Digital education is better to do until the right time comes

(Education should not come under pressure from mafias)

----------------------Dr. Satyawan Saurabh,

According to media reports, the Ministry of Human Resource Development is currently in no hurry to open schools. The Union Human Resources Minister has removed the uncertainty by stating the date after August 15, but some states in India are still involved in the exercise of opening schools despite all these. Don't know what their compulsion is? I think the school is under pressure from mafias. Today we have thousands of ways to educate children in this technological age of emergency. Children can be taught at home by online or digital study, so why so early in opening schools? Why so quick to open schools during the global epidemic in which social distancing is the only remedy? Governments should not open schools until the corona vaccine is introduced. Education should not come under pressure from mafias. Such people are neither worried about life nor the future of children. If they are worried, just to collect the fees.

All schools have been closed for the last five months due to the Covid-19 epidemic and today more than 240 million children in schools across the country are sitting in their homes. It is very difficult to tell when that pleasing bell will ring when the school will open. Keeping this in mind, the Union Ministry of Human Resource Development has released a new guideline for digital education through online, under which schools are now being taught not only to reduce the impact of epidemics on education but also how to teach New models of re-education are to be changed, but also a new way of providing quality education to children through a balanced mix of schooling at home and schooling.

Recently issued new guidelines have been developed from the current perspective of the students, who have been studying through online/mixed/digital education in their homes for the last several months due to the lockdown. The time limit has been fixed for pre-primary children to interact with and guide their parents. So that the guardian can give them a fixed time. It is recommended to adopt the alternative academic calendar of NCERT from classes 1 to 12. In the States / Union Territories from classes 1 to 8, online synchronous studies cannot be conducted for more than 2 sessions of 30-45 minutes on the scheduled day of taking online classes for primary classes. No more than 4 synchronous sessions of 30-45 minutes each day can be conducted online simultaneously in classes 9 to 12.

Guidelines for progress on digital education have been issued by the Ministry of Human Resource Development. These guidelines include eight stages of digital learning, which is - Plan - Review - Guide -  Talk - Assign - Track - All these steps guide the planning and implementation of digital education by step by step with examples. But these are advice for states and state governments can make their own rules based on local requirements. Today there is a need to outline and evaluate guidelines for school administrators, school heads, teachers, parents, and students. Care needs to be taken when planning online and digital learning period, screen time, inclusion, balanced online and off-line activities, including resource duration, level-wise distribution, etc.

Physical, mental health and well-being matters have an important role during digital education. Guidelines are needed on precautions and measures that maintain cybersecurity, including cybersecurity and ethical practices. To reduce the impact of the epidemic, schools not only have to remodel and re-teach the way they teach and learn so far Imagination has to be introduced, but also an appropriate method of providing quality education through a healthy mix of homeschooling.

Some state governments have also issued orders to open schools. But the question and concern are whether the school management is ready to open schools, meeting the health standards and whether the parents are ready to send their children to schools across the country today, or are they ready for the future of their children? And is in a state of confusion about life. Coronavirus infection will be difficult to control if schools open, as Corona positive cases are increasing now. In such a situation, if the schools are opened and children are sent to school, then it will become more difficult to control the spread of infection. It is difficult to manage toilets separately for every child within most government and private schools and compliance with community distance rules is not possible.

Now the methods of education have to be changed, for which teachers and students are in dire need of being prepared and working in a new way. Alternative plans are not able to prove viable, yet we have to find alternatives. Special care needs to be taken in the future regarding the health and safety of students, cleanliness in schools. Because no matter how many rules should be made, it will be difficult to get children to follow social distancing after school opens. The government should take such a decision away from the pressure of private school operators and education mafias, who are worried more about the fees charged from the health of their children. In this affair, he is trying to play with the lives of children. The government will have to think a million times. Somewhere this school should not become a laboratory. The example of Israel is before us where thousands of children and school staff got infected with the Coronavirus as soon as the school opened. One view has concluded that schools should not be opened at this time, as corona infection is increasing, which will also put a huge risk on the lives of children. Until the treatment of prevention of corona is not detected, the government and departments should not force schools to open.

-- Dr. Satyawan Saurabh,
Research Scholar in Political Science,
Delhi University, poet, independent journalist, and columnist,
Radio and TV panelists,