This programme is intended for persons employed as or aspiring for employment as laboratory technicians in school or college laboratories.
At present, no academic programme is available in our country to train such people through the distance mode.
This academic programme has been designed to train laboratory supporting staff in appropriate procedures for organizing and maintaining school/college laboratories.
The curriculum for the programme was developed in an International Workshop organised by the School of Sciences, IGNOU in collaboration with The Commonwealth of Learning, Vancouver, Canada and The Commonwealth Secretariat, London.
Programme Objectives
The broad objectives of this programme are to:
- Familiarise the learners with the basic facilities available in school and college level Biology, Chemistry and Physics laboratories;
- Impart knowledge of the basics of organisation and management of science laboratories;
- Train the learners in the operation and maintenance of simple instruments used in science laboratories;
- Enable them to develop skills in common laboratory techniques;
- Train them in the procedures of procurement and storage of laboratory equipment and materials;
- Enable them to adopt appropriate disposal procedures and safety methods suitable for laboratories.
Please Note: The submission of assignments is not required for any of the four theory courses of this programme. The assessment is through Term End Exam only.
Infrastructural and Human Resource for the Laboratory Work
A. List of laboratory courses, experiments and requirements of apparatus and chemicals for them
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List of experiments
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List* of Apparatus and Chemicals
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* This contains the Apparatus and Chemicals required for smooth conduct of the designed experiments for the listed courses; the study centres are approved accordingly.
B. List of approved Study centres........... Click here
a) List of approved Study Centres under a Regional Centre
b) List of Approved Counsellors for the Study Centres under the Regional Centre
c) Schedule of the conduct of Laboratory Courses at the Study Centres under the Regional Centre
Instructional System
The instruction package consists of:
- Print materials
- Audio/video programmes
- Laboratory work and theory counselling sessions. Depending on enrolment, these will be held at the chosen study centres throughout the country.
Attendance in theory counselling is optional whereas it is compulsory for practicals.
Conduct of Laboratory Courses
Learners working as regular employees in the laboratories of Senior Secondary Schools/ Colleges/ Universities can do total 12 days of practical work for the four lab courses at their work place under the supervision of the local teacher, as described in the Progamme Guide. The remaining 16 days of practical work for the lab courses is required to be done at the identified study centre. These learners are termed Mode 1 learners. All other learners termed Mode 2 learners will do practical work for al 28 days at the study centres. The 16/28 days practical work for Mode1/Mode 2 learners is not conducted at a stretch at the study centre. It is conducted course-wise with 4/7 days of continuous work for each lab course for the Mode 1/Mode 2 learners.
IGNOU will try to make every effort to conduct lab courses at the study centre chosen by the learner. But in case of any difficulty, the learner may be advised to attend the lab courses at some other study centre.
Assessment
The assessment of the theory courses will be through term-end examinations. These will be conducted twice a year in June and December. The submission of assignments is not required for any of the four theory courses of this programme.
The practical courses will have assessment of day-to-day experiments (Guided Component) as well as of the experiments assigned at the end of each practical course (Unguided Component).
Admission cycle: January and July sessions (every year)