DIKSHA Portal - National Teachers Platform for India

DIKSHA (Digital Infrastructure for Knowledge Sharing) is a national portal for school education. DIKSHA portal – National Teachers Platform (NTP) was developed on the basis of the core principles of open access, open architecture, open licensing diversity and autonomy outlined in the ‘National Teacher Platform (Strategy and Approach)’ paper released by the Ministry of Human Resources Development in May 2017.

DIKSHA portal – NTP was launched by the Hon’ble Vice President of India on 5 September 2017, and it has been adopted by 35 states/UT’s across CBSE (Central Board of Secondary Education) and NCERT (National Council of Educational Research and Training) by crores of learners and teachers.

DIKSHA Portal – NTP is an initiative of the NCERT, Ministry of Education. It is a state-of-the-art platform built using Application Program Interfaces (APIs) and Open Standards to host Open Educational Resources (OER). It provides tools for Teachers in Schools, Student Teachers in Teacher Education Institutes (TEIs) and Teacher Educators in TEIs.

It is a unique initiative that leverages the existing flexible and highly scalable digital infrastructures while keeping the teachers at the centre. It is built keeping in mind the whole teacher’s life cycle, i.e. from the time student teachers enrol in TEIs till after they retire as teachers.

It aims to equip all the teachers across the nation with advanced digital technology. It will accelerate, enable and amplify solutions in the field of teacher education. It will aid teachers to train and learn through the assessment and learning resources available on the portal. It will also help teachers create in-class resources, profile, training content, news and announcement, assessment aids, and connect with the teacher community.

Features of DIKSHA Portal – NTP

DIKSHA – National Teacher Platform (NTP) contains the following features:

• Courses for teachers to facilitate continuous learning
• Resources for using it in the classrooms
• Dashboards for assessment and progress
• Communities for discussions and collaboration
• Announcements, circulars and notifications

Scope of the DIKSHA Portal – NTP

DIKSHA – NTP caters to teachers of all stages of school education, i.e. pre-primary, primary, upper primary, secondary and senior secondary. All institutions, individuals and groups catering to the above can enrol as members on the DIKSHA – NTP portal and contribute to the creation and use of resources on the platform. The DIKSHA App is also available on the Google Play Store for downloading it and using it on the cell phone.

One of the main goals of the DIKSHA – NTP is creating a shared repository of OER for easy access by all the teachers across the country. It leverages open and free repositories such as the National Repository of Open Educational Resources (NROER) and other sources to host openly licensed content and resources. 

It also hosts content that focuses on developing skill, knowledge and attitude for teachers. It holds a bank of openly licensed teaching content that teachers can use as practice and reference materials in class or for preparation before their classes or student assessment. The content types on the portal include activities, videos, animations, interactives, lesson plans, charts, textbooks, exercises and several other materials. 

Benefits of DIKSHA Portal – NTP

The DIKSHA – NTP has the following benefits for teachers:

• Teachers can get access to relevant, personalised professional development training anywhere and anytime.
• Teachers in the schools can use the curriculum-linked resources to prepare their class or teach in the class, while the Teacher Educators in TEIs can use it to provide blended training.
• Student Teachers in TEIs and contractual teachers can take courses on the portal for preparing for Teacher Eligibility Test (TET) or/and get certified.
• Cluster and Block Resource Personnel can use the standardised observation tools on the portal to arrange need-based coaching support for teachers and conduct a continuous training needs analysis.
• Teachers can have access to a personalised workspace to track and plan their progress, including performance in tests, courses completed, etc.