METHOD  

DESCRIPTION

APPLICATION/USES

1. Time Line 

Is a chronology or sequence of events that have taken place in a particular village or area. These may pertain to the general history of the village, or to specify subjects or sectors such as health, education, agriculture, animal husbandry, etc.

 The time line exercise can be applied to find out the background of a village or the evolution of specific activities or programmes such as Health, Education, and other Social Amenities (such as-transport, water supplies etc.), Animal Husbandry and Agricultural programmes, and other economic activities. The time line for Agriculture, for example - would indicate the occurrences of droughts, in the adoption of new crops and varieties, HYVs and Hybrids, fertilizer usage, years in which major crop failures took place and so on.

Similarly a time line on Animal Husbandry would indicate the trends in Animal Husbandry practices, shifts in the populations of small and large animals, introduction of cross breeds, installation of vet infrastructure major disease epidemics and so on.  

2. Venn Chapati Diagrams

These show relationships of various institutions, organizations, programmes or individuals with each other and with the village as perceived by the villagers. The exercise is carried out with the use of different sizes of circles or paper contents, which indicate the relative importance or un-importance of a particular institution/ individual to that particular village.

In general terms this method could be used to establish the total picture in terms of the villages' relationships with different institutions (such as banks, Milk Cooperatives, Vet dispensary, Hospitals, Market, DRDA Office etc.) Specifically, the exercise may be done by asking the villagers to indicate, for eg., their positioning and ranking of various constituents of the veterinary infrastructure such as Artificial Insemination, Hospitals, Milk Societies, Cattle markets, Grazing lands, Drugstores. etc.

3. Seasonality Diagramming

An extremely important and useful exercise which is used to determine seasonal patterns in rural areas as related to rainfall, farming practices,employment and so on.

In seasonality an attempt is made to determine the seasonal calendar as understood and practiced by the Villagers. This is either 

The seasonality exercises has a wide range of applications. It can be used to indicate rainfall, agricultural operations, employment, credit and fodder availability, grazing patterns, milk yields, breeding periods, animal and human health disease patterns, etc.  

in terms of festivals such as Ugadi, Deepavali, Shankaranti, etc. This is then adjusted to the English Calendar and thus built upon using different lengths of sticks or numbers of stones or seeds to quantity items such as rainfall, employment etc. 

4. Matrix Ranking

For Eg. in the case of crops, the criteria could be gram yield, straw yield, quality, drought resistance, disease resistance, etc. In the case of animals, the criteria could be milk yield, fat percentage, disease resistance, requirement of green fodder, etc., Once the chart is established, scoring is done i.e. points can be given for each item by placing seeds or stones. For eg. if a variety or breeding is extremely disease resistant, the farmer may give it a score of 4 or 5. If it is less resistant 2 or 3 points. If it is disease susceptible it may be given 1 or 0 points and so on.

Matrix Ranking can be used to study a range of subjects: trees, Fodder, Types of Cattle and Breeds, Crops and Crop varieties, Soil types etc. 

5. Mapping 
a> Social Mapping 

This is the construction of a map of the village living area using rangoli powers or chalk on the ground or a cement floor. Through this exercise an understanding of the village layout, showing the main features such as housing, temples, stones, and other infrastructure.

5. Mapping 
a> Social Mapping (continued..)

Once the base map is established, it is possible to build on to it different types of information such as animal and human status, land holding and economic status and many other such items of interest about which information is required for the purpose of planning. For this purpose different types of seeds can be used to indicate a specific category or item. For example if it is an animal husbandry census then, tamarind seeds to indicate bullocks, custard, apple seeds for buffaloes; castor seeds for cross bred cows, maize seeds for  buffaloes, blackgram seeds for goats, green gram seeds for sheep and so on can be used to indicate the various populations of these animals in each household. Similarly markers of different columns of rangoli can be used - given to indicate irrigated land owners, brown for dryland owners, red for landless and so on.

Social maps can be used to identify different caste groups, cattle owners (particularly) crossbred owners, small animal owners, milch buffalo owners, etc.). The exercise can also be done to find out the house hold wise status of animal or land holding. Animal and human census can also be done by this method using different types of seeds as described. Mapping can also be used to identify past and future IRDP beneficiaries, families which have undergone family planning, household educational status or health status such as identifying those households where chronic ailments or handicaps exist.

5. Mapping
b> Resource Mapping

This method is used to locate the resources of an area such as village, forest, watershed, etc. This helps us to establish the extent and locations of these resources, and analyse and understand them  better.

Items such as dryland, irrigated land, grazing land, forest land, revenue and temple land, tank and nulla's and other water bodies can be indicated through resource mapping.

5. Mapping
b> Resource Mapping cont’d...

Like social mapping, resource mapping can be done using rangoli powders or coloured chalk, or coloured marker pens, either on the floor, on the plain ground or on paper. 

The resource mapping method can also be used to prepare treatment plans for soil & water conservation, forestry and other treatments. 

6. Transects 

Are observatory walks through the village living area or the area surrounding the village such as fields, hillocks, forests, grazing lands etc. This exercise is done with farmers as guides. It helps not only to locate and pin-point various physical aspects of the village/watershed, but also to understand and discuss with the people the backgrounds of these items. For eg. the cause of deforestation, the use of common lands, soil and water managements and other indigenous practices. 

Transects are used as pre requisites for mapping, Zoning of different areas into ecological zones, land use mapping, productivity zoning, locating indigenous technologies etc. can also be done transacts are also used to locate areas in the village which need to be treated/developed.

7. Historical Transects

Indicate the trends that have taken place over a period of time. These show the changes that have taken place in terms of resource use, cropping patterns, livestock, population etc. Discussions (with farmers and  internal) as basis for evaluation document. Charts as record.

Historical Transects are useful to understand the changes that have taken place in livestock practices, nutrition, health care and  education, customs and social practices, forests, land use and agricultural practices, productivity, populations and demography etc.