Amid Covid-19 School Education Deptt adopts online, offline mode to educate students

Jammu : Covid-19 pandemic has brought with it strict lockdowns closing schools and affecting the education system in the whole world. In India also schools have been closed and examinations have been postponed leading to uncertainty and disruption in the lives of many students.
These special circumstances posed a great challenge before the educational authorities. To overcome this challenge, the J&K School Education Department has adopted both online and offline measures to cater to the learning needs of children studying in Government schools who mostly belong to the deprived and marginalized sections of the society.
Initially, the biggest difficulty before the Department was how to reach out to the children at their homes given the fact that they had limited access to technology. Neither the teachers nor the students were trained to use online method of teaching-learning, so to start online classes in itself became an arduous task. Finally the department took initiative with announcement of *Project Home Classes*: A window was created on the directorate official website www.schedujammu.nic.in for connecting all stakeholders at one platform. Interactive e-content: SEQM cell laid the procedure for providing high quality; curriculum based interactive e-content in all subjects covering classes from 6th to 12th as per academic calendar of DSEJ through volunteer services of expert educators on the website with the link www.jammueducators.com and started online classes successfully. SEQM Cell has collaborated with Bodha Guru Learning Private Limited to get their links of animated video channel embedded to this webpage which are specifically meant for the purpose of viewing only. The webpage has been viewed by more than 3819 users, and a list of key Digital / e-Learning resources provided by MHRD for online education on subjective topics of Classes 8th, 9th and 10th. Feedback form is also generated on the Official Website to have feedback from students wherein the students can put forth their suggestions and queries, if any, regarding videos or topics which are further redressed by the concerned Subject Experts.
Director School Education Jammu Anuradha Gupta has informed that around 2.5 lakh students have been covered under online education programme, who have internet connectivity. She said Department faced difficulty in starting online classes as most of the students did not have smart phones or internet. For such students, she said Doordarshan, cable operators and radio channels were engaged to educate students. Take 1 media Network is telecasting daily one hour live class from 11am to 12 pm for class 12th on subjects like English, Physics, Chemistry, Biology, Computer Science, Political Science etc. So far 34 classes have been conducted beginning from April 16, 2020. Under radio tele classes, Radio Mirchi is collaborating for daily audio classes from 2pm to 4 pm for class 10th. So far 30 classes have been conducted beginning from March 24, 2020.
The initiative has helped department to educate students who have televisions or access to Radio Fm in their home. However some students who had no such access to smart phone or television or radio is being provided textbooks at their homes through door to door delivery by the department. The department has received around 8.5 lakh textbooks from Jammu and Kashmir Board of School Education. These books have been distributed to 66 educational zones of Jammu division. To ensure that these children receive study material, instructions have been issued to the teachers and masters to prepare study material for the students. District Institute of Education and Trainings (DIET) have been assigned the task of preparation of class wise study material.
Director School Education Jammu informed that various helplines have been launched to clear the doubts and queries of the students. “We are continuing the educational activities smoothly and we are ready to face any challenge to educate our students in a better way” she added.