Source: Handwriting training
How much ever tech savvy the world may get, nothing compares with the good old habits of reading a physical book and handwriting. Warmth the latter conveys, especially in personal communication is second to none. Legibility then becomes an important factor, for it is necessary to transmit the message. Like everything else, skills are best learnt early in life. Nothing like starting at school. Knowing this fully well, the managements of Bengaluru schools are training their wards to write better. Another activity the pandemic has laid low, finds Kumaran P.
After the closing and reopening of schools multiple times, students have lost the touch of writing. Several schools have now started teaching writing skills for students to cope with their exams and board exams, which will be conducted compulsorily on their campuses.
Jyothi Menon, head of Ekya School ITPL, said, “Children have lost the practice and focus. They are taking a lot of time to write. Only practice will be able to help them. Their note-taking speed in the classroom has slowed down, and they are making spelling mistakes. As a priority, when they return to offline classes, we will focus on lab work and remedial classes. Increased emphasis will be on brushing up their cursive writing and being able to write in a straight line with speed. Teachers often get blank stares from children in online classes when they ask questions. There is a lack of response from the other end. When we see too much of that happening, we push students to go for remedial classes.”
Experts concede that note-taking has become difficult. Dr Sridhar G, founder of Deeksha, said, “Yes, writing and comprehension skills of students have deteriorated to an extent. There are many instances wherein the students are unable to take down notes or answer their question papers with optimal speed. Since most of the classes went online and lessons were available in video format, the practice of writing notes was adversely affected. As opposed to physical classes where the teacher ensures that the student’s hands are at work, during online classes, teachers could not monitor students’ note-taking closely. To cope with this situation, we are holding a special bridge course, which students will attend at the start of the new academic year.”
“It will refresh the fundamentals and concepts of previous classes as well as basic skills such as writing, reading, comprehension etc. This will be done prior to the teaching of the new syllabus. This should help students in catching up. The refresher course on fundamentals is particularly important for students who are entering the 12th grade as they will write their board exams and prepare for university,” added Sridhar.
Aloysius D’Mello, principal of Greenwood High International School, said, “Handwriting habits have been on the decline due to non-physical classroom learning because of the pandemic, especially in the lower age groups. Those from the higher grades have also been impacted equally owing to lesser assessments and rigour. There is slack in students picking up the handwriting habit once again due to the recent adaptation to online learning and typing over these couple of years. We did give handwritten assignments to our students regularly and encouraged them to scan and send them from time to time, so that their writing habit does not vane away.”
“Assignments with cursive writing books were given to students to overcome the lag in legitimate handwriting. There are many activity books available in bookstores and parents must invest in such books and mandate their kids to write essays and present them to the elders. There are a number of cursive writing books too that can help mend a child’s handwriting skills,” said D’Mello.
Dr. Ted Mockrish, Head of Scool, Canadian International School, Bengaluru, said, “Due to the pandemic and the subsequent need for schools to opt for online teaching, students have become more versed in digital platforms while mainly using computers, laptops, tablets and mobiles. Students became highly skilled in digital techniques and word processing during this time. While students may still have taken down notes with a pen and paper, they relied on this older form of writing less and less. Research shows that handwriting contributes to better memory retention while note-taking, and striking a balance between keyboarding and handwriting and drawing should be part of a modern classroom.
“Many students have shifted to digital resources that are more readily shared, annotated and assessed, as seen through the use of Google Classroom and Google Docs. These new technologies should be embraced. Striving to return to paper and pencil learning should not be the goal, as digital technologies are important, more efficient and faster in many cases. For instance we no longer require scriveners with perfect handwriting to copy manuscripts endlessly as this is a very 19th century skill that is now out dated.
“However, brain research on the connection between writing and memory is clear and should not be ignored. There are also concerns that students may now lack the stamina to write long board exams that still require handwritten responses. This, however, is no reason to push handwriting over keyboarding. The SAT exams, for instance, will be fully digital next year. It is likely that many other board exams will follow suit in the coming years. Instead, we should look at handwriting and keyboarding as two important tools that affect and influence the learning process and outcomes. The pen and paper is likely to be with us for some time, and their purpose in communication is still important. We should not, however, hold onto this for nostalgic reasons and instead embrace more effective means of writing when writing. The right tool for the right job!” he added.
Source: Offline Assessment
With only a month left for Board Term-II board exams, educators are happy to hold offline exams, which are the best to identify the knowledge gaps and enable students to close those gaps through improvement/compartment exams.
Sanyam Bhardwaj, controller of examinations, CBSE, says, “In the US, Missouri Board was asked if the schools could extend online classes, it discouraged online classes and asked schools to conduct in-person exams. Students planning to study abroad or looking for quality education, yearn for a competitive environment."
“Offline exams allow us to test the child’s critical thinking ability, vocabulary, writing skills, and ability to express. The government has announced that offline classes can resume with full strength, so there is no problem in conducting offline examinations,” says Bhardwaj.
On February 22, 2022, the Supreme Court had refused to entertain a plea seeking cancellation of offline board exams for classes X and XII to be conducted offline by CBSE and other boards including ICSE and National Institute of Open Schooling (NIOS). The apex court had said that its past order on postponing of examination cannot become a norm to pass same order for this academic year as well.
“Students think the real reason for exams is to grade them but the actual objective of assessment has three different perspectives. Exams are meant to assess how successful have the educators been in implementing the curriculum, the level of knowledge and skills that students have been able to grasp, and for the parents to understand the capability of the child. When the students have learnt something then the mode of assessment should not matter. When students know that they have to be assessed and they are prepared for it then how does it matter whether they are being assessed online or offline?” says Deepa Rani, head of school, Ekya School, BTM Layout, Bengaluru.
After the evaluation, teachers will be able to gauge the learning loss in the two pandemic years. “This will help to see if any kind of course correction or bridging of gaps is required. Even among those students from classes I-IX and XI, who have the option of appearing for online exams, most students are opting to appear in the offline exams," says Poonam Thakur, principal, Podar International School, Mira Road, Mumbai
The teaching and learning process may have moved online, but offline assessment remains the most authentic form of assessment yet. “The integrity of online assessments has been questionable across the globe. Given these two factors, if the focus of assessment continues to be learning, in-person assessment is the appropriate way to gauge learning,” says Sangeeta Krishnan Nag, principal, Senior School, Pathways School Gurgaon.
Mona Lisa Bal, Chairperson, KiiT International School, proffers that offline exams will be beneficial for students. “The exams will act as a leveller for self-assessment. Students who have diligently prepared and worked will be encouraged from offline exams and others will get a chance to better themselves. All necessary Covid protocols must be maintained for the offline exams.”
Source: Back to School
After the reopening of schools following the third wave of the Covid-19 outbreak, schools have allowed students the option to choose between online and offline classes. Many schools across states have reopened their campus for students, however, attending offline classes is no compulsion and online classes are also being offered. This flexibility for students, however, has put pressure on teachers.
Teachers across states claim to have been overworked and stressed. They claim that they have to prepare separate notes for both online and offline modes. Simple activities like checking notebooks, taking attendance, and queries have been doubled as some students are attending offline and some online classes at the same time.
“As the schools reopened in the hybrid mode we saw that our teachers had some difficulty in attending to both online and offline students in real-time. For example, offline students submitted their work in hard copy while online students uploaded their work, this way teachers were facing problems leading to stress," explains Dr Silpi Sahoo, Chairperson, SAI International Education Group.
Hybrid teaching has been a balancing act, says Aloysius D’mello, Principal, Greenwood High International School. “We have to redo our lesson plans and classes modifying teaching styles continuously to meet the requirements of students who still prefer online classes and those preferring physical classrooms," he says.
D’mello adds that hybrid takes more time from teachers. Especially, when teaching complex theories, it becomes a challenge. “We are essentially teaching two types of classes - we have to write lessons that work for in-person instruction and ones that work for online classes," says he.
Giving equal attention to both online and offline students at the same time may be challenging at times, says Amandeep Kaur, Teacher, Pacific World School. “Children who are in school seek complete focus of their mentor and are bubbling with energy, which was curtailed for almost two years, whereas children whose parents have still opted for online mode may feel that spark of personal interaction missing along with technical glitches. Hence, ensuring optimum utilisation of class’s time for constructive learning outcome becomes a task at times," says Kaur.
Reworking the lesson plans to allot activities effectively - to online and offline classes could be challenging at times and needed one to be creative, believes, Moitreyee Bose, Middle School, Social Science Teacher, Ekya School, BTM. “Planning resource use sustainably, such as printing out worksheets and using other materials. Breaking out of the inertia of only online or offline. However, well-planned steps have helped us maneuver our way through these challenges, says she.
While most of the school administrations and even parents understand the pressure of dealing with an online and offline class strength simultaneously they are not willing to discontinue the flexibility of offering a hybrid learning model. Many schools have started offering counseling and support to teachers.
“It is important to understand that educational models like hybrid learning and blended learning are here to stay. The challenges of adaptation vis-à-vis the new modes of teaching-learning can be attributed to the lack of streamlined systems," says Dr Sridhar G, Founder, Deeksha.
Organising counseling sessions for teachers by industry experts can be helps, says Dr Sahoo. It can help deal with the workload of the teachers on handling both offline and online classes. “Teachers are happy to have got IT exposure which has widened their learning horizons and has given a new dimension to teaching and learning. It helped teachers advance their skills in the curriculum implementation, policy, education systems, and leadership with the support of their institutions," adds she.