one of key concerns. However, this the rural india, for one has taken a great leap and jumped with full force into mobile phone usage with absolute ease. India has a total of 846.32 Million Telecom subscribers. The link - http://trak.in/tags/business/2011/04/30/mobile-telecom-subscriber-addition-march-2011/ states that in urban areas there are 3 mobile phones for every 2, while there is 1 phone for every 3 individuals in rural areas. This ratio for the rural areas is very promising nevertheless because of the amazing reach that mobile phones have achieved even to the most isolated areas.

The question that comes to me right now is whether we can use mobile phones as a means to increase literacy. I had seen this toy in the market while trying to buy something for a friend’s 6 month child. It was shaped like a giant phone, with all the works, big keys, an led display and speaker. So, the kid is meant to press a key, which shows the display of it on the led screen and croaks the sound of the alphabet. Its meant to make the child connect sound of the alphabet to the visual display.

Now if we connect this thought to the real mobile phone now. Most people in rural areas stop at using the green and the red button, that’s the ‘call’ and ‘cut call’ buttons. I understand that people have been successfully using the VAC (value added services) to get all sorts of information about prices of commodities to the weather etc. but most as I read get limited to fwding msgs. Creation of msgs or even adding numbers to the address book (input in general) lags behind possibly they are not literate.

What if we create software based on the existing voice recognition system, sensitive to each dialect which recognizes what the person is saying, then highlights for each word, every single letter in order one after the other, reproducing the sound of the alphabet being used. This can be particularly accurate for Hindi since it’s a phonetic language. So then the phone repeats the sound and completes the word then follows it for the sentence. Through repetitive action, the person using the phone will be able to identify the words visually as a collection of sounds, which are represented on the keypad.

Slowly, in time, the user will quickly learn at least the most basic words as written text as well.

As a next step, it can be taken on as a game. That the user will be given certain amount of chances to guess how to spell the word, each time the users gets it wrong, like in a game, it will buzz, and blink red. Like that, there may be levels with increasing difficulty as well. Further on a point system can be attached etc for further encouragement.