Mohammad Asif Jan
Due to COVID-19 outbreak, educational atmosphere whether a school, college or university was more badly influenced than other sectors. Nelson Mandela once said “Education is the most powerful weapon you can use to change the world”. The famous quote sums up the cardinal importance of education and it is all the more true as far as our country is concerned. Different initiatives were taken by central government as well as Jammu & Kashmir government to provide a substitute for regular learning methods but there is a big question mark on the success of these methods. In today’s information technology age, everything is on your finger tips or in other words what you want is just a click away then what is the role of a teacher in this current scenario. The phone you are having in your pocket is no more a phone; it is everything that you want it to be. These days colleges, universities offer students a CBCS(Choice Based Credit System) which provides a cafeteria approach where student can learn as per their taste and pace. This Phenomenon depicts an inter-disciplinary approach where a student can choose subjects besides from their own domain.If we go through, the book namely “Why do I need a Teacher if I have got Google” written by Ian Gilbert .He says, If the material you want is available on the internet then why you need a teacher. At the end of the book the author writes that it is a fact of life that everyone remembers their best teacher that means no one can replace a teacher. Dr. Sir Muhammad Iqbal says about a teacher:Sheikh-e-maktabhainekemaratghar Jiskisana’thainruh-e-insani (A teacher is like a builder whose industry is to build and develop the soul of a human). In J&K various initiatives were taken by Educational Institutionsto provide a virtual platform for teaching learning process. On fast track basis whatsAppno.’s of students were collected and whatApp groups were made by school authorities. Social media was used as a tool for such campaigning. There are many platforms including WhatApp, Zoom, Google Classroom and Youtube by using these platforms teachers provide audio lectures, videos lectures, ppts and study material to students.Directorate of school education invites various resource persons on different topics to deliver live classes on DD Kashmir and Radio Mirchi. If we notice the intensity of growth graph posted on the statistical board by the higher authorities seems to be in vain and unproductive .There are many reasons for non-involvement of students but the main reasons are whether the teachers are not playing their role what they are supposed to door in other words, students don’t get benefitted by these online lectures or students are not having smart phones. Due to uneven internet services, students are not getting connected, digital divide, first generation learners, security and privacy concerns and non-availability of power supply. These are the root causes that the students are not showing their keen interest in their online studies.
A classroom without walls means a classroom without a teacher and curriculum because any student can enter in the class anytime, can leave anytime, can chit-chat with classmates during the class, can do anything what he/she wants to do and a teacher can teach topics as per his/her choice. The only advantage that students and their parents are getting by these initiatives is they become tech-savvy.
There are certain concerns that are to be addressed. The first and the foremost is the non- availability of smart phone because maximal count of students pertains to down trodden and under privileged classes .Parents are not in a position to purchase smart phones for their wards and do recharge on monthly basis , they hardly manages bread and butter. There is another question, if a parent is having more than one child, somehow they manage one phone what about the others. In villages due to poornetwork, students are unable to make a call then how online teaching is possible. Many teachers teach students of their private coaching centres and circulating those snapshots and details to their concerned higher ups, who is monitoring those so-called online classes, who knows whom the teachers teach. How come it is possible that a teacher posted at boys’ or girls’institute can teach boys and girls simultaneously. Before COVID-19 students were not being allowed to carry mobile phones in educational institutions so that they can’t get distracted from their studies or to incline towards any untoward, but during lockdown students got a chance to explore the world of social media by simply having a lame excuse of online classes. They close the door of theirs rooms on pretext of online classes but God knows whether they attendant the classes or not, here parents and teachers have to play an important role otherwise a minor having mobile phone throughout day may have an adverse consequences ahead.Many teachers upload videos on YouTube by choosing topics un-chronologically. Needless to say by picking random topics without taking curriculum into consideration confuses students because for topic B, topic A is prerequisite. Teachers should follow the ladder up approach rather than ladder down approach. All subjects are compulsory but more focus is given to few subjects. Math is a subject that always falls in the grey area. It reminds me a saying “A teacher which makes his subject boring is a criminal”, same thing is happening when mathematics is being taught on radio, it is a big joke with the subject as well as with the students of mathematics. Conspicuously, a classroom without walls means a classroom without a teacher and curriculum because any student can enter in the class anytime, can leave anytime, can chit-chat with classmates during the class, can do anything what he/she wants to do and a teacher can teach topics as per his/her choice. The only advantage that students and their parents are getting by these initiatives is they become tech-savvy.
( The author is a P G Student at Central University Kashmir. Views are his own, [email protected])
