Efforts on to make online classes a parallel alternative for students: Dr Samoon
Srinagar, April 13: With the start of tele classes and e-learning initiatives, the students of government schools in Jammu and Kashmir will be able to study at home during the lockdown announced to contain the spread of coronavirus (COVID-19).
To ensure that students continue their education, the School Education Department had already distributed assignments of Unit I and Unit II to students during the early phase of lockdown through DIETs.
This information was revealed in a meeting chaired by Principal Secretary School Education, Dr Asgar Hassan Samoon here to review the progress of e-learning initiative of the Department.
The meeting was informed that the Education Department has started tele classes on Doordarshan on a daily basis from 4 pm to 5:30 pm by resource persons of the Department.
Notably, Directorate of School Education Kashmir has a repository of tele classes which are also being aired on DD Kashir separately.
Regarding roping in of local cable networks for the initiative, Dr Samoon was informed that the tele classes have also been started on local cable networks.
“Tele-classes are being aired on local cable networks by lecturers, District Resource Persons, ZRPs and teachers. Also the recorded videos of these classes with Directorate have been provided to the Districts for airing them on local cable networks in their area,” Director School Education Kashmir informed the meeting.
Dr Samoon also directed starting the online virtual classes through different platform like WhatsApp, Zoom Cloud, Skype, Google Classroom to reach out to the Children.
“The schools have to form different groups of their students and teachers and accordingly form a timetable for virtual classes. They should also engage them in a play way activity, quizzes, assignments, small projects in a two-way process,” he said.
Meanwhile, the meeting also decided to provide 2500 low-budget educational tablets to the students of 10th to 12th standards for enhancing their virtual learning experience. The tablets would be loaded with textbooks, problem-solving techniques and other related material.
Dr Samoon reiterated that the School Education Department through its online education initiatives is trying to ensure that students can continue their learning during the lockdown period.
The meeting was also informed that the Department has taken an initiative titled Aawo Padhein- a centralized repository of voice PPTs and videos for Unit I and Unit II with proper indexing and sequence which is available on http://www.dsek.nic.in website.
Teachers and students have been guided for accessing DIKSHA portal e-content and content on NCERT’s e-Patshala, officials said.
Dr Samoon directed expediting the process of collecting phone numbers for forming a database of their contacts.
“We are trying to make online classes a parallel alternative where students on the click of a button attend classes virtually like a normal day.”
He also asked for the status of distribution of dry ration and collection of account details of students for transferring the Mid-day meal scheme benefits to them.
Earlier Principal Secretary issued orders for placement of four hundred fifty 10 +2 lecturers in Kashmir Division in various disciplines.
He also approved the conversion of leftover 130 RETs to Grade II teachers and Rs 150 Crore was also sanctioned on the occasion to clear the pending salary of these teachers.
