Should schools resume physical education and sports activities post-reopening

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Institutional heads advocate for resumption of sports activities that support students’ fitness while maintaining safety precautions.

Healthy body for healthy mind

With schools reopening, physical education classes and sports activities should be resumed. The lockdown period has made us all indolent. We see our children getting obese, lethargic, gloomy, and dull. The only reason for this is the lack of physical activity for such a prolonged period. In the new normal, we need more physical and mental strength so as to combat the day-to-day challenges. Therefore, sports activities are a must for our children to help them face the post-pandemic situation more energetically. It will also help them to focus on their academic skills and promote holistic development as it has been rightly said that ‘a healthy body leads to a healthy mind’.

Pallavi Upadhyaya, principal, Delhi Public School, Rajnagar Extension, Ghaziabad

Sports will boost learning

With schools gradually re-opening in a staggered manner, it is of utmost importance that school leaders give sports and physical education the same priority as academics. Schools are the ideal place for a child to play as it provides safe play spaces. Moreover, due to the lockdown there has been no distinction between school time and playtime. Many experts have emphasised on the physical, emotional and mental well-being of children, especially during lockdown. The WHO recommends a minimum of 60 minutes of reasonably rigorous playtime every day for a growing child. Along with physical and mental health benefits, sports and nutrition are two elements that can boost a child’s immunity. It can also be a critical tool in blurring the line between curricular and extra-curricular activities while providing children the confidence to select their preferred pathways across the sciences, arts and vocational programmes.

Krish Iyengar, Business Head, Sportz Village Schools

Restructured sports curriculum needed

Sports plays an important role in a students’ growth and development in school life. Also, being a part of the curriculum, it brings discipline to life and teaches the value of dedication and patience. Once schools gradually restart with students attending physically, we must definitely plan for physical activities that support their fitness while maintaining COVID precautions. The activities and sports to start with, must be critically designed that allow gradual increase of exercises as the students are returning to the new normal after a long gap. The ones that are contactless and can be done with physical distancing rules such as yoga and meditation can be started. A restructured sports curriculum in a phased manner will support the schools while ensuring the safety of the students.

Anjali Bowen, principal, Ryan International School, Kandivali, Mumbai

Can battle weight issues

Exercise helps to combat many health conditions, so important during this time of the pandemic. Keeping a healthy weight is also important. We have seen our students grow over this year of online learning, not only upwards, but also outwards. I fear many of our children will return to school battling weight issues. But exercise is not just about healthy bodies, it has been proven to improve cognitive functioning. If one were to look at the top 10 skills that the World Economic Forum have suggested which will be required in 2025, many of them can be inculcated through physical education and sports – resilience, stress tolerance and flexibility; problem solving, leadership, initiative and active learning, to name a few. Add to that teamwork, collaboration and communication and one can truly understand the value of reintroducing physical education with urgency, albeit with safety protocols.

Hillary Hinchliff – principal & CEO, GEMS Modern Academy, Kochi


–As told to Rajlakshmi Ghosh



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school reopening news: Talking Point: Is blended learning-teaching troublesome for teachers

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With educational institutions reopening in a phased manner, the hybrid model of education has become a new normal, which could be a double-trouble for teachers

Teachers need to improve productivity

It becomes difficult for the teachers to manage their schedules in a blended model of education. More than technology, the problem is the multi-hybrid nature of this situation – a blend of online and offline classes, a mixture of on-campus and off-campus students, a combination of in-class and at-home teachers. The ongoing situation is creating challenges for institutions to follow a certain plan. It is best to embrace things as they are coming. Teachers will have to exponentially improve their productivity.

Ravinder Pal Singh, chief innovation and strategy officer, Rishihood University, Sonipat

Blended learning increases outreach


The blended model of teaching-learning has increased load on faculties as they have to manage two sets of students at one time. However, this format of education is a blessing in disguise as it increases outreach to those who are not able to afford costly on-campus education. Though, teachers and academic institutions need to be tech-savvy to adopt this new format. This will also be helpful to address the shortage of faculties in the institutions.

Priya Ranjan, professor, SRM University, Andhra Pradesh

Opportunity to evolve a new hybrid model


With the challenge of teaching online comes the opportunity to disrupt the traditional passive pedagogy of one-way communication from teacher to student. The dulling effects of passive pedagogy are amplified online, where students have the entire internet to distract themselves. The pandemic has compelled us to shift from passive to active learning methods in order to hold students’ attention. We have improved our ability to get students to speak, discuss, analyse, synthesise, critique, solve problems, collaborate, and express their creativity — methods that are more engaging and produce more enduring learning. By being forced online, we teachers also have sharpened the online skills that are second nature to our students. We now have an opportunity to transfer active learning methods from the virtual classroom to the physical classroom, thereby energising both. We can now evolve a new hybrid model that draws upon the best of both.

Jamshed Bharucha, founding vice chancellor, Sai University, Chennai

Hybrid model is new normal


Like in any other industry the pandemic posed challenges to the education sector too. Had it not been for resilient educators who not just rose to the challenge but emerged highly productive – it would have been a year of no education across the globe. As we inch towards resumption, our teams are now faced with the need for a hybrid teaching model. To take this head-on, teachers are well prepared with the requisite tools, strategies, and skills to deliver lessons both in-person and online. The school has worked on a blueprint that will clearly define what, how, when, and why of hybrid teaching if required. Not just the delivery of the content but we have also achieved the monitoring and evaluation of the delivery of lessons and the performance of the students effectively. As a team, we adapted to the situation by adopting effective methods of education to deliver our objectives. The hybrid model of education has started becoming a new normal and this would not be challenging from a delivery perspective for us as a leading school network.

Madhu Singh, principal, Billabong High International School, Mumbai

Juggling between online and offline is taxing


Although the teaching via online mode ensured that our operations continued unhindered even during the pandemic, there were several challenges endured by the teachers. During online teaching, it is very hard to gauge whether the students have understood their lessons or not. And to make sure that the students understand everything, involves a lot more effort. Also, no matter how advanced technology the teachers deployed for delivering their classes, some teething technical issues always hampered an otherwise smooth-flowing session. Furthermore, with the lockdown being called off and more schools open, juggling between online and offline teaching modes has been very taxing for a teacher and monitoring students through this hybrid mode is something that is not proving to be easy.

Archana Vishwanath, director, Jain Heritage School, Bangalore



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Telangana schools for Classes 6 to 8 to reopen tomorrow

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The schools in Telangana for classes 6 to 8 will be reopened on February 24 following the directions of Chief Minister K Chandrasekhara Rao. Chief secretary Somesh Kumar in a meeting held today directed the district level education monitoring committee to monitor the Covid-19 safety measures and protocols taken by the schools at the time of reopening.

The students need to wear masks, carry hand sanitisers as, without them, they will not be allowed to enter schools. The students also need to take parental permission to attend classes. Around 17.24 lakh students are likely to attend school, the government stated.

The schools in Telangana for classes 9 onwards were earlier reopened on February 1. The schools were allowed to function from 9.30 am to 4.45 pm in the districts while it was from 8.45 am to 4 pm in Hyderabad and Secunderabad.

The SSC exams in Telangana will be held from May 17, while intermediate exams from May 1.

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KV students return to physical classes, attendance highest among board classes

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After the phased reopening of the Kendriya Vidyalayas (KVs) across the country, the number of students attending the physical classes has increased. The Ministry of dedication on Monday informed that an average of 42 per cent of class 9 students, 65 per cent of class 10, about 48 per cent and 67 per cent of class 11 and 12 students, respectively have started to attend physical classes.

The number of students attending physical exams is higher in the board classes – 10th and 12th. The rest of the students, however, are attending classes online. The data is collected till February 11, informed the ministry. “These figures are dynamic and trends indicate consistent increase every day,” it added.

Read | Covid lesson for teachers: How teaching-learning methods evolved during pandemic

The reopening started with senior students. Face-to-face classes for standard 1 to 8 have also been started in some KVs where state governments have permitted to open schools for junior grades.

“Regular contact with the parents and guardians is being established by the schools in case of any apprehension from students/parents. Students are being permitted with the prior consent of their guardians,” the ministry said in an official statement. “However, for students who are not attending the school, the provision of online classes is also running. Students are also in touch with their teachers through various digital platforms,” it added.

During the pandemic, 32,247 teachers from KVs across India had conducted online classes and 7,07,312 students have benefitted from these classes, the ministry had informed earlier.

Meanwhile, Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalayas (JNVs) — the residential school of the government has started phase-wise reopening. At first, classes will only commence physically where the state government has allowed reopening schools. For classes 10 and 12 too, only students who have consent from parents will be allowed to attend the classes.

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Study points to learning loss due to Covid school closure

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In what points to a deepening of India’s learning crisis, a study by Azim Premji University has found that 92 per cent of primary school students have lost at least one language ability from the previous year during the school closure induced by Covid-19.

Mathematical abilities, too, have suffered considerable damage. According to the report released Wednesday, 82 per cent of the students in Classes 2 to 6 had lost at least one mathematical ability in the same time.

The study defines loss of language ability in the said age group as describing a picture or a personal experience orally, reading familiar words, and writing simple sentences based on a photo, among other things. Identifying single or two-digit numbers, performing basic mathematical operations and describing 2D and 3D shapes are some examples listed under the mathematical abilities the students were assessed on.

To be specific, 67 per cent of children in Class 2, 76 per cent in Class 3, 85 per cent in Class 4, 89 per cent in Class 5, and 89 per cent in Class 6 have lost at least one mathematical ability from the previous year, the study found.

In case of learning loss in language, it found that 92 per cent of children in Class 2, 89 per cent in Class 3, 90 per cent in Class 4, 95 per cent in Class 5, and 93 per cent in Class 6 have lost at least one specific ability from the previous year.

The findings are important as they confirm apprehensions of experts over the damage prolonged school closures may have inflicted. The survey assumes significance against the backdrop of the recently announced Budget for 2021-22 that has proposed a cut of Rs 5,000 crore for Samagra Shiksha Abhiyan that funds school education.

The study was conducted in January and covers 16,067 children in 1,137 public schools across 44 districts in five states -— Chhattisgarh, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan Uttarakhand.

The report emphasises that the extent and nature of learning loss are serious enough to call for action at all levels.



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